Dawntrail character graphics update - opinions, requests and discussion megathread

[Crystalenya]

I’m not typically a forum poster, but after reading (skimming) all 59 pages I felt there wasn’t nearly enough mention of Au Ra limbal rings. So, here’s my feedback:

Above is a crop of a goose I took at some point before the update. Below is what I compromised on after burning the free fantasia and finally giving up on the new rings.



And here’s my journey as to why I simply gave up on limbal rings (one of Au Ras’ defining features).

The ring is now a gradient that overlays the eye, going from opaque at the outside and fading to transparent. Previously it was a hard edged ring.



Given the changes in the iris and pupil, losing a bit of gloss in the update, adding this extra hazy overlay only makes the eye that much more lifeless.

I was going to simply deal with that until I got into low light situations what I found the rings now have a demonic emissive glow!



I had already used my free fantasia to lighten her overall eye color to try to get back to pre-7.0 vibes, but when I could finally no longer stand the glowing eyes, I bought a fantasia and I’m now a very saddened Miqo. I miss my Au Ra, but her eyes were her window to her soul, and they’re shattered now. If I’m going to play a character I don’t recognize, I might as well play one that doesn’t leave me with bitterness and longing for days gone by…

Thank you so so much for this. I thought I was going crazy and I was the only one seeing it, nearly no one talks about this.
Literally what you said, Limba makes the eyes lifeless during daytime lightning while a demonic-glow appears during night.

What bothered me the most is the vast inconsistency between how the eyes with Limba rings look during Day and Night

[Holt9]

Hi all,

I have encountered issues with Dllss and overall quality graphics update.
My system is good to run this on max, but max graphics making this worse.
Here is image below for your interest, hope this gets fixed soon.

https://imgur.com/a/JyxfjoP

[aiqa]

Hi all,

I have encountered issues with Dllss and overall quality graphics update.
My system is good to run this on max, but max graphics making this worse.
Here is image below for your interest, hope this gets fixed soon.

https://imgur.com/a/JyxfjoP

The game stops camera jitter during cutscenes, which breaks DLSS.

[FateweaverAlpha]

Howdy all. First time I've ever used these forums. I play on PS5 for reference but I figured I'd post my Duskwight Elezen fella cause the changes to him are pretty drastic and I'm wondering what happened...
I wasn't able to grab many before pics as IRL got in the way and when I got back the update was in progress. I never got to see him in the benchmark being a PS5 player. I managed to scrape together a before and after image and gif using his old and new Bard portrait which shows exactly how bad it is.

Black Cloak is his Endwalker graphics, Red Cloak is his Dawntrail Graphics.



I used Face 2, Jaw 4, Eyes 3, Eyebrows 4, Nose 4, Mouth 1, and Ear Shape 1.

From what I can personally see his cheekbones have been lessened by a lot, while his lower jaw is larger between the ear and the chin, his eyebrows seem to have changed shape and placement, his lips almost always look like he's tiredly smiling now (when he isn't using his annoyed emote), his eyes have changed shape drastically (he always had a annoyed emote in his portraits cause that's his usual mood), and gotten bigger with very dark under eye bags, and his skin is very waxy/wet in appearance.
His nose is the least changed from what I can tell and I can live with that but the rest of all this changes him so much that I've been completely unable to play him. Tried several different combos of facial parts and nothing works.

[DPZ2]

snip

It was nice that you combined the two images. Most of what you've been describing are not changes in shape or size, but in shading - in lighting itself. I can literally put my thumb to the upper and lower portion of your eyes and note that there is no change. Same with the contour and length of the jaw.

I have to say that the lips of the original have more of a "smile" to them than the new version. Most of that is due to lack of shading on the face of the original.

I've noticed a certain sheen to the skin of my own avatar (who has pretty close to the skin coloring of your avatar). Under most circumstances, the sheen is not there. It's definitely not the sheen we get with wet skin though I've yet to determine what lighting is necessary to produce it.

It may take a bit of time to get used to the changes. Or not. I haven't used a Fantasia on my avatar since he was created nearly 10 years ago (anniversary coming up this fall). Based on other MMORPGs I've played with graphics changes, WoW Cataclysm comes to mind, I know I'll grow used to any changes in the next two to three months. I'm sorrowed that your avatar, who I consider good-looking in both incarnations, has become a cause of dissatisfaction.

[pompompom]

Her face feels completely different to me! I used a fantasia to switch to Viera, but it's just not the same. I miss my wonderful highlander girl.

I tried to make some comparison photos. I couldn't replicate everything 1:1, because I already used the fantasia to switch to Viera, so I made an alt with the highlander face.

These are the 7.0 graphics.


These are 6.x graphics. I wish the images were a bit more HQ, but I was playing on a PS4 in those days, so they'll have to do.

The biggest difference I can see is that my wol's nose now looks smaller. The length of her philtrum looks longer. It's not flattering.
In the older graphics, she had slightly dark shadows under eyes - and it looked great! I loved those shadows. In the new graphics, it looks like she applied way too much concealer, and in a color that's way too light. The shadows added a lot of dimension to her face.
I wish I could be more specific, but finally, the new graphics make my wol look younger and softer. Which isn't really what I wanted when I chose to play a highlander, you know? She used to be beautiful, mature, kind of scary. And now she looks like a callow high school girl. Like she's been replaced by a much younger sister.

Also, this is my subjective opinion, but I preferred it when she looked dead-eyed. The sparkles are a bit too much.

I hope these comparison pictures explain why the graphic update hasn't been great for me.

[Mouthbone]

I love how my roe turned out, but my elezen alt feels so rough...
Her lips used to be more defined and glossy, her expression was more pronounced, her skin looked beautiful and her nose was cute
The new lips are less defined and juicy, she barely emotes, the skin looks off and her nose grew twice in size
Old:

New:


Fem elezen in general feel much less expressive, for example look at /smile:

and compare it to a straight face:

Why is she wincing and not smiling? It's so bizarre...

I don't know what went wrong during the yassification process, but to say I am disappointed is to say nothing
How did your fem elezen weather the update?

[Moonfallen]

Besides the animations for emotes being slightly different, I noticed that the run and sprint animation for F miqo'te is also slightly different than before. It was bothering me for a bit and I couldn't quite put my finger on it until I started to watch my character run and sprint more closely. The animation is slightly different/off than what it was in EW.

[Jaynair]

Hi all,

I have encountered issues with Dllss and overall quality graphics update.
My system is good to run this on max, but max graphics making this worse.
Here is image below for your interest, hope this gets fixed soon.

https://imgur.com/a/JyxfjoP

I am having the same issue with my RTX 3060 on max

Thanks for making me feel that I have not lost my mind

[Brian25]

This reminds me of when WoW updated their character models and people whined and whined, and nothing was ever done about it and they moved on.

I'm sorry people but they aren't going to revert the graphics engine update because your eyebrows look slightly different and your ear textures were improved.