Dawntrail character graphics update - opinions, requests and discussion megathread

[Darko]

While I'm on the subject of old versus new, another thing that's completely broken are Emet-Selch and Hythlodaeus' eyes. As before, first is old, second is new. Emet's glow is completely gone and Hythlodaeus' eyes also seem to lack it for the most part and aren't even the right color:









That needs to be fixed. Maybe they're leaving it until they update their models but uh. Going off of my WoL and Ardbert and everyone else I'd really rather they never update them and just fix their eyes. There's also the absolutely insane lighting difference in the scene now. Which isn't the cause of the eye issues, Emet just doesn't glow at all. I'm not sure if Hyth isn't at all or the color is just set completely wrong.

The lighting was so perfect to highlight his eyes. This beautiful, captivating scene is now ruined.

DT's MSQ has zero replay value to me - it was horrific enough getting through it the first time - and now I can't even replay past MSQ because of the graphics update.

Lighting needs to be fixed, across the board, Thancred's face needs to be fixed, the Ancients need the glow in their eyes back, the eyes of mere mortals at least need to look alive, and faces need to be de-puffed and reworked to look like they used to. I also preferred the previous skin colour Emet and Hyth had, this looks too saturated.

It boggles my mind that this graphics update and DT's storyline were deemed suitable for release. Starting to wonder why I'm still holding onto hope here.

[Rueby]

Man Hythlo and Emet look like cheap plastic lit up barbie dolls. I adored their eyes and how stunning/captivating Hythlo's eyes were...
I was playing the MSQ with my friend awhile back and honestly...meh..alot of NPCs look really weird in this lighting....

[Darko]

The dazed and bored eyes strike again. A character with an intense passion behind their eyes? Can't have that, add more shadows, flatten the mouth, make them look like they feel nothing.

I see this face was also hit by the Great Lip Flattening. Had a unique lip shape? Not anymore! Now everyone can have the same generic lips and mouth!

Ugh.

Same for male midlander face 1. My WoL now has a dazed stare. Maybe he's thinking of the sharper, more charming face he used to have.

[SchwarzwaelderTorte]

the Ancients need the glow in their eyes back

That has been supposedly fixed in 7.1 (at least I noticed that they look somewhat brighter on the NPCs in the Pandaemonium extra quest they added) and the post you quoted is from 7.0, so I would be curious to see what this cutscene looks like now and how it holds up compared to 6.X.

[eohippus]

In the spirit of keeping this thread alive, I wanted to repost some of my complaints dating back to the benchmark. I've been really demoralized out of grabbing additional screenshots and am going to unsub sometime in the near future. While 7.1 made some aspects of my character more familiar again, I remain extremely sad with how different his mouth shape looks and how much more washed out his skin became. I really hope the mouth shape in 7.2 will be restored to the shape he had before. He really doesnt look the same at all ingame now. https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...=1#post6471918

[FuturePastNow]

I'd still like the developers to understand that I strongly dislike what they did to my old (Roegadyn) face.

Since I said this, I suppose I should provide screenshots and some feedback. I took very few pictures of my Roe after DT before I fantasiad so I don't have an exact 1:1 comparison, but here's a before (left) and after (right):



This is also enlarged 200%.

1) The eyes. Removing the baked in eye glow was the worst change they made. The color of the new eyes is barely visible. I don't think I need to say any more.

2) Nose. I'll admit that I was never a huge fan of the Roe nose- Gosetsu has a basically human nose and I'd have used that if it had been an option. But the old nose had some character- there was a slight up angle on bottom, a point on the tip, and thought it's hard to see, the bridge of the nose is slightly tapered, narrower at the top than the bottom. The new noses make no attempt at replicating these features, it smooths the tip, is flat on the bottom, rounds the edges and has a fixed width. There's also an ugly crease where the nose meets the cheek. That may have been present on the old face geo but it wasn't visible.

3) The skin. It's hard to describe but the new face looked wet. Like she was sweaty at all times. It's most visible on the lips but the entire face was like that.

4) Hair. The "fake" baked in lighting and shadows on the old hair gave it volume and the dark colors looked dark. All of that is lost with the new lighting.

I've given up hats to not have to see my old character's new face.

[Rueby]

The Au Ra in the 2025 Heavensturn promo art have the same dilated pupils we have now in-game... should I take this as a sign that this is considered spec?

Huh? Pics?

[Kahnha]

Give me my glowing horns back.

[Rin_Sato]

Still no fix to Miqo'te Face 2 eyebrows...

[Turethir]

Crossposted to the Thancred's New Face thread, but a few of us Thancred fans have put together a comprehensive site demonstrating the issues with his updated face, and have collated several image and slider comparisons to show the differences in details.

Please check out the link below and feel free to share with your friends! If there is any way to get the word out it would be much appreciated.

Save Thancred website