Dawntrail character graphics update - opinions, requests and discussion megathread

[Iscah]

lSo of course I finally won it. I finally won a home for my character after years, but my character isn’t my character anymore. Now I can’t just let my account go dormant while I wait to see if they improve things, or else I lose the house I’ve been trying to get forever. Just miserable.

You can still go semi-dormant. Let your sub lapse, enter the house on the last day so the timer is reset, stay unsubbed for 40+ days and come back for one month. Repeat until the devs have good news for us.

[lunartears]

i think i understand what you mean? the contrast on the texture feels much higher, with darker darks and brighter brights. this ends up making it feel like the ONLY place the colour shows up is in that bottom ring under the pupil, rather than it being the entire thing. while, yes a very minimal change in the grand scheme of things, clearly it makes a big enough difference for people to notice. my main has very dark red eyes, and before the update i could see that hint of red in most lighting, but now its like theyre pure black unless the sun is right in his eyes...
sunseeker eyes feel like the easiest to notice the difference on, maybe because the bright eyes were very fitting for their theme, and letting the thinner pupil shine. but i definitely see it.

i also definitely agree with the eyes looking off in darker lightings. sometimes they just look glossy in a way that also ends up cloudy? if this makes any sense. again, i use a very dark eye colour, so its VERY obvious when there's this weird... film looking thing overlaid on the eyes. its like he's always about to cry or something. i find hrothgar eyes specifically can look really weird because of this sometimes, since you basically cant see the whites of their eyes.

Ah yeah, contrast is the word I meant. I've also noticed that darker colours look too dark now (I'd also say the same is going on with bright shades being too bright), and while this goes outside of the topic of lighting - the entire palette being made different has made all kinds of shades look weird now. Even if it's slightly off like in my case, it's frustrating. You can't even try to achieve the same options as before because the settings are so limited to begin with.

A lot of my gripes with the dark relate to how I preferred the way the eyes would be "lit" in the dark before but I'm not gonna embarrass myself trying to explain it lol

I've noticed the film on the eyes on other characters posted in this thread but not much on my own character (honestly looking for too long at those giant eyes makes me feel grossed out). My friend's Miqo'te character (also Sunseeker) has a major case of it and it's made worse by the low graphics settings. It's 100% easier to see on races with unconventional eyes (like you said, especially on Sunseeker).

So much of this is a product of homogenization.

[Ashenfall]

I don't like how the eyes are much more heavily dependent on lighting than before on my miqo. Compare the eyes to the old ones, which were heavily dependent on the airbrushed shading of the eye models. The original eyes were actually painted on for a reason, which I theorize is to reduce this sort of dull appearance and to add dimension to the eyes no matter what kind of lighting you're in. I get the point of adding more realistic textures, but I would've preferred the eye texture and rendering to be somewhat closer to Y'Jhimei's eyes from FF15, especially with modern improvements.

For the sclera color, I'm not sure for other races, but I have an old photo of my miqote's sclera from before (pic 1). You can see how much more shading there is on the older eyeball. 6.x looks pretty uncanny, while 7.0 look more like a cartoon character. But if you move your own eye to look at your sclera, you're more likely to see red veins, which was closer to before.
The 7.0 whites have multicolored textures that look like resin/glass eyes or the eyes for wax figures. I would assume it's because the new sclera is much more shiny and reflective, while the old eyes were matte and painted, with enough warm shading to compensate the form. For color theory of eye whites in old paintings and regular photos from afar, they tend to be more warm and dark in color, which makes sense for smaller, human eyes. The lack of shadows in the whites make it seem much more bright than it should.

I agree that the old irises felt more vibrant and almost glowed, and though there was much less shadow before, the shadows were dark enough to show dimension. The new textures for the irises are extremely detailed, to the point where my console renders itself to being more sparkly than it should. The way certain light reflects on the irises looks extremely creepy. The old eyes would not have reacted to the Gridanian market lighting like pic 3.

