Character graphical changes are NOT in an acceptable state, please make it optional

[Loggos]

Thank you, I'm very happy if it's helpful!
And also very cool to hear that someone perceives it similarly!

[Mylandra]

I would like to share this with you.

For context, I've been playing this game since January 2014 and I have 18k hours of playtime so yeah I've been staring at my character the whole time and I was really affected when I saw it in the benchmark. To me, she looked too different and I was really disappointed.

However, I've somehow managed to make a character I like and I hope my advice can help some of you.


The 1st piece of advice I can give you is to check the system configuration and your current character lighting setting.

For comparison, it seems that the character lighting is at 0 in EW benchmark and at 100 (or maybe 50, I don't know) in DT benchmark




This is how my character looks in game, with 0,50 and 100 character lighting and 2 different light source.
as you can see, lighting has a strong impact on your look.





The 2nd tip is to use your current game settings in benchmark. This can help, especially when your chin and neck seem to blend together at max settings. I tried it and the jawline was more visible.

My final tip is to import your character's current hairstyle if it's not available in the benchmark, and try to change small details like eye or skin color.
In my case, when I saw my character with her usual hairstyle during the cutscenes I was like "ok I recognize my wol but the skin is too dark and the eye color doesn't look natural"



I used a free fantasia I had on an alt that has access to the aesthetician, switched to midlander and changed the eye and skin color, then I bought the hairstyle at the MB (I lost 2 million gils but it was worth it tbh)

here is how it turned out :





it's not really "same and better" but rather "very similar and pretty cool".
I hope it's helpful for anyone ♥

And please let's be nice to each other
(+ I'm sorry english is not my native language so there may be some mistakes)

Edit : I would like to clarify, I'm not saying lighting, gamma or settings will fix all the issues, it can work for some and not for others and I'm sorry about that.
I'm aware that there are bugs and bad shape changes etc.
The aim of this post is to help and not to invalidate anyone's feelings.

[Thrawn21]

I would like to share this with you.

For context, I've been playing this game since January 2014 and I have 18k hours of playtime so yeah I've been staring at my character the whole time and I was really affected when I saw it in the benchmark. To me, she looked too different and I was really disappointed.

However, I've somehow managed to make a character I like and I hope my advice can help some of you.


The 1st piece of advice I can give you is to check the system configuration and your current character lighting setting.

For comparison, it seems that the character lighting is at 0 in EW benchmark and at 100 (or maybe 50, I don't know) in DT benchmark




This is how my character looks in game, with 0,50 and 100 character lighting and 2 different light source.
as you can see, lighting has a strong impact on your look.





The 2nd tip is to use your current game settings in benchmark. This can help, especially when your chin and neck seem to blend together at max settings. I tried it and the jawline was more visible.

My final tip is to import your character's current hairstyle if it's not available in the benchmark, and try to change small details like eye or skin color.
In my case, when I saw my character with her usual hairstyle during the cutscenes I was like "ok I recognize my wol but the skin is too dark and the eye color doesn't look natural"



I used a free fantasia I had on an alt that has access to the aesthetician, switched to midlander and changed the eye and skin color, then I bought the hairstyle at the MB (I lost 2 million gils but it was worth it tbh)

here is how it turned out :





it's not really "same and better" but rather "very similar and pretty cool".
I hope it's helpful for anyone ♥

And please let's be nice to each other
(+ I'm sorry english is not my native language so there may be some mistakes)

This is great information! Thanks for taking the time and effort to put it together and share it.

[CuteBucket]

I'm really tired of hearing people say to adjust the lighting and gamma. I have. Many of us have. We've tried edits, angles, lights, settings, anything to make our characters look like themselves again, but nothing works. I made the settings the same and took identical screenshots in multiple lighting conditions in the current game and benchmark that are in the Au Ra changes thread to show that this is not a lighting issue. Changing the environment and and gamma setting doesn't do anything to fix the fundamental changes they made to my character's facial structure. Hyur players made it through relatively intact, judging by looking through all these threads. Many other races did not. Like these lips are just not even remotely close to each other.

[cutestfox]

I'm really tired of hearing people say to adjust the lighting and gamma. I have. Many of us have. We've tried edits, angles, lights, settings, anything to make our characters look like themselves again, but nothing works. I made the settings the same and took identical screenshots in multiple lighting conditions in the current game and benchmark that are in the Au Ra changes thread to show that this is not a lighting issue. Changing the environment and and gamma setting doesn't do anything to fix the fundamental changes they made to my character's facial structure. Hyur players made it through relatively intact, judging by looking through all these threads. Many other races did not. Like these lips are just not even remotely close to each other.

The shape of the lips on the left are beautiful
I find the new one off-putting in comparison

[4clubbedace]

I'm really tired of hearing people say to adjust the lighting and gamma. I have. Many of us have. We've tried edits, angles, lights, settings, anything to make our characters look like themselves again, but nothing works. I made the settings the same and took identical screenshots in multiple lighting conditions in the current game and benchmark that are in the Au Ra changes thread to show that this is not a lighting issue. Changing the environment and and gamma setting doesn't do anything to fix the fundamental changes they made to my character's facial structure. Hyur players made it through relatively intact, judging by looking through all these threads. Many other races did not. Like these lips are just not even remotely close to each other.

they are. all intents and purposes, the same lips

DIFFRENCES
The "sharpness" of the lips are softnes due to more polygonal structures, same way an decagon is smoother than a square

lips are no longer glossy: i get this, i feel this is like, a majority of peoples issues. I dont dislike matte, but adding another seperate gloss option would go a long way

[CuteBucket]

they are. all intents and purposes, the same lips

DIFFRENCES
The "sharpness" of the lips are softnes due to more polygonal structures, same way an decagon is smoother than a square

lips are no longer glossy: i get this, i feel this is like, a majority of peoples issues. I dont dislike matte, but adding another seperate gloss option would go a long way

Excuse me? Are you trying to gaslight me? No, they are clearly not the same. Not even close. The look LOWER RES than the current lips. The shape of the top lip is much more pointy in the benchmark. The shape of the bottom of the top lip is completely flattened. The bottom lip is smaller and no longer protrudes over the shadow the lip casts, as seen in the 3rd row pic.

[Tethan]

they are. all intents and purposes, the same lips

DIFFRENCES
The "sharpness" of the lips are softnes due to more polygonal structures, same way an decagon is smoother than a square

lips are no longer glossy: i get this, i feel this is like, a majority of peoples issues. I dont dislike matte, but adding another seperate gloss option would go a long way

I'm sorry and I honestly don't mean to be rude, but that is just not how it works. "Smoothness" in 3D graphics has very, very little to do with actual poly counts. It has to do with things like shaders and spec maps.

In fact, I strongly doubt the poly count has been increased very much at all. This is not a dig at the graphics but simply, you don't need huge polycounts to achieve better results.

[Doopliss]

I'll be honest...I do still genuinely wonder why these things are weighed the same? I hate arguing about this sort of thing, because I know it never ends up well--but, if I'm allowed to be a little more blunt with my thoughts, I don't understand why people who prefer the new look should be given the same weight as those who prefer the old ones? I don't mean this dismissively, I say this because my reasoning is:
1. Nobody has gotten to actually play with the new looks yet.
2. People who prefer the new looks, I assume--hope?--made and currently play characters they enjoy the looks of.

This is of course, me thinking with the resolution them being fixing the features so that they're in line with what they look like now. Not like, reverting the graphics update...which I still honestly haven't seen many people actually call for.