A while back a change was made to our game engine that affected how reflections work on a global scale. As you’re likely aware, this caused eyes to accept too much reflection, creating a glass look (sparkly eyes). This was not a simple fix for the eyes as it wasn’t actually the art of the eyes themselves causing the issue. To adjust how the reflections looked I had to re-author all of their textures.

 

This is what myself a few others have been trying to explain to our fellow players. When they changed the reflections, it also changed the skin and hair colours, but no one seems to care about those but me. Such a shame because my girls don’t look as hot as they used to be 😢

here are some insights from our Senior Character Artist

Thanks a ton for sharing this.

I love the idea of eyes with a bunch of different colours in a single iris. We saw this to a certain extent in the 5.6 eyes, but the issue there was that it replaced our existing eyes that a lot of us didn't want to change in existing characters. But I'd be happy to see the changed eyes as separate, new options - and I'd like to see a bunch more like them. I'd especially like to see blue, green, and hazel eyes with flecks/threads of gold/brown, like this or this (maybe not so intensely/unrealistically saturated as these, but they convey the general idea).

Hey folks,

 

A while back a change was made to our game engine that affected how reflections work on a global scale....

 

Ahh thats why i have much larger lag in game... my old graphic card can't handle the new settings.

Thanks for info

Thank you for asking. I was one of the few who liked the reflective eyes.

Here are some eye color ideas: https://imgur.com/a/JDmAT

edit: regarding the brown eyes question, iirc #5 was lighter brown and #6 was darker and now it appears reversed. On characters I use the #5 previously lighter brown, but am glad to have brown back regardless of shade. It would seem to me it would be best to try to return the eyes to their previous shade - #5 lighter brown, #6 darker so ppl could feel they don't need to switch if they still preferred the previous options, otherwise provide a free eye color change on the appearance modification station. I also appreciate the explanation for what happened with the eye changes.

Suggestions for new eyes:

• Black eyes of evil! - Fully black, not just the iris
  
• Cyber eyes
  

(just links to random images I found which show what I mean)

I would appreciate feedback on which brown should be darkened to help inform that decision. I would also like to invite your input on what new colors you would like to see in game. We will draw from your suggestions and see what we can do to make more options available.

I like the lighter brown but it's in the wrong place as the darker brown to the left (on the human slider) should take that place. Perhaps swap them or offer one free eye change to all characters created before a certain date (or make them free for a limited time.

As for new eye colours, I would like to see a very light blue (like Senya and LS Arcann) and a light green that is more mossy coloured. The light blue particularly is very dark and desaturated for me and I don't want to go bright white as that looks unnatural.

I'm a big fan of all the DS colours that have been introduced as permanent colours that aren't affected by your alignment so thank you for that.

Hey folks,

 

There have been quite a few questions about what has been going on with eyes in SWTOR the past few updates. There are actually a few things going on and so here are some insights from our Senior Character Artist.

 

 

 

-eric

The three new yellow Sith eyes from the Expanded Selections bundle becoming available to Twi'lek, Togruta and Rattataki! That would be what I'd like to see most happen in regards to eye colours. I personally didn't have an issue with the brown colours, but if there is to be one darker then I'd vote for number 5 to become darker while number 6 staying the same as it is now. The latter has become a nice hazel-brown colour which I find very beautiful and appealing.

I wouldn't mind having a red back for humans. I had to hide my Sith's corruption because he went from nice red eyes to this orange-yellow blurry mess that looked awful on him. I know we have the DS eyes as an option in the CC now if you bought the pack, but there's still no solid red. I wouldn't mind the colour change if it looked more like Valkorian or Arcann's pre-redemption, but to me, DS V corruption eyes just look blurry and horrid (at least on my character, if you love it that's fine, but I wouldn't mind a solid red back.)

I'd definitely go for Heterochromia eyes also.

I don't know if this is possible, but could you guys look into having mixed eye color combinations? Like one Blue/one Green, One Brown/one Gray, etc.? I think it would be a cool character customization to have in game.

I'd love this.

Please, just make sure all the old eye colours are back, looking the way they were before all of this, and left unchanged.

Any new colours or colour combinations should be added totally separately, not overwriting the original colours.

