VIERA AND HROTHGAR COMPLAINT MEGATHREAD

[XiRon]

Theyre dropping new hairstyles 3 years after our release and viera and hrothgar cant even get brand new crap getting added to work for them. Why? If you have to work on new crap for 6 races, add the other two as well.
"Well each hrothgar face is really slightly different"- wow andy heart bleeds for the dev team that made that dumb decision in the first place, it really does. But stop treating your players like afterthoughts first mkay?

[Midareyukki]

Nope. I just said the difference is I don't want to celebrate everytime they do a tiny thing that should be expected of them, while you are fine with doing that (while simultanously critiquing them). I just want to ONLY critique them. That is all. That is the difference. And that was all I said.

Issue is it felt like you were insinuating that that's what we do. Celebrate when they do a tiny thing.
Which we don't. Because that would be ignoring the context of why we're happy to begin with. And if anything, it just shows exactly how sad the situation really is.
Again: we're happy because they finally did one thing right after 3 years. Too bad that it was the absolute bare minimum. But it does still beat the absolute sh*tshow on April 1st.
The issue I have is people only saying "it was the bare minimum!" when that's what we were told to expect for us. Meanwhile, if any other race had the bare minimum, the community would band together and hound SE for it.

Theyre dropping new hairstyles 3 years after our release and viera and hrothgar cant even get brand new crap getting added to work for them. Why? If you have to work on new crap for 6 races, add the other two as well.

Even then it depends on the content.
Hairstyles are mostly a "one race fits all" sort of deal with minor adjustments here and there to fit. Why they haven't done so for a while or why Viera aren't having the same treatment as Miqo'te did is beyond me. Only Hrothgar requires a fair amount of tweaking, as realistically it's the same model across every race. Just scaled down or up to fit the race.
Equipment is technically made for 3 races. They have to adjust Hyur stuff for Miqo'te, Viera, Elezen and Au Ra a bit but the model's treated as the same, and the game adjusts innately. Then you have Roegadyn and Hrothgar who share a body type. And then you have Lalafell.
Basically, "working on new crap for 6 races, add the other two as well" sounds really weird when you consider that most of the stuff they make for other races is really just "the same as Hyur, but adjusted to fit". And half the time they don't even adjust jack, it just looks awfully stretched out.

[Midareyukki]

"Well each hrothgar face is really slightly different"- wow and my heart bleeds for the dev team that made that dumb decision in the first place, it really does. But stop treating your players like afterthoughts first mkay?

Here's a funny thing XiRon:

Yoshida admitted before that the dev team uses Agile Software Development, which splits the process into cycles called Sprints. In a very barebones napkin explanation of what Sprints are, you basically define all the stuff you want to do, then you do it, and each new Sprint is a new version of the software because once you finish a Sprint, you loop back around and improve on what was previously established. On and on, until you meet the goal you've set, which usually is the final version ready to be released.

So not only did Creative Business Unit 3 collectively decide on a very different race with very unique demands, they designed it and tweaked it... and you want me to believe at no point people stood up and said "Guys, this race is not like what we're used to"?
At no point at all? Someone designed this, someone approved this, someone made the models, someone implemented the models and each step had to be approved by someone. Really, no one thought "this race is problematic if we keep working like this and change how we approach it"?

Hrothgar as a race needs to stop being blamed for its own shortcomings. Sprints are designed so that at whichever step, if you find a hurdle, you have time and are capable of readjusting the plan to fit your needs. It's in the name: AGILE Development. What the devs are showing is a clear lack of agility. Sure, they may have their reasons... but just because they have reasons, like obstacles, it doesn't excuse these races being this continuously piss-poor. Especially not after so long.
The devs were the ones who agreed on making a shoddy race, it's not the race's own fault. If it is any harder to make a Hrothgar than it would be any other race, then they should have noticed it and allocated more time and resources to focus on their most ambitious race. But they did not, and have not for three years.

All to the detriment of the players that a) didn't even ask for this race, unlike Viera which was implemented due to fan demand (and ironically are also suffering from lack of care), and b) have proven to support and enjoy playing it.

And before any other dumb person shows up and says "well, clearly people play it, so it's fine", yeah people also stuck with 1.0 until the end. It's how we have videos of the last 11 minutes and all that. It didn't stop it from being sh*t and need fixing, did it?