6.x > 7.0 > 7.0


Now that I think about it, I sort of wish that miqo irises reacted to light (and looked) more like real cat eyes, instead of the way human eyes work with light. Even how the old eyes almost glowed felt more catlike.

[Liamont]

So I finished all of DT and I still am not very happy with the changes to my characters. Besides the eyebrows which I've discussed before in great detail, one thing that really stood out to me throughout DT were the expressions.

For example:

(/eat pizza) Ever since 7.0, elezen male expressions have become way too goofy. There were several moments in DT where he made a similar expression, and it always jarred me out of the story because it looked so silly.

I'm pretty sure the face shape has changed, especially around the eyebrows, which contributes to the odd expressions and the tilt at the end of the eyebrow that wasn't there before. There's a ridge now on the end that wasn't there in 6.0.


(/smile) Whenever he smiled in DT, it looked like fake smile, because he was just tilting the ends of his lips up and not pulling his lips back. I don't have screenshots from 6.0 of his expressions, but it feels like his eyes got a lot more squinty in many of the expressions in 7.0.


(/grin) has just gotten extremely goofy. The eyebrows are pulling up in a strange way, and this problem persists in many of the expressions.


(/content) used to actually look content, now his eyebrows are pulling up weirdly.


(/smirk)


(/taunt) also looks goofy now, also his right eyebrow randomly twitches at the front end.


(/sad) was never a really good looking expression for elezen males but it somehow looks worse now. The eyebrows go into an S shape when previously it looked more like one stroke upwards.


This is especially apparent in (/scared), which for some reason DT liked to use a lot. Needless to say, it just looked incredibly goofy and I wish they would have stopped using this expression so much lol.


They also really liked to use (/amazed), which wouldn't be that bad except for now (/amazed) looks goofier than it did in 6.0...


Once again there is a strange S shape in (/worried), and also his eyebrows are twitching.


There was a moment in DT where he used (/sneer) at what was supposed to be the beginning of a fight...and it kind of made what was supposed to be a cool scene just...awkward. He looked like some weird villain, and I can't say I've ever thought that about my own character lol.

[Liamont]

There's also a twitching problem in (/confused). Also the eyebrows are not even.


(/simper) vs...


(/beam). I remember quite distinctively that I preferred to use (/beam) sometimes because it would open his eyes up more, but now only his mouth changes.


(/scoff) is the only one that makes my character look like himself again, but that's probably because the eyebrows are now straight lol. Either way there's a twiching problem still.


(/ponder) was always a bit more goofy on elezen male but now there's a strange bend there on the eyebrow.

I'm not gonna lie, the more I look at the graphics update done to the characters, the more I feel like they did not do much quality assurance. Like even a single careful pass over every character expression would've caught things like twitching. I don't understand why it has become up to us, the customers, to catch these kinds of issues that the developers should've caught themselves.

Not to mention, having access to the original models and expressions should have made it easy for them to make the graphics update for characters as close as possible to the originals like they promised. In this kind of thing, paying close attention to the small details should have been a priority, instead of making changes that were "close enough."

I have to say that my motivation to play the game has decreased by a lot whenever I log on and look at my character's face. I've been invested in my character's story since 2018, so to have it change so drastically is pretty demotivating for me. And since I was already starting to consider moving to another game before 7.0, this hasn't helped me want to stay.

I sincerely hope that the devs will take our feedback into consideration.

[Anarnee]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UqqmfQ95P0k

The twitching happens really badly on Femroe face 2 too, I hadn't seen anyone else complain about it, but I suppose it's good to know maybe a universal thing. Looks like my poor girls have a damn heart beating in their head.

[Talamh]

There's some very subtle changes to my Elezen that made her stand out more.
But otherwise she's the same as always.

I took this one during the character creation long ago when I was finally happy with her look.
And then during Dawntrail benchmark, I recreated her appearance and took it in the same pose.
Old / New

Apologize on this one for the lightning differences.
Before Dawntrail / After Dawntrail

I didn't want to flood the post with images so I made image links.