To mess with the original eye colours just destroys the characters who have them and some of the older CC eyes, totally unnecessarily.

I do applaud the efforts underway to restore the original colours, but those Zabrak gold/red are looking far creepier than they used to, and the lighter brown which should be slightly darker, and has been mentioned, I hope this gets restored to it's original colour as well.

On the matter of eyes: I understand what that designer is trying to do, but I see two issues with it, and frankyl I don#t quite understand how that keeps getting missed.

One is texture. Yes, I saw you added texture to the iris, which on close up _and from a certain angle_ looks more realistic and would look quite good in a static image. The problem is that texture alone doesn't do it, angle of light comes into it as well. You can get away with fixed textures on armour or even face because that's not what humans are wired to pay that much attention to. But eyes...from the wrong angle, the highlighted parts in the texture of the iris (which of course do not change with angle) make a character look cross-eyed or just weird.

The second is scale. Most of the time, a character is viewed from quite a distance and still has to have an expressive face/expressive eyes, which means you need more contrast than is "realistic", and the "realistic" textures interfere with that. Angle and distance of the viewer are important here, just compare to how for example paintings on the ceilings of cathedrals have angles deliberately distorted so they look good from where the viewer stands, or how proportions on large statues are deliberately changed to non realistic so they look "right" when someone stands in front of them and looks up. Same principle, you sacrifice correctness and realism to give the viewer a familiar view, because that is how perception tends to work.

I notice this most with the light grey and (previously) yellow-ish non CC eye colours. The textures are so heavy that when not in close-up, the characters seem to suffer from cataracts and partial blindness. It annoys me to no end.

Ditch the heavy textures from the original colours and make them optional for people who like them. Since the way people perceive colours is individual anyway, you won't ever get a real consensus on this anyway.

Hey folks,

 

There have been quite a few questions about what has been going on with eyes in SWTOR the past few updates. There are actually a few things going on and so here are some insights from our Senior Character Artist.

 

 

 

-eric

Honestly, it would be best rid of the hazel eye color(number 6 for Humans). Then you could add it as a brand-new color and allow players to temporarily switch eye color free of charge or make it ridiculously cheap. I'm sure many players would appreciate it. Thank you for taking your time and other developers into looking at this issue. Our characters really mean a lot to us.

I didn't mind the shiny eyes... but the subsequent 'fixes'... all I have to say to the Senior Character Artist is:

YGBSM - Are you really that blind?

Fade to Black...

Any word on this? We're halfway through January and just wondering if any devs are still giving this any attention?

Maybe more tweaks with an upcoming patch of some sort?

Well, I'm done. More bugs than I can shake a wampa at and the eyes issues have been swept under the rug since November along with countless other issues they've decided to pretend aren't there. I've finally had my fill of false promises, lackluster delivery, and complete lack of communication. If they want to push away their player base, they're doing a bang up job of it. It's time for me to move on.

Cancelling sub and uninstalling. Thanks for the years of fun. It was good while it lasted.

Best of luck to those of you who choose to remain. I hope they turn the game around for you.

Well, I'm done. More bugs than I can shake a wampa at and the eyes issues have been swept under the rug since November along with countless other issues they've decided to pretend aren't there. I've finally had my fill of false promises, lackluster delivery, and complete lack of communication. If they want to push away their player base, they're doing a bang up job of it. It's time for me to move on.

 

Cancelling sub and uninstalling. Thanks for the years of fun. It was good while it lasted.

Best of luck to those of you who choose to remain. I hope they turn the game around for you.

I assume they hope we will all get used to the new eyes or give up on getting them fixed. I just wish they would stop tinkering with things that aren't broken and focus on fixing what is. It's not like there is a shortage of issues to deal with

Hey artist guy who was so under utilized you messed up my characters' eyes because you didn't think you had anything better to do, Vector and Scourge still don't have skin after 3 years! How about you fix that before you start looking around for something else to mess with.

Hey BW, we're on 5.9.1a and the eyes still haven't been returned to their original colors. When will they be restored? Don't think we've forgotten about this and the Resolute Guardian and related armor sets legpiece dye bug and the companion unify colors bug during cutscenes!

OP, it would help if you changed the thread title to something more descriptive than just "Eyes." That could be about anything about eyes.