FFXIV Old graphics and new updated graphics comparison. (PS5) (A few Ilberd related cutscenes )

This was more so a small passion project since Ilberd's my favourite character in FFXIV and I wanted to see how he changed in the new graphical update.
All Settings on my PS 5 and the game are the same as before the graphical update.
Look how they massacred my sloppy boy

[@Chocoboy_James]

Those putting down comments about "Put your character lighting slider to 0, you idiot!" Character Lighting slider is for your personal WoL only. (It even says so in the game next to the slider.) EDIT: (disproven! It works for me OUTSIDE of the cutscene for all characters, yet inside the cutscene it doesn't do much of anything. You can attack me for this all you want, but it doesn't change that simple fact. I have done everything I personally can to check. Mine has always been on 0 since I started the game, and I carefully checked it when I started DT. (Since most tips are: you should slide to 0)Thanks for the tips, but sadly that is not what causes the issue in my case. EDIT: I've just rewatched a scene with slider on 100, then turned to 0. It didn't do much change, if anything. Might want to upload that kind of video later once I've progressed more of DT ^^7 Thanks most folk for being so open and putting down feedback. and my overall apologies for trying to prove the previous edit was true. The game has been something I have been trusting for years, and after MSQ grind I could finally use the slide myself, therefore concluding that it WORKS for me outside of cutscenes but doesn't seem to do much in the old cutscenes. To think a mere passion project would arise such confusion and debate, also from my end and claims, I can only own up to it and apologise for the character lighting issue! Sorry for a late edit on this as well, I too am trying to enjoy Dawntrail in its new glory, and I cannot check everything on a whim. So again my apologies for everything ^^7

[@hehashivemind6111]

Yeah, no. I just tested this scene myself. Your character lighting is absolutely not at zero, but not only that, you should consider cranking down the Full Screen Mode Gamma Correction (or whatever it says for PS5) right above that setting. On an OLED, its worth cranking that all the way to zero, but at minimum bringing it down to 15-20 on an LCD IPS display should make it look better. Character lighting affects everyone, not just your player character. That makes no sense.

[@Chocoboy_James]

@@hehashivemind6111 Great of you to assume such when I know my personal settings pretty well. Edit: plus look on the Exclamation mark next to the character setting. the game isn't lying.

[@Soyboythoughts]

@@hehashivemind6111 Thank you, this helped me a lot

[@Shahpo]

Character lighting is not just for your character, it's for NPCs too. Try it out in a field of mobs.

[@Chocoboy_James]

@@Shahpo I did, and it's true, apologies in advance! (I finally had time to check myself after MSQ grind ^^7) It's however still not changing anything in the cutscene, not sure why tbh. It still looks bright and clay like.

[@razoras]

It's like someone attached a lightbulb to the cameras

[@ilakya]

There's the "character lighting" that's already existed since 2.0 but now it's been reset to 0.5 no matter if you had it on or off before. This seems to be the default.

[@pencilgoblin655]

Was thinking the exact same thing

[@serenehearts326]

@@ilakya that's not true. mine's at .22 and is still at .22 and I didn't do anything to it.

[@StormierNik]

​@@ilakyathat's.. Only for your own character. And it's still there. What the actual thing seems to be is that there was always a dim lightsource attached to the camera in this scene because some areas would end up being WAY too dark. The type of dim lightsource you'd find in group pose. But because they changed the lighting system globally, it's much more apparent.

[@lollydolly1340]

It’s a ring light 😂

[@ashezarrine]

The most jarring thing about this video was being reminded of Ilberd’s old voice lol

[@mostlyblissful6666]

That Richard Epcar jump scare lmao

[@gamermaster16508]

sloppeh

[@tobaccocrow4432]

Ahh the times when Ilberd(and Gaius) shared a voiced actor with Raiden and Old Joseph Joestar.

