Dawntrail character graphics update - opinions, requests and discussion megathread

[Khryseis_Astra]

I wonder what happened to the people that posted early on in the thread when DT first launched. Have you guys gotten used to the changes or has the graphics update just demotivated you from logging in whatsoever?
I ask because it looks like a lot of people didn't fanta into something else despite their grievances. Not trying to antagonize or belittle anyone; disliking the update is totally valid. Just curious where you all stand 2 months later.

Fantasia really doesn’t offer any solution to the problem, unfortunately. I really gave it a shot, but the issues my Hyurs have aren’t things that can be adjusted through the settings… the philtrum is overemphasized with all Highlander mouths, the upper lip is reduced and/or reshaped on most races and faces, the whites of the eyes aren’t as bright anymore and so the eyes don’t pop as much as they should, the shapes of the eyes have all been changed, the Midlander eyes all look like they have bags under them, the facial trait (not face paint) eyeshadow/eyeliner is either on or off so no way of adjusting the intensity of it…

I’m really hoping to see at least the mouths (including the philtrims) and eyes (both shapes and the brightness of the whites) fixed across the board… I could force myself to get used to the rest, but the eyes and mouth are vital to the way emotes look on a character. Seeing the post a few pages back about the mesh, I think that could be responsible for a lot of issues, since many faces seem like they got pinched in to a central point.

For now, I just don’t play on my alts as much anymore… at least my Lala main is close enough to herself that I can ignore some of the issues for the most part. But I’d still be happier if they fixed her mouth too.

[Asteri]

I wonder what happened to the people that posted early on in the thread when DT first launched. Have you guys gotten used to the changes or has the graphics update just demotivated you from logging in whatsoever?

o/ Early poster about FemRa Face 2!

At the start of DT, I fanta'ed briefly to change my eye shape to try and get something closer to what I had, but both the eye shape I previously used and new eye shape I tried were so different from my EW eye shape, and to be completely honest, just knowing that I had changed it entirely bothered me. I ended up using a second Fantasia to swap back and have lived with my dislike since.

I've mostly made peace with the eye shape, but the lips still bother me daily and I have no option to fanta to. They're so much more narrow, differently shaped, missing the Face 2 dimples I so loved... If Square can at least improve the lips, I'll live with the rest.

I've got my bug report as Accepted still, and waiting with bated breath on the update for the graphical changes announced (maybe tomorrow?), but yeah... Still struggling with my FemRa Face 2. :')

[poooman]

ive been lurking this thread pretty much since it popped up, just havent said anything because my characters came out honestly perfectly fine (main is a face 1 miqo M, most of my alts are hrothgar), but some of yall really got shafted BAD. idk if its just because there's a lot of passionate players of them, but man it feels like femra got the shortest end of the stick. the changes are very obvious to me as someone who DOESNT like fem au ra, and spends basically no time at all staring at them lol, so take that as you will. femroe also got butchered really badly.

a lot of the changes that i hate come down to... just the lips really. they all look drawn on and glossy even when lipstick is off. the eyes dont look great either, the shadow is way too dark and makes it hard to see the eye colour. i honestly liked the borderline glowing iris when using brighter colour options, and the way theyve been toned down makes characters that used to have it feel almost lifeless. also the catchlights just... look bad imo. 'buh buh realistic' it looks bad. BUT ! there are some changes i DO really like; personally, im a bigger fan of the new face 4 miqo m, but i understand its a big change to those that liked it before. i just wish it was new options instead of replacing what was there.

