Was This Face Change Ever Explained?

[Cheapshot]

Oh I hadn't heard about an upcoming update! Thanks, I'll save my fantasia for now then. I wonder what's to happen for players who already spent theirs though.

This particular change on changing the colors of the face stripes seems so blatant to me however, that I assume it to be an intentional one. Instead of being a minor alteration of a lip or eye shape, this seems to be such a more... obvious, for lack of better words, change, so I assumed it was one they did on purpose. I just wonder if there was any word on "why".

It's fairly inconsistent. Here's the megathread where people have left the majority of their face feedback.
https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...ion-megathread

You'll be able to see that some faces received much more significant change than others, and oddly, there's not really any consistent philosophy across the board. Some facial features were made softer and more delicate on some faces while made sterner and sharper on others. Some faces were made more youthful looking and some were made more mature looking. Some faces had their features carefully recreated while others had them entirely replaced. Some faces lost racial traits. Some things changed colour for seemingly no reason. Some peoples eyebrows were made brighter, some made darker. Many features like lashes or eye textures were replaced with different ones, while still being the same resolution, so it's unclear why they were even replaced. It's kinda the wild west. It doesn't entirely feel like there was enough oversight or guidance.

As for people who have already used the free fantasia, well I still had my original. I loved my character so much that I never used it. I finally fanta'd for the first time recently and became an Au'ra with a friend to see if an entirely new character might work for me but it didn't. I'm hoping they adjust my original face and then I'll fanta back to my original appearance. I think that if I didn't still have a spare fanta, at this point I would just happily buy another and I wouldn't even dream of complaining. My attachment to my character was cementing my connection to the story and world. I want my face to look familiar again so badly that I'd pay money. I suspect a lot of people in that thread feel the same way.

I'm just waiting very patiently and anxiously for the statement they promised toward the end of this month regarding all the feedback on character appearances.

[Rabblerabble]

I feel like another slider is needed for fine tuning, not sure 'where' that slider should affect, and that that free fantasia needs to be given again with the upcoming update.

That being said, I do feel like the second picture of the OP is better than the first picture, but I don't make fem miqos often, so haven't got much stock in the affair.

[Argantaelle]

Were these ever explained by the developers?

I remember there was a mentioning that they wanted to keep faces close to how they originally appeared before the graphics update, but this change seems way too glaring to be a mistake.

No, the changes weren't announced or explained; players just had to face reality when the first benchmark iteration was released.

The root of the issue is (as far as I can see) the universal mesh the developers replaced all the faces with (maybe except for Hrothgars; they are too extreme) and universal diffuse maps for some body parts (like the eyes, for example). And then SE designers tried to make the faces resemble their former selves.

Some faces got better treatment, some faces suffered severely, as if they were put in the hands of different designers with different skill levels or the QA team had no time (or intention) to verify them properly. Also, the universal mesh has some animation problems (especially with the smiles), and they are present across all unified races.

This Japanese post explains very well the issue with the universal mesh:
https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...=1#post6585636

P.S.
In case it's difficult for you to read Google-translated Japanese, there is an English post about the same issue illustrated by Lalafellin mesh.

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...=1#post6580162

There aren't "tiny changes," "resolution increase," or "smoothing the polygons here and there." It's a complete character overhaul.

[Titor]

Oh gosh if they're planning another major graphics update change to fix the current issues, I hope we get another Fanta to undo changes we made to try to work with how they look now <_>

[Caitlinzulu]

Then its prop a me thing but i cant see any difference in my own characters.
I struggle to see a difference in a lot of side by side examples people post claiming their character is unrecognisable. To me it feels like a lot of hyperbole.

[Cheapshot]

Then its prop a me thing but i cant see any difference in my own characters.
I struggle to see a difference in a lot of side by side examples people post claiming their character is unrecognisable. To me it feels like a lot of hyperbole.

