Ithelia looks so weird

Syldras

To add to my last comment:

From what I have read in the forum, Ithelia is fractured at the moment, since her escape, and now searching for her other parts. Of course this fits the broken mirror theme wonderfully. But since this only happened now, why would her design and her whole realm revolve around mirrors already before she was ever imprisoned, forgotten and broken? First I thought that the banishment might have changed her - and since the realms of Daedric Princes and the creatures there are formed according to the nature of the Prince, everything might have changed after her banishment. So her realm might have looked completely different in the past. But no, we see in that flashback scene that she had already had those mirror shard wings before her banishment.

Symbolically, I still find it not the most fitting choice for what her abilities as a Daedric Prince are..

kynesgrove

Maybe she's a resident of Innsmouth.

TaSheen

Hmmm. I don't know.... but somehow I see the mirror imagery as reflecting all the possible paths - those always available, as well as those either not taken, or not available at a given moment in time.

[snip]
[edited for trolling]

NoticeMeArkay

TaSheen wrote: »

Hmmm. I don't know.... but somehow I see the mirror imagery as reflecting all the possible paths - those always available, as well as those either not taken, or not available at a given moment in time.

[snip]

You didn't just put a major main quest spoiler into a thread with no spoiler tag and related to nothing but the visual appearance of character, RIGHT?

[edited to remove quote]

Response to Edit: Thanks for removing the spoiler, Icy.

shadyjane62

NoticeMeArkay wrote: »

TaSheen wrote: »

Hmmm. I don't know.... but somehow I see the mirror imagery as reflecting all the possible paths - those always available, as well as those either not taken, or not available at a given moment in time.

[snip]

You didn't just put a major main quest spoiler into a thread with no spoiler tag and related to nothing but the visual appearance of character, RIGHT?

I don't care if its a spoiler. I couldn't kill her in Necrom which means I can't finish Necrom which apparently closes me out of the epilogue that wraps up the stories in both Necrom and Gold Road and actually prevents me from ending the story in Necrom, I probably won't be able to kill her in Gold Road. Besides she is so incredibly ugly she deserves to look like that till the end of eternity.

[edited to remove quote]

BetweenMidgets

Soarora wrote: »

True that. I’ll never get over the whole thread about Isobel’s eyebrows…

I must have missed that thread but, to be fair, the eyebrow options for females in the character creator are REALLY awful. Assuming those are the options ZoS had access too for Isobel, I'm not surprised if they looked bad LoL. I don't have her unlocked / never spoken to her so I can't comment.

TairenSoul

No point in sugar coating it by saying weird. She downright fugly, imo!

belial5221_ESO

Maybe that's why they wanted to have her forgotten,lol.

Soarora

Syldras wrote: »

Btw, I'm still wondering why ZOS chose the mirror design with huge glass wings for her. It seems to (how to put it...) fit more to what happened to her in his story than what her capability and "function" as a Daedric Prince is? Which does seem a bit odd to me. I mean, of course she could decide to manifest in this form after what happened and could have looked completely different in earlier manifestations (before she was forgotten), but still.

I think the mirror thing is specifically broken mirrors, how a broken mirror will show distortions of reality from the glass being at different angles, along with the cracks being similar to the Many Paths. The wings, as someone else pointed out, is possibly because she is implied to be a Magne-Ge like Meridia and Meridia has wings. Her being a Magne-Ge is its whole own can of worms haha.

Syldras

NoticeMeArkay wrote: »

TaSheen wrote: »

Hmmm. I don't know.... but somehow I see the mirror imagery as reflecting all the possible paths - those always available, as well as those either not taken, or not available at a given moment in time.
[snip]

You didn't just put a major main quest spoiler into a thread with no spoiler tag and related to nothing but the visual appearance of character, RIGHT?

Is it really a big surprise for anyone? I mean, ZOS never lets their chapter stories have any lasting influence on the game world.

BetweenMidgets wrote: »

I must have missed that thread but, to be fair, the eyebrow options for females in the character creator are REALLY awful. Assuming those are the options ZoS had access too for Isobel, I'm not surprised if they looked bad LoL. I don't have her unlocked / never spoken to her so I can't comment.

There were several threads criticizing Isobel's looks, also including complaints that her physical build or the way she stands or walks wasn't "feminine" enough. As if she was supposed to be a fashion model, not a knight.

