New 7.1 hairstyle looks nothing like the winning hairstyle from the 2023 contest

[Evermomo]

Please don't twist the information. I never said the xiv version looks appealing. I said it's not easy to make volume of strands to look good and not hitting polygon limits.

It's the technique that gives the effect, really. Polygon counts are not as important as artistic ability. I say this having worked on video games as a 3D artist. Even trying to be generous to what you're saying, it's not a good excuse.

(Besides, they just did a huge environment update massively increasing foliage polycount, so...)

[Zero-ELEC]

That's truly terrible execution of that hairstyle, I didn't even realise it was meant to be that one until people pointed it out. What a shame.

[Doopliss]

Please don't twist the information. I never said the xiv version looks appealing. I said it's not easy to make volume of strands to look good and not hitting polygon limits.

I quoted your whole post.

"For those who say the new hair is bad, it would be nice to provide example or suggest way how to model the hair to not completely fry gpus with millions of hair strings."

Which sounds to me like a 'they're doing the best they can within their limitations'. And also weirdly dismissive because people have been...providing examples and ways to adjust the hair without high-fidelity requirements.

"The player-provided examples from other games sadly don't look appealing."

Then there was this extra comment tacked on to dismiss any other actual argument. Look, man, I'm just saying--a lot of people who possess this hair type (you know, the one the contest winner originally shared and not whatever FFXIV's team decided to do with it) seemed to vastly prefer what GW2 was doing with it.

Deciding they don't look appealing within a whole is basically just letting the team know they don't have to try harder, because they can't "possibly" make anything up to standard. I just can't stand these kind of arguments.

If that wasn't your intention, I'm sorry, but please think about what you're even trying to argue for here. Your comments together inadvertently make it seem like this quality is okay, because it sounds like you claim they shouldn't even attempt any other quality. (Or, worse: continue to never add curly hair at all).

I'll be shutting up from here so I don't derail this thread into any actual arguments. Sorry, again, just in case.

[glatissant]

Writing to add my voice to this thread. I don't think the in-game model looks like what the original submission intended it to look like: a curly textured style. Why pick this as the winner if it is not going to be faithful to the original artist's vision? It's somehow more disappointing that it's been done badly than if it had not been done at all. Please fix this.

[MAJRIS]

Even trying to be generous to what you're saying, it's not a good excuse.
(Besides, they just did a huge environment update massively increasing foliage polycount, so...)

Fair point. Personally, the task of designing and texturing such shapes to not look ridiculous would be my personal hell.
If it is not a poly limit then having a conversation (similar to the live letter panel about ground textures) to bring us closer to understanding why so many short hair in the past, would be something nice to have.

[Jannosuke]

Not only does the preview looks like it's an incomplete hairstyle, it also looked like it's designed without considering how it'd look like on certain face models. I feel like it looks awkward on this particular Au Ra model, but imo it has to do with the hairstyle looking like it's not complete.

[Gyabo]

Adding my agreement. If the original design was going to be so thoroughly ignored, what was the point? It's disrespectful to the designer and all the players who were looking forward to seeing this hairstyle in game.

[Aerisuna]

This is so bad. There's no way making textured hair is that impossible. So many games have loads of textured hair, this is just sad.

[ronibosch]

The texture pattern isn't the same as the original - what we got in-game is more wavy than curly. Don't know if I'll unlock it or not, but I've been aching for more type 3 and 4 hairstyles.

[Halivel]

I remember this haircut from when the contest happened and honestly was looking for it. I didn't even register that this is the same design.

Not going to lie, even as an "inspired by" cut it really doesn't do justice to the original, and I feel bad for the artist. Looks very sloppy and sort of oily - like someone didn't wash their head for a week. A certain community does a better job at creating unique hairstyles.
I get it that there's a chance they simply didn't have enough time considering 7.1 seems to have a lot of other graphic adjustments, but if that's the case - why not just postpone the haircut that clearly requires a careful attention until you have enough time, and go with something simpler?


I hope they'll listen to the feedback on this one and fix it, even though that probably doesn't have a high chance of happening.