[@rogerarteaga2665]

It was fine really dont see anything wrong with them one has an accent the other doesnt

[@shinkansen1]

Scene still gives me fear of Raubahn. The Bull of Ala Mhigo KICKED a segment out of a solid meter-thick stone support column.

[@jasongarrett768]

The lion roar brings the hype every single time too.

[@rubykid15]

In some ways the new lighting definitely helps in the more "well lit" areas like in the throne room, but in the darker areas, ie. Ilberd / Alphinaud moment, it causes the impact of the shadows to be lost, which actually wind up taking away from the scene and character expressions. Makes you wonder if they went through each of these scenes one by one or if it was just a global setting they turned on and it's not properly balanced with every scene.

[@bakacdaz]

Ilberd look like a cray doll and the handmaid look like teenager who use beauty filter app on the phone.

[@twilightgeneral777]

I'm hoping they go through and readjust the lighting in some of the older cutscenes

[@doodoorockss]

yeah was thinking the same thing lol, i believe its just global setting it would take way too long to go through every scene and redo all of the lighting

[@KwehShiro]

global setting, they are currently working on the housing lighting that got janked by the update, so it iwll take some time till they fully update and adjust the lighting throughout the whole game

[@satoshisiq9086]

I think the problem here is the same as the first benchmark, the light in the cutscenes is different from the light in the world, and with the updates of how models react to light it doesn't work anymore I hope they go back and fine tune old cutscenes to better suit the mood

[@SigmaTheWhiteFlame]

Obviously looks better but the original was planned out with the original lighting so when they take artistic liberty it doesn't translate as well with the new lighting. The darkness of the original works slightly better with the red rage Robahn lighting. But this is a minor gripe.

[@toastee5421]

gripe my balls!

[@LBPreviews]

It's not lighting that's causing it. They basically bumped up the luminosity of subsurface scattering values. Which makes all skin look way too bright.

[@nelieltu9730]

Can't you simply change the characters lighting in the settings to fix that? Or is the cutscenes locked to a specific setting?

[@Tundex_Plays]

Totally agree , I liked the old lighting for that scene .

[@xden]

for what it's worth, as someone who just finished ARR, I don't think it obviously looks better. I actually prefer the original.

[@uttrik]

While some scenes are definitely too bright, the new lighting enhanced almost all of Raubahn's facial expressions. Surprisingly, Kan-E-Senna's reaction looked great due to the cast shadow of her staff. But yeah, I think dialing the brightness down a bit and making it warmer to match the lights in the background would help the banquet scene a lot.

[@falkarios2944]

The lighting makes some scenes better, and some scenes worse.

[@FrostFay25]

Thank you for making this video! It's neat to see how the graphical update changed some of the old quest cutscenes. Hopefully they get around to fixing the old quest cutscenes to make the new graphics match to the old graphic's style.

[@Chocoboy_James]

Appreciate it! had I known it would have attracted this much attention I would've had recorded more scenes with other NPCs to compare! It was a fun passion project for sure ^^7 And indeed let's hope! I shall most certainly compare again if that comes to pass!

[@orimu836]

Everything is great except of the brightness and color of the light. It doesn't match the room they're in. The light should be dimmer and yellowish like the old one.

[@filipvadas7602]

Its both better and worse. The more toned down colours and shadows worked for some of the scenes better, but the added details and better overall lighting do help in their own way.

[@mynesotta]

Graphical update aside, I miss old ffxiv narrative. People getting cut in half, losing a limb, sacrificing themselves and so on.

[@TRCartos]

Teledji deserved a lot more than what he got

[@LemonedIScream13]

at least we can chop his zombie down again if we encountered him randomly in POTD

[@LowCountryMatt]

I mean cut him some slack, the half pint is half the man he used to be

[@terrancenightingale1749]

Teledji: "Just a little off the top." The barber, Raubahn:

[@doinyourdad_6969]

Old version had very good lighting placement and knew what colors matched the atmosphere. If they kept that and dimmed the focus light on the new one, then the updated one would’ve been peak.

