There are several things they could do to improve the character customization that wouldn't increase the number of data values loaded for each player, assuming that excuse is true.

Such as:
- Adding more faces, eyes, noses, mouths and hairstyles.
- Adding an option to mirror hairstyles (by treating the mirrored versions as separate hairstyles on the backend, accessed by a "mirror" button on their corresponding hairstyle)
- Adding different highlight patterns for certain hairstyles (using the same workaround as above, separate hairstyle IDs)
- Separating Au Ra faces and horns (again by using a similar workaround, storing every face/horn combination as a separate "face" ID on the backend)