Dawntrail character graphics update - opinions, requests and discussion megathread

[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.

[Astronis]

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

The settings can never be exactly the same, because Dawntrail changed the lighting in the entire game. It's very likely that people who had portraits they liked in EW will need to adjust them in DT because of this, to take better advantage of those changes.

Frankly, in my opinion, I prefer the eyes on the Dawntrail version of your character. They don't look so cartoony and artificial. I do think her expression looks a little different, perhaps moving the light source a smidge would help with that.

My character has smaller eyes than yours, more deep-set, more shadowed by nature of being a male Highlander, and whether or not you agree, I think the new eyes are a vast improvement--the color is visible, he doesn't look slightly cross-eyed anymore, his eyes are more legible, more defined by the actual eyes rather than the single absurdly strong catchlight.

[GreenLeafy]

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The comparison between you two is crazy because the dullness/darkness that Astronis had in his eyes in EW is something that Kryseis ended up receiving POST update - he got the clearer view of the eyes that she had in EW lmao. Just these two posts alone show the absolute lack of quality control across the board to make everyone get a good update evenly.
I genuinely have no clue how you look at the picture of Kryseis' character in DT and say its clearer when it literally carries all the things you disliked about your character in EW.

[Doopliss]

The settings can never be exactly the same, because Dawntrail changed the lighting in the entire game. It's very likely that people who had portraits they liked in EW will need to adjust them in DT because of this, to take better advantage of those changes.

I actually think a problem with the portrait system is that the lighting hasn't been adjusted for Dawntrail. A lot--if not all?--of the "eye texture flatness" tends to be shown via portrait screenshots, versus the overworld. It's possible to make them look okay in certain poses, but in some others it's actually not possible to get the portrait lighting to hit the eyes just right. I haven't had problems personally on my Elezen, but I have experienced it on some other characters and haven't been able to fix it at all without limiting the poses I can take their portraits in. Overall, this is a wordy way of me saying I think (well, I hope) it is something that should be easy to fix without actually displeasing anyone.

Of course, I think this is a different issue from them messing with the color balance on some races' eye options, and don't mean to dismiss anyone concerned about that.

I do think her expression looks a little different, perhaps moving the light source a smidge would help with that.

Sorry, I'm also just taking this quote to give some more spotlight to that user's face option because it is an unpopular one. This is nothing against you, lol.

I just wanted to say that her expression looks a little different because they fundamentally changed how ♀ Highlander Face 2's eyes are to a degree that feels a little too extreme to me, and I don't even use the face. I really do hope that is something that gets fixed.

Another user--Aimed--posted this image as a really good example to show how drastically that face specifically got hit:

In fairness, they did raise the upper eyelid a little bit since the initial benchmark release, but the eye shapes on this face are still pretty fundamentally different... They took away the rounded, friendly feeling they used to have.

[eohippus]

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.

early poster, to the point I posted when the first bench dropped. I still feel pretty awful. I don't gpose or rerun content or old cutscenes like I used to. I'm really struggling with my hyur's skin either looking too washed out (as it did with his pre-fantasia skin color) or too dark (as it does now), but there's no options in between to switch to. basically he only looks ok during the golden hour in certain locations. He also is so. so. shiny. all the time. I miss his round eyes, and his old lip shape, old smile, and when his skin wasn't mottled. It hasn't gotten any better over time. Its hard not to feel like they specifically made all the male hyur models "more masculine" in a way that lost so much of my character's appearance. I miss him a lot! I'm holding off on even buying glams for him during the sale because I dont want to if he has to look like this forever.
That said, I AM hopeful for the update to fix or revert a lot of these issues! And checking in the forumns has made me feel a little less insane for feeling so awful lol

[CidHeiral]

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.

Personally I think the right side looks much more natural but as Doopliss mentioned, the portrait lighting isn't the best example.

Here is an image I made for some feedback about a lip issue with the face I use.



The whites of the eyes look plenty white to me even though all these images are in shadow. They're a little extra shadowed on the upper part of the eye but that makes sense given that there's an upper eyelid and a brow hanging over them. That is how I would expect light to work and it adds depth. Everyone is entitled to their opinion but I'm really not seeing how these eyes could be considered dead, soulless, grey, "black holes," etc.

