New hrothgar hairstyles are really bad.

[alsiniz]

At this point, I wouldn't be surprised if they have a dartboard and put the number of the hairstyle on it and while blindfolded they throw the darts at the board and on the hair number it lends that one it is! I feel really bad for the blindfolded person though, they seem to be awfully unlucky.

At least with the dart board you're statistically going to pick random styles both good and bad fits, not the 6 worst possible fits.

I keep waiting for any sort of communication from the devs; an apology, a promise to rectify, or even just acknowledge the players being disappointed after 3 years of promises only to get mouldy bread crumbs.

The FFXIV team shot themselves in the foot with their own strict polygon count they imposed on themselves in ARR (and have not updated despite no longer supporting the PS3). To get around this self-imposed limitation they're offloading Hrothgar ear models from the body to the hair since the beastly Hrothgar details require more polygons than humanoids to look decent. This is why the only communications we get are "it's technically very challenging."

They already have a system for hiding/showing ears via metadata. That's why Miqo ears will show with some gear and hide with others. The structure is all there. But instead of using their existing systems and revising their own restrictions and guidelines on polygon counts, they run around like headless chickens screaming in agony about "technical difficulties."

It's extremely unprofessional and frustrating for the players who have gotten empty promise after empty promise for years.

Even with this Hrothgar crisis aside, let's look at an actual model from the game. (Lord's Clogs)



Tell me we aren't long overdue for an overhaul of 3D asset restrictions. I know MMOs are designed around having potentially over a hundred players rendered on screen at once, but it's 2022 now and the PS3 is no longer supported. The average gamer these days plays on a GTX 1060 or equivalent card according to Steam's survey.