Hidde Glamours Locally (& other graphically immersive options)

[Saraide]

This game, just like every good Final Fantasy, started and for a long time was a what you call "lore game", and just like FFXI before it. I would love for this game to be more like ESO in many aspects as well. Immersion is important in any game, specially in RPGs. It saddens me to see the developers seem to care for kids, teenagers and not adults and mature players that want a more immersive experience and that actually value the ingame lore, world and story, and want things to coherent and more "in tune" and not all "wacky" and over the top non stop all the time.

World building is one of if not the very most important thing besides gameplay in any RPG, and basically is one of the main factors that dictates the quality of an RPG, that's why people love FF Tactics, FF9, FFXI, EQ1, etc.: world building, make a fantasy world actually believable. That's one of the major things that separate good RPGs from bad RPGs.

But the ff14 world is and has always been wacky. Godbert and Hildibrand have been part of the game for a long time. Clothing in a modern aesthetic make sense because of influences from allag and garlemald. Seasonal events have some main story characters run around in a chicken suit. A fantasy world is not just doom and gloom all the time. Casting glamours has been part of the story. You'd be breaking game lore if you removed glams from everyone if anything.

[SilverObi]

stuff

I get what you mean honestly, I think what you're looking for is an aesthetic cohesion or something similar. 1.0 and FFXI shared a similar style in armor and world with both feeling very grounded in their fantasy elements, and that made the outlandish stuff (Garleans and Zilart) feel otherworldly or exotic just for how outside the established aesthetic of the world they were. And it made them more special for it in my opinion. So while yes everything that seems out of place in XIV has been given lore reasons for existing I can agree that for some folks it can be jarring or at least incongruous.

Do the Regalia, 2018-esque Japanese fashion, Korean historical outfits, mascot outfits, cartoon character minions, jets, and cyborgs exist canonically in-universe? Yes. Can they still be considered weird by people expecting a more traditional fantasy aesthetic regardless? Absolutely.

And yeah I know FF has long been mixing fantasy and sci-fi elements in their games but I argue that they did a better job of blending them and/or making the reason for them being so mismatched a lot better. Not that it bothers me at the end of the day, it tickles me to no end that I can see a Miqo'te cosplaying as Korone Inugami or someone riding basically Mechagodzilla. I just don't see a problem either if someone wants a toggle system to swap out some of the more "interesting" outfits in the game.

[Fabbro]

I get what you mean honestly, I think what you're looking for is an aesthetic cohesion or something similar. 1.0 and FFXI shared a similar style in armor and world with both feeling very grounded in their fantasy elements, and that made the outlandish stuff (Garleans and Zilart) feel otherworldly or exotic just for how outside the established aesthetic of the world they were. And it made them more special for it in my opinion. So while yes everything that seems out of place in XIV has been given lore reasons for existing I can agree that for some folks it can be jarring or at least incongruous.

Do the Regalia, 2018-esque Japanese fashion, Korean historical outfits, mascot outfits, cartoon character minions, jets, and cyborgs exist canonically in-universe? Yes. Can they still be considered weird by people expecting a more traditional fantasy aesthetic regardless? Absolutely.

And yeah I know FF has long been mixing fantasy and sci-fi elements in their games but I argue that they did a better job of blending them and/or making the reason for them being so mismatched a lot better. Not that it bothers me at the end of the day, it tickles me to no end that I can see a Miqo'te cosplaying as Korone Inugami or someone riding basically Mechagodzilla. I just don't see a problem either if someone wants a toggle system to swap out some of the more "interesting" outfits in the game.

Thank you, much appreciated. I agree with you : )

[andrealfus]

the instant solution to this would be to just close your eyes

[Ath192]

So here is the thing about immersion. I got back and forth a lot with this issue. Because to some extent both sides have their merit. It is nice to feel fully immersed in an "Epoch" where the story is taken seriously and people show up for battle well prepared and a great battle is had. By the other token FFXIV is more "Fairy Tail" anime than say... "Attack on Titan" where uniforms are well defined and everyone is dressed congruently to the setting.

At the same time, when we talk about "world" and immersion, if we take a look at our world today we have people in space and conducting genetic research and creating clones all the way to aboriginal tribes that have no contact with the world and live the same as when Neanderthals were still around... (an easy research on this is that Island close to India)

So FFXIV reflects a bit more of that reality, that the world at large is a truly diverse place... On the other hand though... These diversities are spread across bigger geographic areas in the world, whereas in FFXIV everyone is squished together. So you get a guy in a swimsuit queued with you in full plate armor ready to battle hades...

I mean yeah... I would say getting a bunch of frogs, swimsuits, and joke glams in an expansion finale trial does ruin the experience somewhat. Because you can't seriously get into it... I mean everyone is treating it as a joke... and you feel silly wearing good armor to battel with a bunch of those people.

If this world had more things to do outside of instances a great solution would be to create "Casual Gear" and "Battle gear" and have those respective plates, where you as a Miqote WAR, could wear something sexy and casual while doing activities in the overworld (unfortunately these are severely lacking), queue for a fight, and switch to your battle plate when you load in. That way, all your cute glams would be there for you and would have a use most of the time, but when things get serious, you transform into a glam that means business...