i get im biased by being an artist and chronic hater of when games put technical specs and graphical quality over stylization and, yknow, actually making things Look Nice. but the shift towards what seems to be more semi-realism is not it. the characters are too stylized for it to work. i dont want to see my characters every pore and skin texture, i dont want to see every detail on his face, i just want it to look... good?
(also while this isnt character appearance criticism, i just want the game to run well. it doesnt. i cant afford a high spec fancy pants pc, nor do i want one because im a casual gamer, and i know many people who can barely play anymore because of this. just... at least let me disable more things in the settings. no other game makes my computer this hot)

whining wall of text done, i'm not saying anything new here at all, just tossing my hat in the ring to say what everyone else is saying: for the love of god just revamp character creation

quick edit: also the teeth. theyre so white. holy shit. jumpscare

[Aurumis]

the shortest end of the stick are the male miqo'te face 4 eyes 3 and I am not moving from there, thought there are also other faces that got very very changed, all the new changes should have been added as new customizations, changing the characters was THE WORST IDEA. Devs, really, what the fuck were you thinking? Why change the faces instead of just upgrading the textures and lights and such? why? Why not add new features for customization instead of erasing how our characters looked?

[noumen0nn]

but the shift towards what seems to be more semi-realism is not it. the characters are too stylized for it to work. i dont want to see my characters every pore and skin texture, i dont want to see every detail on his face, i just want it to look... good?

100% this. The artstyle in which XIV was created does not lend itself at all to realism, and trying to head in that direction was the wrong choice. It would be like if you took a classic, stylized anime like Sailor Moon, and overlayed realistic pore textures over all the skin and drew veins in all the eyes (I'm exaggerating obviously but you get the point). And what bugs me is, you don't *need* to head toward realism in order to up the graphics of a game. Guilty Gear Strive, Monster Hunter Rise, TotK, just to name a few, are all visually stunning games with distinct art directions, and none of them accomplished it by making sure to over-render every single wrinkle of every character's face.

[CidHeiral]

I think it's important to also state your character's race and character creation parts when saying things like this. You may be right but I don't think it's a true blanket statement for every race/option/maybe even color of eyes/etc.

I have yet to see a comparison where the old eyes look better than the new ones so I would say the upgrade is universal, but I concede there could be some niche graphical error I'm not aware of. However my feedback isn't really aimed at that, it's more toward the general "new eyes are soulless revert to the old eyes" feedback. The old vacant, lifeless eyes always bothered me and I would strongly prefer not to go back to that.

While I agree that the totally-pure-white eyes could look out of place in the new graphics, one look at the state of character portraits should be enough to see that eyes look terrible right now. They are dark grey and dead, and need some touching up

I'd have to disagree. I think they look fine, but to each their own.

The pure white sclera and radioactively glowing iris would absolutely look ridiculous now as they did prior to 7.0. Between that and their overly defined teeth the pre-7.0 characters remind me of the villain from Who Framed Roger Rabbit.



I'm not here to argue about it though I just want to let the devs know not everyone is in agreement on this "soulless eyes" feedback. I have no reason to push back on feedback for features that don't effect me but eye changes generally effect everyone. The last time they addressed that same feedback they turned up the catchlights to a degree that looks quite bad, in my opinion.

[Cyrtip]

I wonder what happened to the people that posted early on in the thread when DT first launched. Have you guys gotten used to the changes or has the graphics update just demotivated you from logging in whatsoever?
I ask because it looks like a lot of people didn't fanta into something else despite their grievances. Not trying to antagonize or belittle anyone; disliking the update is totally valid. Just curious where you all stand 2 months later.

I didn't get used to the changes, I threw a mask on every single one of my gearsets so I wouldn't have to see the face. I looked at what limited option we have via fantasia, and none of them solved the problems I had with the update, so I'm stuck with what I've got...
It isn't solely the graphics update that's demotivated me from logging in, but its one of the big three. The character I played is a different person, the only four jobs I liked had changes ranging from ruined garbage I will never play again to simplification that just makes them boring now, and the new chapter in FFXIV's MSQ is the worst story I have ever played in a videogame. Adding on to the first point, the new graphics and lighting have also retroactively ruined playing any of the old MSQ again, because the mood lighting is gone, characters look like imperfect clones, and emotes look downright uncanny, so even though I've wanted to replay the old story again I've held off from doing it.
I used to spend most of my free time playing FFXIV, trying every single piece of content in the game, even achievement hunting. Now, I only log in twice weekly to play savage with friends, and a third time for tomes (Which consists of going AFK at an aetheryte waiting for a hunt train to begin, while playing a different game), and I'll stop doing that when I have enough for a single job's BiS.

