Updated benchmark

[SchwarzwaelderTorte]

Because, right now? It feels like a countdown to doomsday where our characters just get deleted and replaced with some alpha build that got slapped together before a lunchbreak and forgotten about. It feels like they're saying "eh, this is close enough".

Seconding this, this is going to be super cliche, but instead of making me feel excited, the traditional daily artwork countdown makes me feel like I'm in Majora's Mask and I got no ocarina on me.

[Plushy]

My dude, you need to learn a little empathy.

People are legit angry about the update not for the sake of it, not to be nitpicky, but because they're passionate and absolutely, truly love this game, and only want to see what's best for it. It's not okay that characters that people have had for upwards of 10-14 years have inexcusable mistakes (some of which are really trivial to fix, like the opacity of hellsguard pupils and nose smudge), which while many were addressed/improved with bench 1.1, there's still many, many more. I even saw a male au ri on the Japanese feedback thread, with a plump tail, have part of it cut off at the end, leaving a visible a cross section.

I know Faiarrow and have for over ten years. They have said to me, point-blank, that they'd even be willing to play through DT msq without fantaing to a femhroth (which is about the same as the death of their character, basically), if we had another check-in from the devs. Something saying they are still listening and working on things, and 'maybe expect something patch 7.x'. Some sort of transparency and timeline from the devs, rather than the sea of anxiety and uncertainty as to whether these changes will go unfixed because 'close enough'.

It's no different than the feedback players back in 1.0 gave when the game was crashing and burning. There were certainly strong words back then, because people LOVE THE GAME. Like I said, they only want to see what's best for it, and for the devs. That sort of passion doesn't come about out of a vacuum.

I do have empathy and if I seem insensitive I apologize.
But as I said to another person. They just can not change characters in the middle of the expansion. It'll cause way more harm than good.
I already gave some examples but to repeat; people that like the changes would be in the same boat as all the people not happy, the people that warmed up to the changes and like it now will also be upset and the people that WANTED changes have a chance of STILL being upset because the changes SE did isn't how they wanted it or they changed things they actually liked then we'll be right back where we are, another example of the peoples that want change.

Person A: I don't like the lips and want the 6.58 version but I like the eyes so good job there
Person B: I don't like the eyes and want the 6.58 version but I like the lips so great job there
Person C: I like the new changes, please don't revert anything SE

Now who should SE listen to? if listen to A and B this is what would happen
Person A: Change the eyes back SE! I liked the new eyes!
Person B: Change the lips back SE! I liked the new lips!
Person C: Why did you change things SE! Change it back!

People will get upset wanting more changes. With that possibility in mind...(and you know it will happen).
Rather than asking for things to be changed. At this stage its better to ask for more options. SE is in a position where they split the player base on the new characters and changing anything at this stage is a terrible decision and no matter what, someone is going to be sad.
SE isn't going to do another overhaul of the characters after 1.1 still isn't enough for people.
Not to be rude but most (---->most meaning not everybody<----) people wanting things reverted won't fully be happy unless they just decide to not do the character update and even if that's not true. I think people need to accept even if they some how got characters to look 1:1 with everything the same model.
It STILL won't look like 6.58 because higher poly, better textures, better shadows, sub surface scattering and non hand drawn pupil highlights and lips, different lighting rendering and how it reflects off the eyes. Its just not possible, someone will not be happy.

I really do think most of you will get use to the changes personally once you're actually in-game and seeing your character in different lighting and glams rather than the benchmark, could still be wrong but for most people I think will get use to it.

It's no different than the feedback players back in 1.0 gave when the game was crashing and burning. There were certainly strong words back then, because people LOVE THE GAME. Like I said, they only want to see what's best for it, and for the devs. That sort of passion doesn't come about out of a vacuum.

Honestly this isn't even comparable to 1.0 because people actually like the updated characters. This will only make sense if everybody hated it and nothing is still being done.
I'm not going to list my links again because it makes people mad but yeah....not comparable, not by a long shot.

[Iscah]

Now who should SE listen to?

The people telling them how to achieve their previously stated aspiration of keeping the characters looking the same as they were before.

[GreenLeafy]

I was holding onto little hope to see my miqo'te's botched mouth to be fixed even with the second benchmark , but seeing them barely address most of the issues that weren't connected to the poor lighting in the first benchmark and how sloppy some other fixes are kinda cemented they don't care as much. Not even a mention in the LL either.
Its a pretty hard pill to swallow that I'm sacrificing my character's face that's been the same for 9 years , for the sake of supposed new animations that might be available for facial rigging with all these extra polygons wow !!! - and then see Wuk Lamat and other NPCs in the latest trailer use the exact same facial expressions and talking animations I've been looking at in cutscenes for almost a decade. Like lmao if you're forcing the plastic surgery on me at the very least make it worth it Idk.

Seconding this, this is going to be super cliche, but instead of making me feel excited, the traditional daily artwork countdown makes me feel like I'm in Majora's Mask and I got no ocarina on me.

This. I am dreading launch day...

[azaleai]

I'm going to be totally honest. I HIGHLY doubt they're going to change characters in the middle of the expansion. (This on top of there are lots of bugs and weighting issues they have to fix)
Everybody that liked the changes will be the in the same boat as you, people that have warmed up to their new characters will be upset and then on top of that, assuming they did make more changes. Its possible the changes they made won't even please you and others that wanted changes so now everybody is stuck with a character they're not happy with, everybody is upset.
They just can't make big changes at this stage as its too risky and just a overall bad move, the only thing they can do is add more character options in 8.0 or 9.0.