Soarora wrote: »

Syldras wrote: »

Btw, I'm still wondering why ZOS chose the mirror design with huge glass wings for her. It seems to (how to put it...) fit more to what happened to her in his story than what her capability and "function" as a Daedric Prince is? Which does seem a bit odd to me. I mean, of course she could decide to manifest in this form after what happened and could have looked completely different in earlier manifestations (before she was forgotten), but still.

I think the mirror thing is specifically broken mirrors, how a broken mirror will show distortions of reality from the glass being at different angles, along with the cracks being similar to the Many Paths. The wings, as someone else pointed out, is possibly because she is implied to be a Magne-Ge like Meridia and Meridia has wings. Her being a Magne-Ge is its whole own can of worms haha.

I can accept it, but still find it weird

[edited to remove quote]

SkaraMinoc

I didn't realize she had highlights until I saw the promotional content and compared to the in-game model.

emilyhyoyeon

Syldras wrote: »

Omegacron wrote: »

Not glass... mirror shards. Her whole theme is broken mirrors. Her realm of Oblivion is called "Mirrormoor" and her faction of Daedra is called The Shardborn.

What are the shards of a broken mirror made of, if not glass (I mean normally; I know that you can also polish stone to serve as a mirror, but that's not the standard case)?

I still think it's a weird choice for the Prince of Paths. A mirror reflects, two mirrors facing each other reflect endlessly, but they don't show anything different, but only mirror reality. Unless you use distorting mirrors, but that's again a special case, not what you normally think of when it comes to mirrors.

You could probably make up something about the picture in the mirror being broken and then reassembled in different ways, although that also doesn't really make sense because the picture in a mirror isn't static.

Thank you for bringing this up and articulating it so well. I've been thinking the exact same since her and her design were revealed.

Sync01

Syldras wrote: »

Okay, so I have found her now. Animated, she looks even more creepy. Her facial movements seem really asymmetrical somehow, it has to be botched in some way. I'm also not sure whether her teeth might be, well, placed incorrectly in her mouth and that might cause the perceived asymmetry? At least it looks like one side of her upper row of teeth was missing (or very dark)? And when she bent her head down while taking, the lower row of teeth were reflecting the light strongly, which the upper row did not. I regret I didn't take screenshots. It looked truly bizarre.

I mean, I understand that she is probably supposed to incite pity if we look at her, so it would make sense to give her slightly torn clothing or maybe even damaged teeth, and give her a scared staring impression, but that's not really working out in this case.

Also, in a flashback scene we see that she already had the glass wings before her banishment. I still think the glass theme is a bit weird for the Prince of Paths.

I agree that she becomes creepy looking with the animations, they don't fit her features so it just looks bizarre.
So far I have't seen anyone mention it specifically, but the first thing that stood out to me as wrong was that her eyes/eyelids don't match the blinking animation and the blinking is diagonal. It's like the texture of the face is slightly larger than the model/animation, and it looks like she never manages to fully close her eye at the outer corners.

I managed to grab a screenshot as she's blinking:


The eyeliner doesn't help, and even if she technically can close her eye (it's hard to be 100% certain that that's where the eyelid stops as it's quite fast) the animation is still off >_>

I_killed_Vivec

kynesgrove wrote: »

Maybe she's a resident of Innsmouth.

Mother!

NeoXanthus

This is the most ugly character that I have ever seen in ESO, I hope this is not a trend.

Elvenheart

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

A gypsy

🎼Gypsies, tramps, and thieves, I hear it from the people of the town…🎶

Inval1d

I'm guessing, wherever Mora kept her hidden, there was loud music playing 24/7 and gave her those sleep deprived eyes

soldierofzion82

I think Ithelia is creepy [snip]. When I saw the statue, I thought she looked too pretty. In game, she really looks evil. She's not a Disney Princess. She's sort of alien and freaked out. She looks like a Daedric Prince, yet unique in a strange way. This whole chapter with the scribing stuff is super cool. I'm getting an old school fantasy vibe with the music and everything. So far, it's my favorite and I've been playing since 2016 off and on. I've been highly critical of some things over the years, but they nailed this one. Fisheyes and bubble lips or whatever you want to call it, she gives me the creeps. Like she could rip off her mask and scare you to death if she wanted to. Don't know how to explain it. CREEPY. Like a doll in a horror movie or the old lady ghost reading the book in the library in Ghostbusters that freaks everyone out the first time they see it. Maybe at some point, we see that evil side unleashed.