[@japanese2546]

I'm actually a huge fan of the increased ambient lighting, especially in darker lit environments. I prefer to see the detail of the scene. Agreed there should be a toggle for people who want the original lighting though

[@Syntherus]

I don't think the increased visibility is the problem. It's that the light is too strong. It looks like the guy holding the camera is also holding a ring light and you can clearly see it reflecting on the characters. The scene has yellow light but the characters are reflecting white light.

[@manutdfan231]

Thanks for this vid! Seeing the differences is dope!

[@oxfordking]

Love that you took the time to do this!!! Thank you! Now we gotta wait the next waves of Upgrades to get an even better side by side.

[@Chocoboy_James]

Thank you! I am happy it's appreciated! I hope so! I'll definitely make one if they do this. I already saw they're changing the housing lighting cause the ambient lighting was something they made too bright. My suspicions is that they did this for older content too, hence most looks so lifeless, like indeed, the housing ^^'

[@asheliagaming]

The reflections of light in the world and the resolutions of details like hair are a vast improvement. But I am a bit disappointed in the light on characters. For example when you look at the discussion between Alphinaud and Ilberd (after 17:30) in a dark night scene, the new makes it look like they're literally standing in a spotlight. Too bright and not much shadows left defining the face (even if it sometimes was a bit too much previously). Or Yda (at 18:19), the old makes more sense to me there. If they'd find the middle way on shadows and turn down the character brightness a bit, it'd be perfect.

[@Chocoboy_James]

The biggest let down for me personally is the shot at 10:27. His menacing grin seems to be lost, and the darkness still covering his fave made it more 'creepy' Now it's like; "I am grinning but you barely see it and it looks like I have a greenscreen behind me and am overlit af." So yes, a lot of character's lighting in dark scenes are overdone and completely blinding.

[@sammicoporsammicopor]

​@@Chocoboy_James i disagree, I like the new lighting & graphics. Have you seen the wonderful illuminating glow of the aetheryte shard?

[@Chocoboy_James]

@@sammicoporsammicopor No offense, but an Aetheryte shard is different than an NPC in a cutscene...

[@rhenforlyr5081]

@@Chocoboy_James Something I'm seeing in that scene in particular, but others too, is how the shadows make the characters feel more like 'they match the scene'... For example, in that scene, the shadows make Ilberd feel like his ambitions and his madness have taken a toll on him, as it looks as if he hasn't slept or hasn't been eating all that well and is dead set on summoning his primal. The new lighting makes him feel a bit.... more 'perfect' in presentation, like he is at his best, ready to go out and have a ball. It's as if the characters all got ready to take pictures xD But I guess the devs's main focus was on the new content? The old stuff isn't awful, but it could have been better.

[@Chocoboy_James]

​@@rhenforlyr5081 Indeed You've said it perfectly! A friend of mine mentioned that there were rumours that Yoshi did plan on making old content better overtime. But she can't recall where she heard it so she told me to take it with a grain of salt till Yoshi confirms it, or never mentions it. If that's the case, I'll happily make another video on it!

[@cser2453]

Honestly watching this for the most part i like the old better. the new lightning gives good shadows and some better effects on some objects, however on characters it makes them look like clay and with the lighting on characters and objects it looks like there is a spot light on them which makes no sense for a room lit by torch light. its way to intense for an indoor scene. The scene in the chambers makes it feel more ominous with the darker shade

[@byte-bg4ob]

Nostalgia is a drug

[@AlexanderPR2]

The visuals of the old scenes are better because they were made with attention to detail and with good use of the engine's own limitations. The new 3D models simply replaced the old ones.

[@ftgyhujdftyhurftyh]

Hopefully they’ll fix the shading, though I like how it’s a tad brighter

[@ClaudioProductionsX]

The biggest lighting problem of the update is that sometimes it seems the lighting source seems to be irrelevant on how the actors will get illuminated. I have the endwalker paladin armor, and the brightness seems to follow the camera rather than the environment. I hope this can be tweaked in the future, the same way the benchmark odd lighting was tweaked.

