Dawntrail character graphics update - opinions, requests and discussion megathread

[ConantSivrha]

Personally I do like the new teeth. One of my biggest petpeeves before was how pronounced the teeth were but I quess it's a matter of taste.

I sometimes thought the outlines between the teeth (pre-Dawntrail) were a bit too dark, which could make the teeth look like they’re too far apart or too small. However, the new teeth look unnaturally white and unshaded. Overall, I found the pre-Dawntrail teeth less distracting. In my opinion, the new ones look unrealistic to the point of being offputting, and they draw too much attention to the broken lighting inside of characters’ mouths because they’re so blindingly white to start with.

[Kaziek]

I sometimes thought the outlines between the teeth (pre-Dawntrail) were a bit too dark, which could make the teeth look like they’re too far apart or too small. However, the new teeth look unnaturally white and unshaded. Overall, I found the pre-Dawntrail teeth less distracting. In my opinion, the new ones look unrealistic to the point of being offputting, and they draw too much attention to the broken lighting inside of characters’ mouths because they’re so blindingly white to start with.

The lack of baked in fake shadows is really distracting in a lot of places. I agree that both versions of the teeth aren't the greatest, but the new ones are pretty disappointing when they look as off as they do considering they were just updated compared to a decade old asset.

[nattherat]

Hi, I made a forum account just for this like many others, because I'd desperately like the dev team to see all and further feedback on this update. I'm trying to word things reasonably and calmly, but I'm definitely upset about what's been done to my character. I have a few reasons for unsubbing at this time, but this is probably the largest one as even when other content might not be for me, I'd still ordinarily be able to wander the world and roleplay my character. This isn't possible any more, with how much she has been changed.

Apologies, I have to split this into multiple posts.

I spent many hours collating these images, and I've done my very best to have them from the same angle, same frame in an animation, same lighting direction, even the same location in Black Shroud. These are exactly the same character, I have had the character appearance saved since Heavensward, so all the same options with the sole exception of forgetting to put lipstick on some of the DT ones (however I'm not bringing up lipstick, so I feel this is irrelevant). I really hope these actually show up and this post gets seen as a result.

I want to bring up Lalafell, because I don't feel I see enough lalafell feedback but the changes are extreme and in some cases unacceptable. I believe most of these issues, likely the same as other races, stem from making all heads based on a Hyur head. But I'm not playing Hyur, I'm playing Lalafell, and squishing and stretching a Hyur face into a Lalafell face is a horrible solution that does a disservice to unique races.

First, general/overall structural changes:

Front angle. I've listed on the image everything that is inconsistent between the two, but also made exaggerated doodles to try and help get the feedback across any and all language barrier.
The zodiac stone change is especially bizarre to me. Why is it so much smaller now? That's important to my character, it's the whole reason I enabled that feature. Please restore it to it's original size. The worst issues are the nose and lips, but I appreciate that they're harder to see from this angle/lighting (thank you at least for making dark-skinned characters actually visible now).


The changes to the facial structure become far more apparent at different angles, where my forehead has been inflated, and the tiny pursed lips and strange shrunken hyur nose are more obvious. The entire bridge area has changed. I should have mentioned it in the image, but you can also see how extremely the chin changed here too, which I go more into on the next post.


To demonstrate this further, here's a top view. Lalafellin noses were very stylised, a very anime shape, and had a really smooth transition from cheek to bridge. Now they have this hyur nose slapped on.

1/3

[nattherat]

Now for more emote-based stuff:

From another angle and getting into emotes. Sorry for anyone getting bored of me talking about the hyur nose. I'm showing it from every angle to prove that this isn't just some cherry-picked bad angle, it's a legitimate severe change to the mesh. Same for the mouth/lips. This adorable satisfied smile she pulled when stretching has been changed out to a kind of strained fake smile thanks to the smaller mouth and no lips.


More emote issues due to the much smaller mouth (why was the widest mouth option shrunk anyway?). The cheeks are quite swollen looking, and whilst the teeth are an improvement over the DT benchmark (yes I remember the dolphin teeth), they're still too narrow for the skull. I don't think the ears are the worst but one of the reasons I'm pointing them out is because that amount of complexity is completely at odds with the lalafellin look. They don't have that many contours on their entire body, yet here's their ears with a higher poly count than the whole rest of the lalafell would ever need.