[edited for profanity bypass]

Pelanora

Belegnole wrote: »

You think Ithelia looks bad, what about the Gryphon Luminary?

Omg yes. Thank you. That was awful. No wonder they stuck it up on rock so we couldn't get close. And why can't they do feathers if they can do that tendrilly black stuff in necrom?

marcbf

To add to my previous comment: Not only do we now know why she was forgotten, but we also know why every mirror will break in her vicinity.

Joking aside, ZOS will probably never fix her appearance, even though in this case, they really should.

Syldras

The gryphon looks like he was made of plastic. Which was astonishing as all other gryphons in this game don't look nearly as awful.

soldierofzion82 wrote: »

I think Ithelia is creepy [snip]. When I saw the statue, I thought she looked too pretty. In game, she really looks evil. She's not a Disney Princess. She's sort of alien and freaked out. She looks like a Daedric Prince, yet unique in a strange way. This whole chapter with the scribing stuff is super cool. I'm getting an old school fantasy vibe with the music and everything. So far, it's my favorite and I've been playing since 2016 off and on. I've been highly critical of some things over the years, but they nailed this one. Fisheyes and bubble lips or whatever you want to call it, she gives me the creeps. Like she could rip off her mask and scare you to death if she wanted to. Don't know how to explain it. CREEPY. Like a doll in a horror movie or the old lady ghost reading the book in the library in Ghostbusters that freaks everyone out the first time they see it. Maybe at some point, we see that evil side unleashed.

Unfortunately, I don't think this is what they intended.

[edited to remove quote]

Yamenstein

I am curious why they decided to take this approach. Someone signed off on it. Is it just meant to come down to, she doesn’t belong so her look reflects that ? Reminds me of the episode of Simpsons where Homer ends up in the real world at the very end (for the credits. The one where he gets stuck in some other world behind the couch or something.)

I_killed_Vivec

I think her face reflects disappointment and bemusement at being billed as the most dangerous daedric prince of them all - locked up for all eternity because of the damage she might wreak... memories wiped lest someone should remember her...

And yet she only gets a bit part in a minor "chapter".

FeedbackOnly

Why is the head so weird looking

xylena_lazarow

Ithelia is awesome, it's yall that look so weird.

Elsonso

[Snip]

Personally, I think that this is just new character tech. They said they had to build new character rigs for her because of the wings.

I also don't think they will change anything. It is a little sad that the in-game character appearance differs this significantly, though. I guess we will find out if they release a bug fix in the future for her appearance.

[Edited for removed content]

kynesgrove

Agreed.

If anything from some of the casual NPC dialogue in town, they definitely are not involved! I absolutely adore the naive horridness of some of these NPCs. Its as if Skingrad really is trying to get back to old Elder Scrolls roots. Such as Alcuale in the Mages Guild or Legionary Ida Sibassius in the Temple of Julianos.

Syldras

kynesgrove wrote: »

Agreed.
If anything from some of the casual NPC dialogue in town, they definitely are not involved! I absolutely adore the naive horridness of some of these NPCs. Its as if Skingrad really is trying to get back to old Elder Scrolls roots. Such as Alcuale in the Mages Guild or Legionary Ida Sibassius in the Temple of Julianos.

From what I've read earlier, they're "diversity"-checking stories (among others), but does that include erasing all kinds of intolerance, religious conflict, racism, etc, from the fictional world? Wouldn't make sense to me as a narration might build upon negative aspects of society. Also, no matter how sad that sounds, if there are different groups in a game, it's "realistic" that there would be conflicts of some kind, because bigots exist. It would not make sense that a foreigner in a very gated-off society would be welcomed by everyone (think Summerset Isles) or if people who are at war against or under occupation of another nation would not be suspicious against someone from that nation, no matter if that person is a soldier or not (think 4th era Skyrim). If these kind of things would be erased from stories because of disapproval in the real world, many serious and interesting stories couldn't be told anymore. I don't think fiction should be "sanitized" like that.

