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

[Rueby]

I personally like the new lashes, especially on face 4 mooncat. I hope it is optional because I like them but some people don’t. My guess is they changed them because the most popular mods people use are adding lashes and make up on their characters. It’s probably why the devs decided to make the lashes thicker and longer now. I don’t think they look fake, but they do make the face 4 mooncat cuter imo.

I'm glad that you do! But I personally think these eyelashes are too much, I really loved the way the old lashes looked that they didn't curl up and had an almost downward sloping look to them. She had a bigger nosebridge with a bump on it that was sandfiled, I was really happy with the way she looked and I'm sad that 'flaws' that she had that to me made her charming to me got standardized. I think this is personal preference, but I think they shouldn't have gone that overboard. Alot of eyeshapes look very same-y now because all I notice is the heavy copy pasted thick eyelashes.

1. Stick to the original look
2. Add a toggle

If they really are inspired by mods then this change should be optional rather than 'this is what you get now'. I don't even have any other eye options that has sparser eyelashes because they ALL have the same copy pasted eyelash design. Don't get me wrong, I think she's pretty, but I also think alot of the old charm that I chose is gone.

[Moonsprite]

I'm glad that you do! But I personally think these eyelashes are too much, I really loved the way the old lashes looked that they didn't curl up and had an almost downward sloping look to them. She had a bigger nosebridge with a bump on it that was sandfiled, I was really happy with the way she looked and I'm sad that 'flaws' that she had that to me made her charming to me got standardized. I think this is personal preference, but I think they shouldn't have gone that overboard. Alot of eyeshapes look very same-y now because all I notice is the heavy copy pasted thick eyelashes.

1. Stick to the original look
2. Add a toggle

If they really are inspired by mods then this change should be optional rather than 'this is what you get now'. I don't even have any other eye options that has sparser eyelashes because they ALL have the same copy pasted eyelash design. Don't get me wrong, I think she's pretty, but I also think alot of the old charm that I chose is gone.

I think more options are a good thing. I doubt anyone would disagree with that. It really highlights how limited the character creation in this game really is though. I don’t know which way they will decide to go with either reverting or keeping the changes they made (I really doubt it’s all shadows/lighting). Unfortunately, I doubt they will let us have options.

I don’t want to derail the thread but I want to mention that the viera/Hrothgar situation has taken years to implement hairstyles and they still can’t use a good majority of hats. I know tiny graphical fixes like eyelashes are easier to change than fitting hats, but I doubt they will actually add options for people now.

If they didn’t update character creation for DT, then it probably won’t happen until next xpan. There was a great opportunity during this graphics update to do things like unlock Au Ra horns or let Hrothgar have all their racial styles and they didn’t do it. They even made hrothgirl hairstyles locked to certain faces. I’m guessing it won’t be a priority for now.

[Evergrey]

I think more options are a good thing. I doubt anyone would disagree with that. It really highlights how limited the character creation in this game really is though. I don’t know which way they will decide to go with either reverting or keeping the changes they made (I really doubt it’s all shadows/lighting). Unfortunately, I doubt they will let us have options.

I'm thinking that considering all the cutscenes and pre-rendered animations that most likely are made using the new face skeletons and shapes, I doubt that they even can revert the changes even if they wanted to.
Because if they did, and the cutscenes being tied to the (most likely) new animations they'd have to cut all the pre-rendered cutscenes from the game, unless people want janky as hell cutscenes with weird facial expressions due to less than limited facial structures.

My 2 cents, so I personally am expecting things to stay with the changes.
Lighting, shadow and color touch ups I can see happening. But nothing drastical with how things are shaped.
But who knows, maybe they'll surprise me.

[Arkdra]

I'm thinking that considering all the cutscenes and pre-rendered animations that most likely are made using the new face skeletons and shapes, I doubt that they even can revert the changes even if they wanted to.
Because if they did, and the cutscenes being tied to the (most likely) new animations they'd have to cut all the pre-rendered cutscenes from the game, unless people want janky as hell cutscenes with weird facial expressions due to less than limited facial structures.

My 2 cents, so I personally am expecting things to stay with the changes.
Lighting, shadow and color touch ups I can see happening. But nothing drastical with how things are shaped.
But who knows, maybe they'll surprise me.

Naw, they could. What they would have to do is 1 of 2 things depending on if they scrap the entire project or try to implement a toggle as asked for in the thread title. If they scrap the just the character aspect of the graphical update, then they would throw out all the animation work so far and have to redo all of it using the original bones. Certainly possible, but there's no way this would be doable without a significant delay in Dawntrails release. Don't really have any idea how long that would actually take, probably bare minimum of 2 weeks but if you told me 3-4 months I'd believe you. This gets even longer if they have to revert other aspects of the graphical update like the lighting and he new plants and such. Which, they probably would but whatever, that's more in the weeds than I want to get.

If they wanted to develop a toggle then they don't scrap anything, but they do now have to do several things. First, they have to implement the toggle in a player facing way. 2nd, they then have to redo every cutscene with the old models to make available so that people with old bodies see those cutscenes and people with new models see the new model cutscenes, while also finishing up the new model variants. Once they have old and new versions of cutscenes, they need to create a way for the game to recognize which version of model your character is using and have it play the corresponding cutscene. Then they need to QA all of this so this whole idea means an even longer delay to DT's release than with option 1. Additionally, they are now locked into doing this in perpetuity forever so now not only is dawntrail delayed but every patch and every expansion has that much more time added between releases to accomodate this.

In my extremely unprofressional opinion, there is 0% chance they ever do 2. With enough blowback they might be talked into doing 1, but we aren't remotely close to that level.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

I've made my post some days ago here, but then I figured it would be nicer to elaborate further with more comparison pics. Taken in the Aetherial Sea instead:

Figure 1


My prev post already covers most of my likes and dislikes. But I really would like to reiterate that I severely dislike the new nasolabial folds as it destroys his youthful look. I would be fine if those only become prominent when doing certain emotes. Alternatively, add an age slider.

The ear looking less jagged in DT quite possibly the result of more poly being added, which is lovely.

Figure 2


Face paint is applied to make it easier to see his eyelids on one side. I only did the tracing on right eye but left eye also suffers from similar issue of "having its poly upped but failure to keep the old eye shape". I'd really like to keep his old eye shape.

Additionally, they did make the eyelid less thicker & his sclera is also brighter in benchmark, but I'm indifferent to that.

Figure 3


The tracing shows that his lips are re-sculpted from heart shaped to bow shaped. Additionally, his upper lips and the tips also look less defined. I severely dislike this change. I hope this will be addressed in the 2nd launch of benchmark as promised, though.

Figure 4


There it is again, nose bridge is thinner in benchmark. Nose trills are also shrunk. That being said, I do like the new, better shadows. I'd like to keep the old shape and the new shadows.

Overall, I think it'd be great if they would add more options.