Presumably because we are basically all hyur now, I noticed an issue across several races in that if we previously had an overbite/receeded chin, this has now been changed. Regardless of whether you think an overbite is a bad thing or not... an overbite is what my character had! This is a huge fundamental change to her jaw structure. This also highlights the same strange brow distortion other people have noticed, where the brow bone casts dramatic triangular shadows that don't match what the actual eyebrows are doing.


The same emote from another angle. Wow has this one lost all emotion. The character is now bored, whereas previously she looked on the verge of tears.

2/3

[nattherat]

I now want to show female Elezen, because a lot of the same issues here are exactly the same as the lalafell.

The nose has been made more narrow, and the lips have completely changed shape. Very notably, the cheeks have become swollen/the jaw has been moved.


Like lalafell, the shape of the nose has been changed, as well as the shape of the lips, and jaw has been pulled foward to remove the overbite.


Just as with lalafell, the brow bone does not correspond with the eyebrows like it used to, leading to bits of shading on the forehead. The cheek-swelling/jaw shifting is also apparent here.


Quality control-wise, I also wanted to bring up these. Dunesfolk eyes look really really bad close up. Jagged eyelashes, some very strange misaligned and overly reflective bit in the iris, blurry muddy sclera, and the pores are horrifically oversized. I really don't think pores should be on them at all, again they're not hyurs, but if they're going to be on there you can't just stretch the hyur normal map onto them. They need them made properly.

There are many smaller issues that all compound, but I think the main issue with lalafell, and I suspect most races, is this: My stylised lalafellin features have been removed and replaced with a weird squished hyur. It's genuinely distressing. I'm not a lalafell anymore, I'm a mutated Hyur.

At this point, I'm not sure how this can be realistically be fixed if all races now have to be based on a hyur mesh. So by now I'd actually be happy with a toggle for old graphics, with a confirmation that I just can't watch any DT-and-onwards cutscenes or something. I just want my character back.

That said, as disappointed as I have been, I do want to stay positive, and I thank the dev team for at least acknowledging this thread and the feelings players have had. I hope these images come in useful, and... if the August update brings news that reassures me, maybe I'll resub.

Thank you everyone for this thread, I really hope everyone gets what they need to feel happy with their characters again!

3/3

[MagicMush00]

Watching a lot of these comparison images, from midlander to lalafell and elezen, it seems for some reason, they decided to position the mouths higher up on the models...
I don't see the reason for such a weird change.

[Iscah]

I need to check all of my characters for the brow not lining up with the brow ridge. I was saying the other day that I'd just realised it was happening on my face-4 male Miqo'te but maybe it's widespread. There was definitely someone a few pages back who also had the eye socket shadow creeping above the eyebrow line, and IIRC that was a female Highlander.

[HeyMcFly]

snip

Them removing the lalafell lip fullness is a crime
I almost unsubbed bc I've grown to love my lala over the years- there literally was zero reason to give them thin lips, and the "small" change was quite drastic and not a good one.
Not to mention the "eyeshadow" in DT looks bad because it's so grey in tone & very unfinished

[faiarrow]

Oh my gods...

So one of the f!elezen faces got to keep the coloured pupils, just like m!roe face 2 and f!highlander face 4 while all femroe faces got destroyed with black pupils that shadow 2/3rds of the eye.

Also the hyurification of lala noses is a crime tbh; I understand the goal is streamlining for expressions but with all the issues with those as it is and general loss of racial traits in non-hyur races it is just awful. I genuinely would like to know what quality control was done because right now it feels like the entire playerbase is having to beta test something.

[justausername]

While I'm a big fan over all of the update, I do see some changes in some of the faces. My characters EB husband is a m!elezen and even though my friend didn't change his mouth shape at all, it changed a lot. He's face 2. I haven't had a chance to log into my own m!elezen since launch, but as one who was also face 2, I'm a little worried about it.
A lot of changes I have seen people freaking out over have been extremely subtle, or related to lighting and expected just because of quality. However, there are some that are completely different. I do think some of those should be returned closer to original shape.