Although I see Ida Sibassius more as a humoristic character. She's the one promising hope for the ugly, correct? She probably says the same to Imperial characters? Makes me wonder what she would say to Ithelia, btw

In general I don't see how Ithelia's botched model should be related to diversity at all. I don't even think she has darker skin as some people suggest, because her statue in the store and all official drawn art of her don't look like that - it's probably only the lighting and maybe the hood that obscures her face. And even if she was supposed to look Indian like someone here suggested - how does that change anything about the fact that her facial animations are botched, the mouth and teeth crooked, the eyes completely weird? If she was cliché North European pale, these factors would look awful all the same.

kynesgrove

Syldras wrote: »

kynesgrove wrote: »

Agreed.
If anything from some of the casual NPC dialogue in town, they definitely are not involved! I absolutely adore the naive horridness of some of these NPCs. Its as if Skingrad really is trying to get back to old Elder Scrolls roots. Such as Alcuale in the Mages Guild or Legionary Ida Sibassius in the Temple of Julianos.

From what I've read earlier, they're "diversity"-checking stories (among others), but does that include erasing all kinds of intolerance, religious conflict, racism, etc, from the fictional world? Wouldn't make sense to me as a narration might build upon negative aspects of society. Also, no matter how sad that sounds, if there are different groups in a game, it's "realistic" that there would be conflicts of some kind, because bigots exist. It would not make sense that a foreigner in a very gated-off society would be welcomed by everyone (think Summerset Isles) or if people who are at war against or under occupation of another nation would not be suspicious against someone from that nation, no matter if that person is a soldier or not (think 4th era Skyrim). If these kind of things would be erased from stories because of disapproval in the real world, many serious and interesting stories couldn't be told anymore. I don't think fiction should be "sanitized" like that.

Although I see Ida Sibassius more as a humoristic character. She's the one promising hope for the ugly, correct? She probably says the same to Imperial characters? Makes me wonder what she would say to Ithelia, btw

In general I don't see how Ithelia's botched model should be related to diversity at all. I don't even think she has darker skin as some people suggest, because her statue in the store and all official drawn art of her don't look like that - it's probably only the lighting and maybe the hood that obscures her face. And even if she was supposed to look Indian like someone here suggested - how does that change anything about the fact that her facial animations are botched, the mouth and teeth crooked, the eyes completely weird? If she was cliché North European pale, these factors would look awful all the same.

Oh I absolutely agree. We mustn't sacrifice satire, depth, metaphor and irony on the altar of mediocrity. Dialogue and narrative shouldn't be dumbed down for the sake of sales and market shares.

Also I don't mind being the chosen one, but I don't like being put in to the assumption that I enjoy being put on a shining knight pedestal... Like the scribing questline. Base-game had some fun twist dialogue option to some quests which I really appreciated, even just for RP sake. Being the hero because of necessity makes way more sense in order to give players moral flexibility in their minds. Such as the Coldharbour quest-line originally could be described in such a way, all you really want is to get your soul back, no matter what your moral head-canon for your hero is.

I think they really just tried to make a Daedric prince with ambiguous racial features with bland marketable aspects (I really don't think balayage hair is en vouge with the youth anymore, sorry ZOS, it's almost cheugy) and the rigging went all wrong.

Although most princes like appearing in different forms depending on the region and race, so I guess they should have made her look Ayleid rather than human-ish, strongly doubt the Heartland Elves would worship a being that looks an awful lot like a well-fed version of their slaves.

Also in my opinion Nocturnal didn't look all that great either (very very bland plain Redguard lady wrapped in a plastic bag) versus Mephala who looked insanely amazing in comparison, which was almost jarring at certain points in the story.

EDIT: Oh, you are thinking about Berwadira. She is so incredibly rude, and I love it! (She reminds me of Nazeem from Skyrim)
I'm talking about Legionary Ida, close to Berwadira's area, who says: "I don't mean to disparage them. I believe a few are trying their best, but many of them lack the Imperial instinct for combat. The Redguards, for example, have their own combat techniques that clash with our martial traditions."
The way she says it is brutal, the slight pause before "techniques" absolutely encapsulates her opinion so well. Its wonderfully awful and I love murdering her.

ZOS_Kevin

Finedaible wrote: »

This does have me wondering if ZoS may be using AI-assisted tools for character creation though.

No, we haven't.