I understand where you're coming from and I do agree, if they were to reverse some of the more aesthetic decisions (slightly altered eye shape, altered clan marks and colours, etc) there would be some people disappointed. That's why I personally will make my peace with my darkened pupils and lightened nose smudge if that never gets fixed... I don't really agree with the choice, but I know it probably appeals to someone out there.

But I need you to understand, the parts I want them to make an announcement about intending to fix are the bugs, the glaring issues with the models and textures, the holes and seams.

Here's what I mean by femroe face 2 lip textures not matching up:



The normal map for the lips (the faux 3D texture) is completely straight across, while the diffuse (the colour texture) has a defined upper lip shape. The philtrum doesn't really make sense with either texture, to be honest.

My complaint with the eyebrow creases is rather difficult to illustrate without datamining the textures from the benchmark or some such, but imagine if they took the normal map for the lips and just straight up deleted it, leaving only the diffuse map. When the rest of the face has detailed normals, that looks incredibly odd and uncanny valley. When the current 6.58 face has those normals it feels like a step backwards.

Here's some of the holes between the head and the hair:



Which is caused by the alterations being made to the shape of the head model, but no tweaks being made to the hair model. Either the hair models need to be altered as well, or the head model should have retained the same basic shape.

Somewhat less glaring, but here's an example of the texture seams:



This is just straight up a problem with how the textures have been baked.

These aren't aesthetic choices; these are mistakes. I can't fathom anybody preferring it this way.

But compound that with the aesthetic differences, the lips being completely different shapes, the changing of colours, the fading of clan marks? It's just. a big mess.

[Loggos]

Seconding this, this is going to be super cliche, but instead of making me feel excited, the traditional daily artwork countdown makes me feel like I'm in Majora's Mask and I got no ocarina on me.

My feelings exactly. : (
I know some people say "just change, you're too attached" but this is a story-driven game so it should not be surprising that some people actually build a, well, story around their characters and don't just treat them as virtual legs to traverse the game with.
There's this vibe that story-driven gaming or RPing is somehow less mature than technical fighting gameplay. If you care more about your char's story-driven experience than the fact that they are ostensibly just a means to do battle content with then your "gaming priorities are wrong".
I've had my OG char for such a long time and to add another cliche to this, she is my favourite character in here.
I like battle content but I want to experience it with my character in particular. For me challenge and story are equal components of what makes FF fun to me.
For others the balance may look different, nobody is wrong here, since it's about how you subjectively have fun as an individual. So I wished people who feel less attached to their chars could see that FF has many different aspects that different people focus on in terms of enjoying themselves.
For me the update's changes making my WoL look like a different char is a bit like your favourite character getting updated out of the game.

[SherlottaEryut]

EW:


DT:


My friend said she's turned into Anya Taylor Joy (Side note: LOVE HER but I'm after a FFXII Viera look)
I think she looks less rabbit-like...? I'll have to play around in the benchmark a bit more but at the moment not sure how I feel about this.

[Iscah]

For me the update's changes making my WoL look like a different char is a bit like your favourite character getting updated out of the game.

This is also actually a possibility, given that these changes will affect NPCs as well, either by default because they're built in the character creator or because the major characters' custom faces are presumably being updated through the same methods and by the same people who were supposedly aiming to keep the characters looking as they were before.

[Plushy]

snip

Ahh if its just bugs then I agree (more reason why adjusting characters again is a bad idea because it would just add more character model bugs) but they already said they would fix issues in the update benchmark so they don't really need to make another PSA.
https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes...ecd574ad0d397a
As always, we will remain open to feedback even after the updated benchmark update and Dawntrail have been released, and will also continue to address any issues or necessary adjustments in future patches!

The people telling them how to achieve their previously stated aspiration of keeping the characters looking the same as they were before.

This is just simply selfish. There is no seniority system, they don't have to listen to you or the people pointing out slight changes.
If I were to post my links again it would seem more people are overwhelmingly liking the changes than against it. Because I don't see any posts with over 5k likes that were criticizing the new looks. The highest I seen was like 1k and that was someone upset their male midlander looked different and it was from a popular streamer/youtuber shinpei or something (so you could argue it was people liking it just for the sake of it since it was from a popular streamer.)
https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes...ecd574ad0d397a
---->Even so, we imagine the subtle differences in nuance will inevitably cause some characters to look ever so slightly different compared to before.<----- Should that be the case, a phial of Fantasia will be obtainable from a new quest that will be added with the release of Patch 7.0, which will allow you to fine-tune your character's appearance.

[Evermomo]

The truth is, all of the statements about the graphical update are PR comments. I don't say this to be negative about the development team, that's just the reality of it because SE/CBU3 is a business. They're ambiguous and leave room for interpretation. It's impossible for us to tell what counts/will count as an "issue/necessary adjustment/response to player feedback" vs what counts as "a subtle difference in nuance" except in retrospect. Since game development is such a complicated practice with so many resources and disciplines competing with each other, it's possible that answer could change day by day. So I sympathize that it's hard for SE to make specific promises.

Either way, we won't gain anything by trying to argue with each other where that line is. Making it into a player vs player issue and calling people "selfish" if they disagree with you feels unnecessary.