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

[mallleable]

Glad we got some kind of response, but please do better. Stop half assing these kinds of projects.

[Madqueenmomo]

* me, walking in to just give a thank you for the response cause I didn't expect them to actually come out*
*looks at everyone's posts in between the time i got the forum messages and finished drawing the art for the team so they feel more motivated*
*realizes there is now a giant tone dissonance*
ah.......
My bad, everyone qwq

[ovIm]

* me, walking in to just give a thank you for the response cause I didn't expect them to actually come out*
*looks at everyone's posts in between the time i got the forum messages and finished drawing the art for the team so they feel more motivated*
*realizes there is now a giant tone dissonance*
ah.......
My bad, everyone qwq

It's not your fault, really, there is nothing you have to apologize for (:
People have been a lot less patient with Square Enix lately for many reasons.

[NerysEluned]

I remember seeing that this one had won the contest and had been really excited for it, though I don't think it would suit any of my current characters.
Completely unsurprised Square Enix didn't do it any justice, like why did they even pick this hair if they weren't going to actually make it.
It honestly doesn't even look like they tried.

Hello.

Thank you for all your feedback on the hairstyle that will be implemented in Patch 7.1. We would like to apologize for the major confusion we have caused.

For this patch, we started work to implement "Natural Curls" from the winning entries of the Hairstyle Design Contest, based on the idea of adding not only straight hair but also a variety of other hairstyles.

However, as the development work progressed, the light, delicate, and voluminous curls required for Natural Curls could not be implemented perfectly, despite implementation of the recent graphical update in FFXIV, due to limitations such as the polygon count.

Therefore, the finished result is a hairstyle that has not been implemented as Natural Curls, but as a wavy bob hairstyle, which is called "Doing the Wave" in-game.

However, since we did use the winning entry as a reference in the development process, we included a statement to that effect in the patch notes. We are deeply sorry that this has resulted in a great deal of confusion and concern.

Although we were not able to make it happen this time, the development team will continue to strive to implement many more hairstyles in the future. As for Natural Curls, which was not implemented in Patch 7.1, we will persevere in our efforts to look for other ways to implement this hairstyle.

We appreciate your feedback and hope you continue to enjoy FFXIV!

Thank you for your reply. Going forward, we hope you'll understand the need for transparency around these issues and why many BIPOC players and their allies are upset. We look forward to seeing you resolve this in the coming months.

[Astronis]

* me, walking in to just give a thank you for the response cause I didn't expect them to actually come out*
*looks at everyone's posts in between the time i got the forum messages and finished drawing the art for the team so they feel more motivated*
*realizes there is now a giant tone dissonance*
ah.......
My bad, everyone qwq

I think your response is wonderful. It assumes good faith, which is is sorely needed these days.

[Minarisweet]

Thank you for your reply. Going forward, we hope you'll understand the need for transparency around these issues and why many BIPOC players and their allies are upset. We look forward to seeing you resolve this in the coming months.

its not gonna be months lmao

[ExESGO]

Time to upgrade the engine/rewrite the code or whatever works. I'm SICK of hearing the same excuses over and over again.

They always are, but it takes dev a lot of dev time. Reading various feedback on this forum, we'll never get the perfect unicorn game everyone wants. Do we sacrifice work-life balance of the devs? Do we sacrifice content? Do we sacrifice QoL? Everything has a sacrifice. Maybe they could drop the need to know business Japanese, but once again we'll have to sacrifice something for that.

[Hypnotic13371337]

Wow, what lazy devs

1. Diddn't have to design the hair
2. The fan hair was designed to SE's requirements for the contest
3. Had this whole graphical update shit working FOR THEM for how the hair would look
4. Just had to follow the hair design

Still flubbed it up this bad

Edit: Found and read the rep reply, stupid as hell reason that it was mentioned the way it was in the patch notes. I'm still not holding my breath for the ACTUAL hair when it drops to look like the reference

[Balmung_Griffin]

Easiest fix ever: name change LMAO

[Jokiro]

Hello.

Thank you for all your feedback on the hairstyle that will be implemented in Patch 7.1. We would like to apologize for the major confusion we have caused.

For this patch, we started work to implement "Natural Curls" from the winning entries of the Hairstyle Design Contest, based on the idea of adding not only straight hair but also a variety of other hairstyles.

However, as the development work progressed, the light, delicate, and voluminous curls required for Natural Curls could not be implemented perfectly, despite implementation of the recent graphical update in FFXIV, due to limitations such as the polygon count.

Therefore, the finished result is a hairstyle that has not been implemented as Natural Curls, but as a wavy bob hairstyle, which is called "Doing the Wave" in-game.

However, since we did use the winning entry as a reference in the development process, we included a statement to that effect in the patch notes. We are deeply sorry that this has resulted in a great deal of confusion and concern.

Although we were not able to make it happen this time, the development team will continue to strive to implement many more hairstyles in the future. As for Natural Curls, which was not implemented in Patch 7.1, we will persevere in our efforts to look for other ways to implement this hairstyle.

We appreciate your feedback and hope you continue to enjoy FFXIV!

Genuinely asking, how were you able to render fluffy textures on non-character models such as environmental assets in the form of bushes or the fur of certain creatures, most notably alpacas, if said polygon count issue exists?