Dawntrail Benchmark

You can download it here: https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/benchmark/download/

I feel like most of you already knew that and most likely already ran it (rip console players though, but I'll gladly run it for you if you want to have an idea of what you character look like what the new graphic update!). So, if you've run it already... What are your thoughts?

Au Ra and elezen players have really come out on top, from all I've seen so far.

Pros:


-NO MORE PIXEL HORNS!!!! Actual details on horns and scales. Biggest upgrade of them all imo

-I love how the new limbal rings look like they're actually part of the iris and not like shitty circle contact lenses. I feel like the panic and outcry about them was unfounded.

-Lighting is so much nicer. I'm holding out my opinion on indoor lighting since everything we've seen has been outdoors, but I am very hype.

-Elezen ear subsurface scattering!!!!! Elezen ear translucency!!!!!

-I wanna know when we get that new DRG Nidhogg skill. I'm already reskinning it as Hraesvelgr for Kitali but I am very about it.

-Viper LB3 looks sick as fuck.

-New crafting gear is gorgeous I cannot wait to get my hands on it.

-HROTHGALS. Fem Hroth pretty. I may have to make another alt.

Cons:


-skin and hair tones are presenting WAY lighter than current when I loaded in appearance data for some of my retainers and alts. I had to step down a couple shades darker to get one of my Duskwights to show up proper, though I have not tried the gamma reduction trick yet.

-Keepers lost their fangs, and I believe there's already a forum thread open to lodge complaints.

-Very rubbery/shiny skin texture. I have seen someone fix it by lowering the specular but I don't know if that's going to be a vanilla option.

-Makeup colours seem to be very off? I don't know if it's because they're being applied differently than they are now but WOW they are all over the place.

Misc.:

-Elezen mouth weight seems to be off when it opens? I haven't seen it on any other race and it may be a fluke that has yet to be addressed.

-Most notable change I've seen across the board is the mouth shapes have changed, some more drastically than others, and I am going to guess that this is the result of the scuplts being homogenised to having the same amount of polygons.


Overall, I have a very positive outlook for the updates, and I hope that some of the more objective issues are addressed (like how the viera two tone nose was put back in after the initial upgrade demo).

I can understand that not everyone is as pleased, and that's fine! There is no way to cater to literally every player. But I feel I must also remind everyone that 1) the benchmark has only just released and change takes adjusting to and 2) it's a bunch of fucking pixels. It ain't that deep.

I'm overall very impressed and optimistic as well. My only "complaint" is more of a personal preference: they changed something about fem Vieras' mouths (and maybe eyes) that results in them looking more overtly feminine, which is great if that's your thing, but I prefer to keep my main looking more on the androgynous side, so I will likely go back to their old masc model (which is no problem, since we're getting a free fantasia).

I also heard about the glowup that Elezen got, so I just pulled up my old Duskwight appearance data and....ended up making a completely different character, but anyway, I uh. Love them. I might need to make another alt.