can someone explain the whole 1.0 graphics > 2.0?

[Mugiawara]

Graphics were far more detailed back in 1.0 but it had a cost of requiring a F load of system requirements that can make a PS3 over heat.

Just look at the detail for 1.0 cutscene compared to now...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvXSHLPB1aM

I don't like it to be honest. It's too overly-shaded, everywhere and it's too dark.

skill/spells effects WERE WAAAAYY BETTER

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OA6i0RuBAY

The bard looks alright here but I hate the fact everyone is praying up for a spell.
:/ Looks so lame...glad we are ACTUALLY using our weapons here, I like bards animations for attacks though.

[Grey_Cain]

I don't like it to be honest. It's too overly-shaded, everywhere and it's too dark.

The environment lighting was my biggest beef with the 1.0 graphics. During the day, the game was beautiful beyond measure; everything stood out sharply and brightly, so vibrant. The miasma weather in Mor Dhona was breathtaking. But when it got overcast, then it just got dull and samey. And at night it was impossible to see without driving up the gamma so far the daytime became an eye-murdering level of contrast and washed out colors.

And the trees! My first reaction to the 2.0 screenshot of the PLD in the Shroud was, "Holy crap! That looks like an actual forest!" The Shroud of 1.0 was less a forest and more roots growing over endless tracts of shrubbery and moss-covered rocks. It seemed like there was one (giant) tree per square malm, and the overhead canopy was just those few trees' branches spreading through each others' branches.

[kyuven]

The bard looks alright here but I hate the fact everyone is praying up for a spell.
:/ Looks so lame...glad we are ACTUALLY using our weapons here, I like bards animations for attacks though.

Am I the only one bothered that the BRD sings like they're casting a spell? There's no music...

[ErzaScarlet77]

they scaled down character model? really? because this game has crazy detail for character model
especially fi you looks at the more intricate armor like ironworks stuff

hard to imagine how detailed 1.0 must be

[Felis]

they scaled down character model? really? because this game has crazy detail for character model
especially fi you looks at the more intricate armor like ironworks stuff

hard to imagine how detailed 1.0 must be

[kyuven]

(image)

Behold! the actual framerate of someone on the PS3 trying to display that many 1.0 characters at once

[Felis]

Behold! the actual framerate of someone on the PS3 trying to display that many 1.0 characters at once

On PC it was limited to 20-30 characters/objects (the limit the PS3 have now in ARR).
So, on PS3 it would have been maybe 4? ^^

[Darius-Stormcrow]

I remember hearing that the primary focus on development of 1.0 was to make as pretty looking a game as possible- to the detriment of pretty much everything else.

I have a pretty decent computer, and it handles 2.0 just fine but 1.0 made it drop frames like an art gallery in an earthquake.

[File2ish]

I think it's worth a mention that they replaced the game engine (from Crystal Tools, the engine FFXIII was built with, to a game specific engine). Not that it exactly has anything to do with the "downgrade".

FFXIV 1.0 had ubsurdly high polygon counts for everything. Many regular objects, like a flower pot (as mentioned by Yoshi-P), had about as many polygons as a player character model. That's how ridiculous it was.

By the standard of polygon count, 1.0 looked much much better. Lighting and environment detail wise, however, 2.0 is generally seen as the better. We've gone from LITERAL rotated copy pasta maps to areas built with detail in mind. The areas feel smaller by comparison, but this among other factors (like optimized game engine and each city/area is zoned off like in FFXI) allows lower end computers and the PS3 to run the game.

And a cut from the Polygon post about it:

Yoshida pointed to three main reasons for Final Fantasy 14's failure in that first form. First, the team had an "unhealthy obsession with graphical quality." In a series of videos comparing the original version of Final Fantasy 14 to A Realm Reborn, he showed that the core game may have looked slightly better, but its areas were also empty and it took up a lot of processing power.

For a specific example, Yoshida showed a screenshot of a flowerpot outside of an inn in the first form of Final Fantasy 14. He called it "the loveliest flowerpot in an MMO," but then revealed its heavy cost: That single flowerpot contained over 1,000 polygons and 150 lines of shader code, meaning it took up as many resources as a single player character.

In order to accommodate such heavily detailed graphics, the original team made compromises that went against the reasons why people play MMOs. For example, they limited the number of player characters on screen at any one time to 20. While this allowed the game to look beautiful while still running, it lost sight of how great it is to log on to an online game and see dozens of players running around at once.

http://www.polygon.com/2014/3/20/552...n-new-approach

[Darius-Stormcrow]

We've gone from LITERAL rotated copy pasta maps to areas built with detail in mind.

^ This, 100 percent this. The areas in 1.0 felt huge but they were almost all a blur of similar looking areas. The Black Shroud especially was like a nightmare to try to navigate.