[@theheroslegend]

Ending on the squelch noise was a great idea, haha.

[@TheVitaltundra]

Characters might seem a little too bright but overall a huge upgrade. All the new shadows casted from the characters is very noticeable

[@stevegarcia3174]

Such a good story line that part had me on the edge of my seat

[@plfernandes88]

Specially when compared to the current writing This was peak storytelling, dark, violent, people died.. Nowadays every villain is redeemed with the power of friendship

[@pascalheinrich3990]

​@@plfernandes88where the hell you say that Bird Dad and current Lizzard Boy and our Stalker got redeemed?

[@casperthefriendlygun]

I kinda wish they'd rework the lighting to bring back that darker aesthetic back, the higher saturation kinda ruins the tone

[@LexioLTG]

I miss Ilberd so much he was a great villain

[@user-qv2wd2jc6m]

I appreciate you taking the time to make/upload this!!! Question, SOME of the skin textures and such are updated due to automatic updates for NPC's that were made using character creator assets, however a lot is still OLD NON-UPDATED but all scenes have automatic improved lighting correct? Also the royal chambers scene is updated scenery wise I know but not the characters/clothes, etc.? Hopefully since some of it still looks poor and should be updated in time as the devs continue to expand the graphics update to all FF14 content.

[@hbaabes]

Everything in previous expansions including this scene was automatic update. Nothing was done manually in those scenes to update them. All of that will be updated in the future.

[@Randoenigma]

When I play, it's not just a "turning on a lightbulb" that changes it, but there's also a burring effect to surroundings. (I also love the more details to the faces because now I see wrinkles/crow's feet in my character's eyes)

[@IrideaeSnowbloom]

It cuts of the title on phone and i hoped it said "A few Illberts were hurt in the making of this". Alas!

[@Dragonfury3000]

Old looks better it's like all of these characters are placed outside on a sunny day.

[@Psi10w]

Wait I get the graphics are more flushed out but the ligbting?....hiw are the models still lit up like spot lights in a dark of nigbt...even spot lights can't cast that much on all sides

[@trieule9446]

Character Lighting slider if for all npcs, if yall are complaining about how the people face are lit up like what you are seeing here, you need to crack down your character lighting down. Alot of people have their on at 100, and that causes people faces to look like what you see above.

[@Sky-lo6wv]

No i'm not a fan. The lighting seem off somehow in the new one.

[@byte-bg4ob]

It's OK to be wrong

[@ShadyLurker16]

@@byte-bg4ob You'd know.

[@EdibleKnife]

the lighting on updated graphics completely kills the dramatic effect :(

[@mastertadakatsu]

Teledji still looks like a giant number 2.

[@ZelosSama]

Improved lighting..... Not surprised in the slightest

[@Jai_dinn]

at 13:00 when you see her run closer the red illumination of the mech can be seen but in the new one its barely there

[@Cloudeusz]

Damn forgot Ilberd used to be voiced by Raiden from MK

[@MEISINGER888]

Ilberd: slo-wait, it's peak!?😲

[@dyreckta23]

All this time i thought my tv had a darker hue

[@sandytentaclez1051]

Some scenes clearly got better but everything at night is just too much...

[@Jimmawww]

Any remaster: Number 1 set brightness to full! Aye captain

[@Riptitde777]

have you checked your gamma settings? and the character lighting setting? seems way to high imo, i had to turn my gamma down immensely with the new update for the X symbol to disappear

[@Chocoboy_James]

Character lighting is personal character only, NOT npc. My gamma settings are 0 by default

[@Riptitde777]

@@Chocoboy_James dang that is actually super unfortunate then for new players imo, the original lighting made a lot of these scenes better for sure. Thanks for the response king o7

[@Chocoboy_James]

@@Riptitde777 No worries at all! Part of me wonders if it's because I cannot tweak performance much better than PC users and this is what I have to live with as a console player tbh xD

[@lauranordell229]

i cant wait to see ser ameryc

[@sjacpswbs03162005]

God I need to do bozja again now!