This would require the developers to only allow specific gear to be battle plated, and would get treated on a per-item basis.

I think people would mostly be okay with this solution, I mean its a reasonable compromise, but ONLY, if there are lots of things to do in the overworld that would make casual gear something you can use and show off plenty....

[Fabbro]

So here is the thing about immersion. I got back and forth a lot with this issue. Because to some extent both sides have their merit. It is nice to feel fully immersed in an "Epoch" where the story is taken seriously and people show up for battle well prepared and a great battle is had. By the other token FFXIV is more "Fairy Tail" anime than say... "Attack on Titan" where uniforms are well defined and everyone is dressed congruently to the setting.

At the same time, when we talk about "world" and immersion, if we take a look at our world today we have people in space and conducting genetic research and creating clones all the way to aboriginal tribes that have no contact with the world and live the same as when Neanderthals were still around... (an easy research on this is that Island close to India)

So FFXIV reflects a bit more of that reality, that the world at large is a truly diverse place... On the other hand though... These diversities are spread across bigger geographic areas in the world, whereas in FFXIV everyone is squished together. So you get a guy in a swimsuit queued with you in full plate armor ready to battle hades...

I mean yeah... I would say getting a bunch of frogs, swimsuits, and joke glams in an expansion finale trial does ruin the experience somewhat. Because you can't seriously get into it... I mean everyone is treating it as a joke... and you feel silly wearing good armor to battel with a bunch of those people.

If this world had more things to do outside of instances a great solution would be to create "Casual Gear" and "Battle gear" and have those respective plates, where you as a Miqote WAR, could wear something sexy and casual while doing activities in the overworld (unfortunately these are severely lacking), queue for a fight, and switch to your battle plate when you load in. That way, all your cute glams would be there for you and would have a use most of the time, but when things get serious, you transform into a glam that means business...

This would require the developers to only allow specific gear to be battle plated, and would get treated on a per-item basis.

I think people would mostly be okay with this solution, I mean its a reasonable compromise, but ONLY, if there are lots of things to do in the overworld that would make casual gear something you can use and show off plenty....

Thank you very much for this, appreciate the read a lot and agree 100% : )

[Awha]

I get this idea is long shot and generally a waste of development resources. That point aside I don't understand the position that having someone alter another's appearance especially when outside of a few outlier situations the persons who appearance has been altered would not even know.

I mean so do not get me wrong I love walking around IRL in one of my extensive hentai hoodies. Though if someone developed the tech to alter appearance of others only to themselves. I would personally not care I still would gain enjoyment wearing what I enjoy.

[DPZ2]

I get this idea is long shot and generally a waste of development resources.

A great waste of development resources. It's never as simple as 'adding a button to activate a switch'. There would be side effects.

How does one go about changing glamour gear into X? The simplest way would be to replace every piece of gear into some 'standardized head, chest, hands, legs, feet' gear. What happens when that gear is worn by an NPC? (Yes, your NPCs wear the same gear you can glamour into).

Not so simple anymore. And the "while you're at it" crowd asking for level-specific gear ... sheesh.

That point aside I don't understand the position that having someone alter another's appearance especially when outside of a few outlier situations the persons who appearance has been altered would not even know.

Why stop at gear?

I'll certainly start complaining about all of the Hrothgar in game. I'll demand a button/switch to toggle all Hrothgar to look like a single Miqo'te female model. It's an appearance that only affects my screen. How could it possibly harm anyone else?

It would also be a lot simpler than the gear toggle, well, except it would also have side effects with respect to NPCs.

Your identity is tied to your appearance. People work a long time when creating a character to get the look "just right". It's Who They Are in-game.

Asking for the ability to change appearances is denying someone else has a right to exist As They Are.

You want a game where you have full control over the look and feel of everyone? Go play the Sims.

[Risvertasashi]

So, let's see...

1. There's a mod that removes lalafell from the game.
2. There's a mod that removes (swaps) the 2B leggings...
3. There's a mod that can freely change the race and outfits of other players as they're displayed to you.

Seems to me someone just needs to link these things together. I'd suggest this idea remain a mod, however. No need to get the dev team embroiled in controversy by implementing it, and every time they make a change, and then worry about it getting dropped if they feel it's not worth the time and return. Not to mention, as a fan project you could have things like a database of immersive outfits to apply to other players at random, which would likely be too much time investment/upkeep for an official dev project.

[Fabbro]

So, let's see...

1. There's a mod that removes lalafell from the game.
2. There's a mod that removes (swaps) the 2B leggings...
3. There's a mod that can freely change the race and outfits of other players as they're displayed to you.

Seems to me someone just needs to link these things together. I'd suggest this idea remain a mod, however. No need to get the dev team embroiled in controversy by implementing it, and every time they make a change, and then worry about it getting dropped if they feel it's not worth the time and return. Not to mention, as a fan project you could have things like a database of immersive outfits to apply to other players at random, which would likely be too much time investment/upkeep for an official dev project.

Which is the website that currently has such and most FFXIV mods available for download please? Nexus mods seems to have too little in terms of any kind of FFXIV content.