You’re right, it’s a you thing. But that’s ok! As long as you understand you might just have a bit of face blindness. It’s normal. There’s a lot of divide on this because recognizing faces is a biological factor determined subconsciously in the brain. Recognizing things that are different is a survival instinct. Some people are gonna see two eyes a nose and a mouth and go “yep, face”, and some people are gonna notice immediately if someone shows up with a different nose. If someone has ever gotten mad at you irl for not noticing their new haircut or glasses, then you’ve run into this before. So when you or others who respond similar to you see people talking about the differences in faces but it all looks the same to you, try to be understanding. That’s probably just what’s going on.

I’ve tried to be accommodating of that with my feedback in that thread by showing as many detailed markups and direct overlay gifs as I could. If I can at least show people that “yes, there are physical changes to the shapes of features”, then I have a foothold. I can hope to convince others that if they know now things changed but can’t tell the difference, then they shouldn’t mind if things are made to more resemble the original faces again, right? If you didn’t notice things changed, then you shouldn’t mind if they change back. They can modify the new base mesh to more closely recreate the original feature shapes. Everything would look just as good in the new lighting with higher resolution textures.

[Sacae]

You’re right, it’s a you thing. But that’s ok! As long as you understand you might just have a bit of face blindness. It’s normal. There’s a lot of divide on this because recognizing faces is a biological factor determined subconsciously in the brain. Recognizing things that are different is a survival instinct. Some people are gonna see two eyes a nose and a mouth and go “yep, face”, and some people are gonna notice immediately if someone shows up with a different nose. If someone has ever gotten mad at you irl for not noticing their new haircut or glasses, then you’ve run into this before. So when you or others who respond similar to you see people talking about the differences in faces but it all looks the same to you, try to be understanding. That’s probably just what’s going on.

I’ve tried to be accommodating of that with my feedback in that thread by showing as many detailed markups and direct overlay gifs as I could. If I can at least show people that “yes, there are physical changes to the shapes of features”, then I have a foothold. I can hope to convince others that if they know now things changed but can’t tell the difference, then they shouldn’t mind if things are made to more resemble the original faces again, right? If you didn’t notice things changed, then you shouldn’t mind if they change back. They can modify the new base mesh to more closely recreate the original feature shapes. Everything would look just as good in the new lighting with higher resolution textures.

Why does it have to be one party having "face blindness" and not the other party having an overreaction to a miniscule change?

[Cheapshot]

Why does it have to be one party having "face blindness" and not the other party having an overreaction to a miniscule change?

Well, when someone tells me I’m overreacting and nothing changed I gave them the benefit of the doubt. I considered I could be somehow wrong and the changes were just tricks of lighting or imagined.

So I looked at the literal meshes side by side. They changed a lot.

How about you? Face blindness is a real thing, it’s called Prosopagnosia and there’s a lot of types of it. Observing and remembering facial features is typically how our brains recognize others who we’re familiar with. Some people don’t recognize others that way. I was willing to consider that I might be wrong, so I went out of my way to test my perception. I don’t see people on the other side of the fence making much effort to consider they’re wrong though?

[Cheapshot]

And if people can see that things look different but they like the new features better, then that’s a different argument. Or rather that doesn’t have to be an argument at all. There can be common ground where everyone wants an improved character creator with more options. There’s an ideal world where almost everyone gets what they want, but SE just needs to devote the appropriate time and budget to making it happen. The graphics update should always have included an update to the CC.

I have a lot of criticism for rushing this graphic update out alongside an entire expansion while the lead dev was also split between this and FFXVI. I also am very anxious if they’re “putting the finishing touches” on an additional update for character appearances as they said. I appreciate that they let us know we’re being heard but it simply hasn’t been long enough to fix everything. If it’s more fixes like we saw between the benchmark and full release I’d rather they take their time.

[gllt]

Why do the people who don't care about the changes care so much about the changes by being defensive over them towards people who care about the changes