[@scrunglebungus4992]

a few of the older cutscenes need a little re adjusting I think, some of them feel a little worse without the heavier shadows, but overall definitely a net positive

[@KwehShiro]

the lighting is so much better now, it's not just a smudge of color mixing with eachother, you can see emotion and face clearly now. some of the scene lose or gain more emotion depending on the version, but the new one make it easier to see what's going on. old you can't see shit lol. but the lighting being this high in some scene dont make sense, probably an oversight from the team with the new lighting, jsut like in housing right now.

[@vain_x]

10:31 hurts, the face is much more detailed in the old version, this feels like FFX Remaster all over again.

[@Fain255]

I miss the old graphics already

[@lockekappa500]

Soo they turned the gamma up on the characters??

[@draco806]

The lighting they added kind of feels wrong for how dark the scenes are.

[@jamesrusselleriii8284]

great graphics btw

[@th0rne_999]

11:32 Is that Sera's VA from DAI? Or am I just hearing things?

[@awkwardelf]

wouldnt shock me! yshtola is voiced by seras VA which shocked me! the pixie king in ShB also is voiced by her

[@th0rne_999]

@@awkwardelf Incredible! I play with JP voice-over so I had no idea.

[@picxal1948]

I think the character lighting is turned up a little

[@vilvethope]

Who tf forcefully increased my in game brightness??

[@LunaticThinker]

The details on the stone at 1:37 have been broken... also... Dark spirit Raubahn has invaded you.

[@BaithNa]

Looks way cleaner now

[@cutelionx]

I also discovered that all that flat lighting appears in housing too. I usually switch the ceiling light off and worked with indirect light behind objects and stuff to create some atmosphere. The atmosphere in my house is all gone now, cause everything is lit flat. But sometimes you just want dark rooms with spotlights. And all that ambient light that is everywhere all the same, just kills it and let it look worse, like cheap plastic. So that basically is why graphic updates can look worse than the original sadly. The atmosphere is killed. Later this cutscene again works quite well, with the golden elements in the background and natural shadows that wasnt there before. But the flat lighting in the beginning is terrible 😅

[@MemoryofFanelia-Esukafurone08]

this will take time to adjust, got so used to the older version, the new version just seem too weird. it is almost like watching 1990 anime (old FF14) to 2015 anime (new FF14). the problem now is tooooooo much lighting. even parts of the story were you need to dark lighting to reflect the dark/devilish characters. afraid to replay shadowbridge with all this new lighting. going try moding the shadows back to old version, than the character faces.

[@Lenc88]

Honestly still the best scenes in game

[@NecroCrusader17]

I kept replaying teledji’s death multiple times…sorry.

[@Cute___E]

That's.... Upsetting.

[@TheVitaltundra]

What’s weird is the character lighting is too bright in some scenes, and then appropriate in others. Have to imagine that’s not intended and they just need to tweak some settings.

[@SoraShadowdancer]

Also, please keep in mind the textures in old areas HAVE NOT been updated yet. You'll want to redo this video once the ARR areas have been given updated textures.

[@0Fyrebrand0]

A few things look oddly bright compared to the old version, but at least 95% of the time it's overall a vast improvement. When you see these scenes side by side, the old version's lighting and contrast look SO FLAT, it doesn't even look like how I remember the game looking in my head. Raubahn especially looks like he's been given new life. Darker skinned characters in particular really benefit from this lighting update. And any gold or metallic textures really shine.

[@tehSunBro]

Don't like how everything seems to look brigther, with less contrast. Hope thats just related to your settings. Else this would be a pretty major downgrade.

