Dawntrail character graphics update - opinions, requests and discussion megathread

[Cheapshot]

Man, I've tried but I just can't bring myself to play as much anymore. I can get by with most of the facial changes, but I just want my Au Ra eyes back. It's such a complete change, a bait and switch. How can they just retcon it like this? She looks so stoned. /sob

ShB


DT


Sorry, just feeling desperate. I really really wish the devs would hear us out. I want to play the game I've been playing for all these years.

Eye changes were so wildly inconsistent across races I really don’t understand what happened. Some got lash reductions, and some got mascara, and none of the lash textures are actually higher resolution? Some got their eye corners raised and some got them lowered? Also why’d they make your pupils randomly bigger? So strange.

[Doopliss]

Eye changes were so wildly inconsistent across races I really don’t understand what happened. Some got lash reductions, and some got mascara, and none of the lash textures are actually higher resolution? Some got their eye corners raised and some got them lowered? Also why’d they make your pupils randomly bigger? So strange.

Lips, too. In a way that's driving me equally crazy. Several lips that used to have a slight smile got changed to a neutral or frowning expression (♀ Elezen Face 1, ♀ Miqo'te Face 2, ♀ Roegadyn Face 4, ♀ Midlander Face 1, ♂ Midlander Face 4, ♀ Au Ra Face 3, ♂ Au Ra Face 3, ♂ Viera Face 3), and several lips that used to be shaped in a frown or neutral expression got changed to a slight smile (♀ Elezen Face 4, ♂ Elezen Face 2, ♀ Roegadyn Face 3, ♀ Au Ra Face 2, ♂ Miqo'te Face 4). Just examples off the top of my head. And of course they've been both widened or narrowed inconsistently, too.

It does really make it feel like things were either rushed or just eyeballed rather than it being an intentional beautification attempt. Then again, makeup for all female characters in the first benchmark was thickened significantly across the board... I really wish they could really tell us what the hell has been happening here.

[Aurumis]

So I did a gif using Endwalker and Dawntrail benchmarks.
To everyone who said they didn't change faces.... you are fucking blind.

I want my old face... what they did to my WoL... they just ruined him. Look at his eyes... and the mouth.... the eyebrows are thinner... the chin is rounder than before... I just want to cry...

Male miqo'te face 4 eyes 3 mouth 1, nose 1

[UNDEAD10000]

After patch 7.0, i spend lot less time looking my character face when my character ended up looking like a lifeless doll and there is so many things that is so wrong with my character face.

Things like:
- Shape of eyes are wrong.
- Size of pupils is too big.
- Size of eyes limbal ring is too big.
- Shape of nose looks too wide.
- Shape of upper lip is too flat.
- Eyebrows are missing the details completely.
- Skin looks way too doll like.
- Scales are way too sharp.

I really wish FFXIV devs to revert all the changes to facial features, so i get my original look of my character face back.

Note that i don't have any screenshots of my character from patch 6.x when normaly i don't take screenshots and i had to use Endwalker benchmark to take screenshots of my character from patch 6.x.



Link to original size of the image:
https://i.imgur.com/atjGyIR.jpg

[grinkdaboy]

what most people seem to take issue with (at least from my point of view) is the fact that they've added many many more triangles to the face in order to give it a more realistic and rounded appearance as opposed to something more angular and lower fidelity

[Astronis]

Just dropping by again to say it has been two weeks, my opinion remains that they did an excellent job, and I am regularly caught off guard at how good my WoL looks compared to before (except for logging in, he looks absolutely horrible there). Looking at older screenshots just goes to show, for me, how well the devs did in updating the characters.

[eohippus]

Lips, too. In a way that's driving me equally crazy. Several lips that used to have a slight smile got changed to a neutral or frowning expression (♀ Elezen Face 1, ♀ Miqo'te Face 2, ♀ Roegadyn Face 4, ♀ Midlander Face 1, ♂ Midlander Face 4, ♂ Au Ra Face 3, ♂ Viera Face 3), and several lips that used to be shaped in a frown or neutral expression got changed to a slight smile (♀ Elezen Face 4, ♂ Elezen Face 2, ♀ Au Ra Face 2, ♂ Miqo'te Face 4). Just examples off the top of my head. And of course they've been both widened or narrowed inconsistently, too.

It does really make it feel like things were either rushed or just eyeballed rather than it being an intentional beautification attempt. Then again, makeup for all female characters in the first benchmark was thickened significantly across the board... I really wish they could really tell us what the hell has been happening here.

The inconsistencies are so baffling. my friend plays as a femra, and we were talking the other night about the graphics update. turns out we had the exact inverse happen to our character's eyes. my face 5 ♂ midlander's eyes were made pointed and narrowed, while their ♀ au ra's eyes are now way more rounded. neither of us are happy. likewise I assumed all lip changes (which I don't like) were standardized, but there's been some faces allowed to maintain features that were totally removed from the lip shape I use on my wol....make it make sense

[Kaziek]

I've posted this about female midlander face 1, eye shape 4 in the bug report forum, in case someone wants to contribute or add more screenshots from before and after (I don't have many from before to compare).

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...-1-Eye-Shape-4

This is an issue with all eye shapes for face 1 actually, and is easily the biggest issue with the character update for that face. There are several other things too that people have already pointed out in detail in this thread as well as the JP one, but if I could pick only one thing to be brought more in line with the old face it would be fixing the eyes. Unlike some of the other F midlander faces they actually reduced makeup as a whole for face 1, which is part of the reason that the under eye bags are so prominent.

[lunartears]

Honestly, I think it can be assumed that every single face was modified drastically (with a heavy focus on eye, eyelash, pupil, mouth corners, lip width, lip shape, eye width, entire facial features position, list goes on) just to varying degrees (sometimes the lips will stay the same but the eyes will change?) with the majority being done in a way that completely lacks the original feeling. When shown an NPC even of a race I don't have familarity with, most of the time I can immediately tell that something is off.

I could probably prove this by analyising and creating a comparision for every single face combination across all races but it would be way too tiring to pull off.

[Aurumis]

Honestly, I think it can be assumed that every single face was modified drastically (with a heavy focus on eye, eyelash, pupil, mouth corners, lip width, lip shape, eye width, entire facial features position, list goes on) just to varying degrees (sometimes the lips will stay the same but the eyes will change?) with the majority being done in a way that completely lacks the original feeling. When shown an NPC even of a race I don't have familarity with, most of the time I can immediately tell that something is off.

I could probably prove this by analyising and creating a comparision for every single face combination across all races but it would be way too tiring to pull off.

if you take a look at the japanese forum, they are doing it already...for their own characters tho, but there is so many... they DID change everything. The devs lied about not changing them or listening to the feedback of the benchmark. How is it possible that the Scions look exactly the same but better, but all the character models looks different? this is not an upgrade, it's a downgrade for many faces. Some look good? yes, but many not, and changed so much that it is not the same character, they could have left them stay the same but with high definition textures and etc, like how gshade, mods and all works, but they fucked it very badly. And it was not necessary. Like I say, it's sad that the NPCs looks exactly the same (except Thancred, he looks worse, specially his skin texture), and the WoL of the people have totally changed. Just liars.