Overall, I'm very happy. But nothing much really changed with her, which is just better.
I'd be so unhappy if they made changes that drastically altered her..

[Astronis]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UqqmfQ95P0k

The twitching happens really badly on Femroe face 2 too, I hadn't seen anyone else complain about it, but I suppose it's good to know maybe a universal thing. Looks like my poor girls have a damn heart beating in their head.

It's universal as far as I know. If it hasn't been yet, it should be bug reported.

[Iscah]

I wanted to particularly talk (not for the first time) about male Au Ra face 3, because while all my characters have issues that boil down to "please look at the original shape and get the details right", this face has been considerably restructured.

I picked up this character because I liked the idea of a dragon race, but instead of going with the apparent tough and serious vibe of the default character appearance, I decided I wanted to make the most "nice" character I could, and once I got him into the game proper I was delighted to find that despite the serious mugshot expression in the character creator, he quickly softened in other lighting and was incredibly cute once he smiled.

Some examples of his expressions - some variety of smile, straight face, smirk and blushing:


SETTINGS

Face 3
Jaw 4
Eyes 2
Iris Large
No limbal rings
Eyebrows 2
Nose 1
Mouth 1
No lip colour

Additional features:
2. Extra cheek scales
3. Horn decorations
5. Eyebrows

Facepaint picked to resemble additional scales

---

So I've been playing him for six years now, and his substitute in the graphics update is just not the same.

Comparison pictures are a bit of a mixed bag since I just had to use what I had previously saved from the old game and could replicate with cutscenes:


His smile has become fake-looking and thin-lipped. The bottom lip sticks out more and has more shadow underneath. Not shown here, but the resting face has shifted from its slight smile to a harsher expression.

[hb]
Downturned mouth and near-reversal of the dark and light sections between the eye and eyebrow


Overexaggerated swoop of the eye makeup at the outer corner, eyes more concealed at this angle, nose shape has changed.


Two problem aspects specifically when the eyes are closed: lack of eyelid makeup interfering with the overall line of the makeup, and relatively huge eyelashes where the original face has very little. Also absolutely no light shining on the undersides of the eyebrows - nothing seems to cut through the shadow on them.


Lower lip is wider compared to the more trapezoid shape of the original


Along the right edge of the face, you can see (if you can make it out against the similar-coloured background) how much more the face puckers inwards around the eyes





This angle particularly shows the change in shape of the chin which was previously rounded, in contrast to the other jaw shape options which were more pointed. Now it also comes to a sharp point.
I also dislike how the top edge of these scales (where the "beard" meets the skin) have been interpreted as very blocky and right-angled. The original shape clearly has additional ups-and-downs and more curving edges.


I put together more comparisons of the mouth shape, but the one I did back in the first benchmark still stands (also note the chin shape):



I've also compiled the eye comparisons from the above pictures into a single image

---

Drastic change of colour on the scales makes them look dark and dirty:


---


Eyelashes are in the wrong position and stick outwards rather than the original minimal and downwards:


I think there has been a misinterpretation of the unusual eye structure:


And this image which I assembled back in the first benchmark seems to still be mostly relevant, although in the current build of the game, the eyelid seems to have been smoothed out somewhat but the shadow under the eyebrow is more intense.


Issues that are still relevant include:

• pulled-in outer eyelid, as can be seen on the right eye

• nose seems more rounded underneath

• lower lip sticks out further with a sharp edge to it

• corners of the mouth are downturned

• chin is much pointier

• narrower face and a larger gap under the "sideburn" scale plates

[lunartears]

I checked back on a photo I made comparing both benchmarks to 6.5 and I noticed that in the April Benchmark that Eye Shape 3 - Female Au Ra Face 1 was much closer to the original with the sharper appearance and longer eyelashes. Oddly, the enlarged pupil size and everything else is the same in both benchmarks, they only modified the eye shape. I'm even more confused now as to why it was suddenly changed last second if it more closely resembled the original appearance in April's. It did look off, but I wish they kept it closer to the April eye shape.