[@PKDeviluke25]

Illberd was a top tier villain.

[@wakirk]

Makes me think of old 80s TV Star Trek TNG Season 1 lighting. Lighting on characters that don't exist in world, and sometimes good, and sometimes off.

[@elafacwen8176]

It's far too white of a light imo. Works in some scenes and looks like you're pointing a flashlight at the characters in others

[@CalestoBella]

Old lighting was bis in cut scenes, they really enhanced characters expressions that the facial rigging lacks. New lighting takes so much expression out of their face and eyes.

[@shooby9496]

The red lighting on Raubahn is better in the original imo. But some shots do look better. Lolorito at 5:35 for example is perfectly lit for an accusation like that.

[@Alex_Connor]

wow now the game look like it was released in mid ps3 gen!

[@saber2802]

Honestly, I wish the lighting was darker in some cases.

[@mikenash5125]

it's just more colorful

[@Kylewatchesyoutube]

They are the same someone just turned up your brightness 😅

[@markjohnston8863]

Oooh some of the scenes are actually better in old...the hair especially..

[@andyd3447]

I cant see any difference other than it looks brighter lol.

[@gatocait]

Hair looks way better in the old version

[@Nurr0]

This isn't a criticism of your video at all but it's crazy how much quality the video compression takes out of FFXIV's graphics update. I kind of feel bad for Square-Enix, it's a hard thing to showcase without actually running the game. The upgrade here looks much less impressive than it does in game.

[@candyhandsjf7288]

Did this scene always have voice acting? Or is that new too?

[@LemonedIScream13]

Always, and this was with the old casts

[@candyhandsjf7288]

@@LemonedIScream13 thank you, it's been awhile so I couldn't remember

[@ampur2]

still sloppeh

[@vegeta2998]

The characters look better but the lighting was better in the original and made sense. The other seems like someone turned on a lamp and a bunch of lights

[@GrimdourTheRampager]

I think the gamma in these scenes is way too high now

[@PixelleHearts]

Part of me misses the distinct tufts and strands of hair in the old graphics. Everything looks way too smoothed out and lacks any character that the old version did. The lighting is much better, but at the cost of some of the actual stylization of some things, I don't think it was worth it.

[@Syntherus]

Man, they just need to reduce that spotlight by like 50%. Edit: They removed all the shadows. I knew something was missing. That's what was so jarring.

[@tuduermestrop8474]

they have just changed the contrast and light ...

[@hardvibe2172]

So we have been playing on night mode for decades

[@conanlum4714]

Voices and pacing is still cake.

[@SoraShadowdancer]

Why is he wearing different clothes??

[@SendixBunny]

They shouldn't have retconned Iberd poisoning Nanamo. The poison being switched for a sleeping potion is fine, but Iberd shouldn't have played the "Oh, it really wasn't me who did it" card in Heavensward. He should have kept taunting Raubahn until Nanamo woke up to shut Iberd up herself... (which would have made his plan to drag Eorzea into a hopeless war against the Empire that much more desperate and diabolical.)

[@Highway_Tollman]

It would be great if the MOG Station was working and just rake my damn money so I can play :)

[@Mochachocakon]

It's very hit and miss, the lighting is definitely going to need some continuous touchups

[@g.c.l]

Man, the other leaders leaving the room upset me so much (which is a Japanese culture thing. Not getting in trouble).

[@HelpfulHuntersGuild]

I really dont like how everybody is well lit. Loses alot of cinematic feel because it feels produced, doesn't feel real

[@Woo-ya]

the old have more shadow i think

[@yuuseihoshikawa9679]

"Graphical Update"

[@krlt9481]

💩 just looks brighter.

[@djbpresents9584]

Maybe dawntrail areas look bettwr

[@Cocollyt]

They do, and the endwalker cutscenes look GREAT. Ultima Thule is gorgeous.

[@Oceanworker]

well looks like ff14 just highlighted that its still a old gen console game just now with better lights.