[LuciaMirain]

"Issue is it felt like you were insinuating that that's what we do. Celebrate when they do a tiny thing."

Well, text is hard.

[Caro178]

The two Viera base game options shown look quite good and I think those braided pigtails will be popular. No weird bangs stretching. I'm sure not everyone would agree but in general the hairstyles that have wonky 5head already had wonky 5head on other races (Gold Saucer ponytail being the most notable example). Check it out on any other race and you'll realize it always looked like that and the problem did not start with Viera, it was just exacerbated on them. Hairstyles with bangs or ones that already look fine on the other races will port perfectly fine over to Viera, although I'll be hard-pressed to change off the Lyse hairstyle which actually looks best on Viera out of the entire lineup of races. Talk about stretched bangs; the Lyse style looks very off on Au'ra in particular.

Safe bet there will be a few more hairstyles for Viera once the patch drops because there were 5 or 6 in 6.1 and only 2 shown in the original patch notes. I would personally like Great Lengths, Form and Function, Styled for Hire and Gyr Abanian Plait with Great Lengths and Styled for Hire being at the top of that list. With these I expect we are also slowly running down the list of base game hairstyles available to all races. If they continue at this pace Viera probably will have every Modern Aesthetics and base game hair by the time 7.0 drops.

In other news I am happy to see Hrothgar are getting their ears back even if it's a patch too late and the hairstyles themselves are still not particularly suited to them. The Snow hair already looks okay and it should actually look good with ears. As a Viera player I am disappointed at how we have been treated but I am appalled at how Hrothgar players have been completely overlooked and borderline ridiculed. Obviously while they are in the same boat Hrothgar have it worse and I was personally on the side of Viera getting minimal attention this patch if it meant more bodies could be put on resolving the Hrothgar problems. Of course it is easy to say that and I am still happy to see Viera get new options.

As for the new "everyrace" ponytails I'm optimistic but not holding my breath. This is the first opportunity to see if the boast they made about changing the Viera head shape to accommodate new styles was all nonsense.

[HollowedDoll]

As for the new "everyrace" ponytails I'm optimistic but not holding my breath. This is the first opportunity to see if the boast they made about changing the Viera head shape to accommodate new styles was all nonsense.

They didn't change anything, idk why people keep trying to spread misinformation about stuff you can just literally unpack and see for yourself.

Their head shape is pretty much in line with the miqote one as well.

[Caro178]

They didn't change anything, idk why people keep trying to spread misinformation about stuff you can just literally unpack and see for yourself.

Their head shape is pretty much in line with the miqote one as well.

I am a console player. I can't see or unpack anything. I am repeating something that was said by the team during multiple liveletters pre Endwalker regarding both male and female Viera and their restrictions. Perhaps I did not use the exact right terminology or quote them exactly and I apologize for that but I am not trying to spread misinformation. I watched the liveletters when they aired.

[HollowedDoll]

I am a console player. I can't see or unpack anything. I am repeating something that was said by the team during multiple liveletters pre Endwalker regarding both male and female Viera and their restrictions. Perhaps I did not use the exact right terminology or quote them exactly and I apologize for that but I am not trying to spread misinformation. I watched the liveletters when they aired.

Fair enough, didn't mean to come of as hostile.
Just tired of seeing people repeat stuff that is blatantly false as gospel, and yeah maybe they said something regarding it in the live letter, but that unfortunately is not reflected in reality.

[Caro178]

Fair enough, didn't mean to come of as hostile.
Just tired of seeing people repeat stuff that is blatantly false as gospel, and yeah maybe they said something regarding it in the live letter, but that unfortunately is not reflected in reality.

It's okay, I understand. This thread is long and I'm sure there have been myriad discussions about what the devs have and haven't said. I wish I had the quotes for myself but it was all a while ago now. Basically they said male Viera were made without restrictions in mind and female Viera were adjusted as well. Thus far we've only had one hairstyle added to the game and a gender locked one at that. It does function on Viera, however. I read a few pages back that the new styles are flagged for all races but Viera but the files also don't seem to be complete and this second male ponytail wasn't in the files at all. They seem to be two different hair files (rewards from Island Sanctuary) so I would be surprised if they were also gender locked. Who knows tho, gamemakers are weird.