There's improvements between this benchmark and the first pass! I like the lighting/shading, I'm happy that characters look less "waxy," and that the nasolabial lines were removed.

I went into this benchmark optimistic and pretty sure my issues were from textures or lighting. Unfortunately, not the case. Since Square is still asking for feedback, I thought it would be worth sharing the things that still stand out to me as worth a second look.




General comparisons: My WoL's face seems longer/his chin seems sharper. That could be because of the fisheye effect of the character creator though. Additionally, it looks like his nose (Midlander Face 5 Nose 2) maybe had its bump smoothed out between Benchmark 1 and 1.1 I am a little sad as I consider it a charm point.



More granular things! Like many, my guy got hit by changed eye and mouth shapes. The eye change is surprising. His were already a round, open shape others seem to have been changed to. He looks like his eyes are half lidded or mid-blink to me now. I liked the old shape. His mouth follows the trend I've seen on other models just less pronounced (but more noticeable than in Benchmark 1). His upper lip/cupid's bow has been elongated and thinned, but the lips overall are more pulled in and puckered. I was attached to the pouty upper lip with the mouth line extending out past both lips that he had to begin with. Echoing everyone who had an issue with lip shape changes, I'd prefer the original.

I miss the brighter colors on eyes and hair, as well as less grayed out skin. My WoL is missing the contrast he had. While it was subtle, I definitely notice the difference. I'd love if skintones could look more like how they do now. While I have the option of taking my WoL a notch darker in CC with the free fantasia, many of my friends play as characters who are already from that furthest row of skin tones, and they don't have any fix for how washed out their characters look now.

All in all, I see my issues as subtle versions of what other folks picked up on as in need of further review. Eye shapes, lip shapes, and skin/hair/eye color. I expected this graphics update to be more of an update to textures and lighting, not a remake of the models themselves. I hope that eventual fixes will bring us closer to that. I love the game and the fun I've had with my WoL so far, and I want to keep playing with him looking like the little guy I've gotten attached to haha.

While I don't expect fixes pre-DT, I'm curious if they could implement a 6.x/7.0 appearance toggle for this expac as they iron things out. I wouldn't suggest this if I didn't know the game was still going to run sans-graphics update on PS4. If the team is open to that temporary fix, I think it would be worth considering so folks who need more refinement and folks who like all the changes are good to go when DT rolls out. Cheers!