The problem isn't the fx update

[CinaedhVik]

• One indisputable issue is the visible neck seam on some models.
  
• Catch-light in eyes: this is not a bug its a feature. Prior, the catch-light specular highlight was painted on regardless of lighting conditions. It's now a real reflection of ambient lighting, which is a huge improvement.
  
• Skin glow (sub surface scattering) they may have gone a bit too far here. I think that's fair to say.
  
• Facial structure and shadows: see painted-on remarks above.
  
• Lips: They added a ton of bones to the face model (bones are points of adjustment, deformation, expression). You don't see this work in the default creator static stare. They look great when you get the characters to move.

My take is that the problem here is not the model updates. They are fantastic and long overdue.

The problem is the character creator lighting and environments aren't great and always have been that way, only now they are actually used much more in influencing how you look whereas before most of it was directly painted on and static. Similarly, to get your character to emote is limited and perhaps not intuitive and that matters now for how the face moves.

My proposal to SE to fix this is to provide basic gpose in the creator. 3 posable adjustable lights and a panel of basic emotes you can trigger and freeze mid action as in gpose in game. This would allow players to use their own lighting choices and see how the faces now move.

EDIT: For context to my comments, I started XIV as a Male Hyur in ARR and switched immediately to Face 4 Fem Au Ra in Heavensward, and never switched since. I had to do some skin tone and eye color changes in the editor for Dawntrail, but I got close to my original look and in some cases better than the original look. My initial reaction to the change upon importing my old look was "Oh my gods, what have they done!?" but once I understood what they had done, and how I could get what I wanted, and why it looked so off at first, I became a lot happier with the result.

Cross-posted from Reddit r/ffxivdiscussion

*If I could have one more wish, it would be that Au Ra faces and horns be separate selections in Character Creation

[Turtledeluxe]

I agree. There are real issues, but some of it will be resolved once characters are exposed to different environments and are moving around more. Similarly some other issues will be discovered. And that's OK. This is a big project and it's a little unreasonable to expect 100% perfection pre launch.

[Fuyume]

I'm also face 4 fem Au Ra and have also been a face 4 fem Au Ra with no changes to my character since Heavensward. And I could almost level with you if it weren't for the dimples. If I wanted a cutesy character I would've made one, I do not want these dimples and there's no way to get rid of them, all the mouths have them. And changing faces is not an option because I've written stories, made art, had art made of my character. She is who she is and changing faces would mean changing the horns that I love and no other face is any more severe anyways, so I can't try another face, and she's never in eight years had dimples, but now she does and I either have to photoshop them out of every gpose from now on, or I have to come up with some reason why she suddenly has dimples. (Which again, I dislike, I made her specifically to have a more sharp and threatening face, and dimples do not add to this aesthetic.) I've seen her face from every angle and in every lighting possible, her current version in live does not have dimples so I don't understand Square's need to add them. And meanwhile, Face 2 fem Au Ra, which a friend of mine plays, is losing their dimples. That's not just light problems.

Example with as exact of a comparison as I could possible make:


Also the new dynamic catch light is far too dim if you're not staring directly at a light, which means in a lot of cutscenes it will be too dim. It needs to be brightened or enlarged. Or both.

[Kaurhz]

Personally, I would have liked to just have access to the suite of default emotes and the 3 starting city zones as a small little roaming area.

Even in the character creator with the city states as the background it isn't always even half-accurate as to what it is when actually roaming around -- But that has just been my feel and especially noticeable with my Xaela.

I am holding out hope that we will have more customization options with the expansion after Dawntrail.

[smashBG]

[LIST]

My take is that the problem here is not the model updates. They are fantastic and long overdue.

No, the model updates are the problem here, at least in part. Some of them look fine but others are changed in a lot of small ways that add up to make your character look like a funhouse version of themselves. It's one thing to adjust models to account for the new face bones and subsurface scattering. It's quite another to do it for artistic reasons, which appears to be the case for some of the more prominent changes.

[Fawkes]

• Catch-light in eyes: this is not a bug its a feature. Prior, the catch-light specular highlight was painted on regardless of lighting conditions. It's now a real reflection of ambient lighting, which is a huge improvement.

While I like the new eyes, I don't think you can say it is an improvement solely because it is more technically impressive. The purpose of the graphics in this game is not simply to recreate reality as accurately as possible. Eyes in particular can convey a lot of emotion, and catch light can help achieve that. I would argue that intentional artistic design is more important than just being realistic for the sake of it when it comes to conveying emotion.

• Lips: They added a ton of bones to the face model (bones are points of adjustment, deformation, expression). You don't see this work in the default creator static stare. They look great when you get the characters to move.

My character's face remained almost entirely the same, while others have entirely different mouth shapes than they used to. Presumably we both got the new bones, so why did they need to change some more drastically than others?

[aiqa]

Firstly, did this really need another thread? We have 20 threads about this already.

Regarding the eyes. As long as you don't get fully pathtraced games with perfect materials for everything, the "it's more realistic" argument doens't hold much water. Making a tiny part of the game more reslistic, but have that depend on something else that is completely unrealistic (the ambient lighting in FF), doesn't mean it's an improvement. Realism shouldn't be a goal in itself for such an unrealistic system, just make sure it looks better. And I haven't seen any screenshot of scene where the new eyes look better. If something looks better is of course highly subjective, but considering the number of complaints it's a widely held opinion.

Regarding the lips. The complaints about lips aren't only, or even mostly, about how they work with older animations. Lips also have a completely different shape now for many faces. That is both goes directly against the dev's stated design goal, and apparently against the preferences of very many players.

[boopadoop]

don't you also feel like everything looks vastly different in the blue aether background compared to the other backgrounds and that might be causing a lot of the issues? like maybe we're not supposed to preview them in the other backgrounds? because in the full shadows, in other backgrounds, everyone just looks awful, but it's not nearly as bad in the default background

i do think as far as actual character model/textures that the mouths were changed too much to remove their little charms, and some texturing across some faces/races that gave more character have been softened and it's a bummers

but yeah, i think overall the changes are phenomenal but there's some nitpicking and issues that are valid - but i also wonder if a lot of it is just that the lightning in different backgrounds making everything look worse
because even like... especially in gridania, textures look so muddy on some faces and icky, but then you look in the aether and it's not as bad
i think i was very redundant sorry lol

but like the difference between these two is PHENOMENAL.. same dude, different setting.. which is closer to in-game?! you know?

[CinaedhVik]

I don't think they updated the lighting or the backgrounds of any of the scenes. Just the models. I could be wrong, but it very much seems that way, and now that the backgrounds influence the way you look, it matters for the first time.

[boopadoop]

I don't think they updated the lighting or the backgrounds of any of the scenes. Just the models. I could be wrong, but it very much seems that way, and now that the backgrounds influence the way you look, it matters for the first time.

i DEFINITELY think this is the case and what's causing a loooot of the anxieties because ain't no way
versus
i see a LOT of people who are upset using gridania with the character turned into shadow like this as the background to preview them in, too, which definitely is messing with what they'll actually look like