[Astronis]

I wonder what happened to the people that posted early on in the thread when DT first launched. Have you guys gotten used to the changes or has the graphics update just demotivated you from logging in whatsoever?
I ask because it looks like a lot of people didn't fanta into something else despite their grievances. Not trying to antagonize or belittle anyone; disliking the update is totally valid. Just curious where you all stand 2 months later.

I'm not the exact audience for this question, but I'll answer from my perspective of someone who has been following this while every now and again coming back to say how much I love the updates--now that it's been two months, I am still very happy with the changes and I can't look at my old screenshots from EW without cringing a bit. The old graphics always had some issues I didn't like that have been fixed or vastly improved by the DT update, and now those issues just stand out to me even more in my old screenshots. So, yeah, I've gotten used to the change, but I loved it from the start so it wasn't difficult to do. My WoL now looks much more like he was always supposed to look, but that 2.0-6.0 was unable to portray.

I have yet to see a comparison where the old eyes look better than the new ones so I would say the upgrade is universal, but I concede there could be some niche graphical error I'm not aware of. However my feedback isn't really aimed at that, it's more toward the general "new eyes are soulless revert to the old eyes" feedback. The old vacant, lifeless eyes always bothered me and I would strongly prefer not to go back to that.

Yeah, overall, the new eyes look bloody fantastic. The new materials and the lighting put more life into them than they've ever had. That said, I can see people having some issues with the limbal rings on au ra since they look to be done differently so the glow effect can be overwhelming and also weird when it's a 'glow' around a dark color, or some Sunseeker miqo'te eyes, it's a little hard to see the slit pupil on some faces. Just the base materials though, I can't get enough of how amazing they look. It's been two months and I am still stopping to look at everyone's eyes because I love what they did so much.

[CidHeiral]

Yeah, overall, the new eyes look bloody fantastic. The new materials and the lighting put more life into them than they've ever had. That said, I can see people having some issues with the limbal rings on au ra since they look to be done differently so the glow effect can be overwhelming and also weird when it's a 'glow' around a dark color, or some Sunseeker miqo'te eyes, it's a little hard to see the slit pupil on some faces. Just the base materials though, I can't get enough of how amazing they look. It's been two months and I am still stopping to look at everyone's eyes because I love what they did so much.

Totally agree, I love the new eyes. I haven't seen the specific racial eye issues you're referring to but I have no problem with things like that being addressed. I just don't think they should wholesale revert or try to emulate the general features of the "no thoughts head empty" eyes from pre-7.0 which apply to everyone.

[Khryseis_Astra]

Totally agree, I love the new eyes. I haven't seen the specific racial eye issues you're referring to but I have no problem with things like that being addressed. I just don't think they should wholesale revert or try to emulate the general features of the "no thoughts head empty" eyes from pre-7.0 which apply to everyone.

This is an example of the eyes for my Highlander…



Left is EW, right is DT. Exact same portrait settings.

There’s no brightness to the eyes anymore, the whites seem too gray and dull, and the new eyeshadow (facial trait, not paint) has been darkened and overpowers them, but she looks bare without it. The eyes used to pop out, now they look like black holes. Add to that the redrawn upper lip and nose, and heavily pronounced philtrum, and her facial expressions look totally different now.

I think the races/faces with larger eyes get mostly better, although I think the luminosity of the eye color was better in the first benchmark, but on a face like this where very little of the white part of the eye shows, for it not to be white anymore really changes the look. And I’ve also noticed on some faces, the position of the eyeball itself seems changed, which is also very noticeable in emotes and cutscenes.