But again, I'm not trying to argue about it or review the eyes of every player in the game. Everyone should leave whatever feedback they feel is appropriate.

The settings can never be exactly the same, because Dawntrail changed the lighting in the entire game. It's very likely that people who had portraits they liked in EW will need to adjust them in DT because of this, to take better advantage of those changes.

Frankly, in my opinion, I prefer the eyes on the Dawntrail version of your character. They don't look so cartoony and artificial. I do think her expression looks a little different, perhaps moving the light source a smidge would help with that.

My character has smaller eyes than yours, more deep-set, more shadowed by nature of being a male Highlander, and whether or not you agree, I think the new eyes are a vast improvement--the color is visible, he doesn't look slightly cross-eyed anymore, his eyes are more legible, more defined by the actual eyes rather than the single absurdly strong catchlight.

100%

[Astronis]

The comparison between you two is crazy because the dullness/darkness that Astronis had in his eyes in EW is something that Kryseis ended up receiving POST update - he got the clearer view of the eyes that she had in EW lmao. Just these two posts alone show the absolute lack of quality control across the board to make everyone get a good update evenly.
I genuinely have no clue how you look at the picture of Kryseis' character in DT and say its clearer when it literally carries all the things you disliked about your character in EW.

I don't think it's *clearer*, and I can see why, in the portraits, it would be an issue. Those things are *small*. The readability is certainly better in the EW version of Khryseis's portrait, but I prefer the look in the DW version, mostly because I know that the portraits are very small and limited and I'm thinking of how it would look outside it. If the whole game was just the portraits, my opinion might be different.

I actually think a problem with the portrait system is that the lighting hasn't been adjusted for Dawntrail. A lot--if not all?--of the "eye texture flatness" tends to be shown via portrait screenshots, versus the overworld. It's possible to make them look okay in certain poses, but in some others it's actually not possible to get the portrait lighting to hit the eyes just right. I haven't had problems personally on my Elezen, but I have experienced it on some other characters and haven't been able to fix it at all without limiting the poses I can take their portraits in. Overall, this is a wordy way of me saying I think (well, I hope) it is something that should be easy to fix without actually displeasing anyone.

Partly, yeah probably. It looks to be a pretty limited system, and it's entirely possible I'm wrong and the lighting didn't change in the portrait system, which could cause problems, too. In any event, it's not the eye materials that need to be changed if there is an issue that pretty much only shows itself in the portrait system.

That's quite a lot of difference in those comparisons! You know what's really interesting about them, though--the amount and shape of the actual visible eyeball looks almost the same from before and after, but the outside of the eyelids are so very different that it changes our perceptions of how open the eyes are. Subtle things making a big difference. I do hope people get options for things like that--some of the "after" eye are quite pretty, but I wouldn't have wanted to lose the original shape for them.

[CuteBucket]

I don't think I can adequately express how rough the past two months have been for me without divulging that I'm autistic and this game is (well... perhaps was) my special interest, and perhaps the stereotypical dislike of change has something to do with my refusal to fantasia. I used to play daily for hours, delving into any and every piece of content I could, racking up hundreds of days of playtime without ever getting burned out in the slightest. And now? It's not the game I fell in love with, that I devoted years to. Now, on days I don't have raid? I don't even log on. And raid days I'm on for the duration of raid and nothing more, no dailies, weeklies or achievement hunting. I haven't found anything to fill the void and occupy the extra time I have on my hands now either, so I have plenty of time to ruminate on why it feels so wrong.

Suffice to say... If I could 'vote with my wallet' without causing problems for my friends, I definitely would.

You're not alone, I resonate with this so much. I have been trying to find other ways to occupy my time, but...I've just been feeling really depressed and stressed ever since Dawntrail dropped. I really didn't think both the story AND the graphical update would be this bad. One was already bad. But both? It feels like I've lost something dear to me. I've been experiencing grief and mourning something lost. This game has brought me so much joy and allowed me to make friends all over the world that I would have never met without it. I have difficulty going to events with lots of people and travelling is a nightmare, but this game allowed me to overcome those limitations and make new friends. It gave me a bigger social life than I ever had before. I don't want to lose that community. But when both of my WoLs look all wrong to the point I can't even gpose to relax like I used to without just getting sad and frustrated, it kills my motivation to log in and play.