They are boring to me because they look just like regular dudes (well, regular corny-dressed dudes walking off of a movie set or a Japanese music video). I mean, nothing about that pic makes me wonder or be amazed or curious. Show me Red XIII, Barrett, Cait Sith...show me that magic and make me go "what in the world is going on here?" Show me color and creativity and different shapes and fantasy.
I really couldn't care less about flamboyant or fantastical looks of characters. The FFXV characters fit the more modern world they are creating. Some main character that looks like Zidane (his actual Amano art look and not the Amano-art-raped-into-deformed/chibi-style look in the actual game) or another TIdus simply wouldn't fit in the world. At all. I care more about the quality of characters as actual characters than making them look something extra special. To me, FFXV's characters are as successful as Nomura's Parasite Eve Aya Brea was. Aya may not be the most excitingly fantastical character design ever, but it does its job perfectly in the setting it takes place in. You could also imagine the main cast to be a prince and his (mostly) young group of friends/advisors/protectors in a modern day setting, though of course ones that have gone through a Nomura/Roen stylemachine. They fit the roles they have as perfectly as a Nomura design ever could. I mean, you could take any prince of the world today and I'm sure they've been seen dressed in similar clothing (maybe less black and not Roen style, but still dressed in similarly casual wear, in somewhat trendy t-shirts and shorts). Maybe that's not what you are expecting of fantasy but FFXV, moreso than any other FF ever, IS based on the real world, so with some stuff they are trying to imitate a more modern day look, while offering something fantastical with huge monsters attacking a city & creating tsunamis that lift buildings off the ground..
Like every Final Fantasy after Final Fantasy 9. Yeah, I know. It was cool for the first 3 years, but it's been the same 10 years after that and looks like it will keep up this way for another decade.
I don't see anything in X, XI, XII, XIII or XIV about them trying to root anything in reality. More realistically proportioned characters, sure, but not rooted in reality.
As with everything, looks aren't everything. Zidane might be more fantastical a character design, but he's a very boring main character overall. With characters, I'm more interested in personalities and interactions of those personalities with each other. I'm hoping that with the help of Nojima and Jun Akiyama (event director/planner of games like Final Fantasy Tactics, Vagrant Story, FFXII), they can get some better character portrayals & interaction that are far beyond the usual (or recent past's) FF quality instead of characters having some more fantastical look, but them sprouting nonsense for most of the game. I can't stress enough how much I enjoy the kid-Noctis & the king scene in the E3 trailer. They seem more like real people instead of trope-ish characters talking shit about being heroes or motivational "don't give up!" speeches, even if Noctis ends up being a character that zero shifts around, casts huge fire spells and does all kinds of other crazy shit.
As far as a FF game goes, I don't really give a fuck if a character looks very distinct like Zidane or if it's a bit more mundane like Noctis & his friends.
I want the fantastical element be more present in the world itself & its events (i.e. the Venice-inspired city looks like something you really can't wait to explore, or how when the nations go to war one of them summons a huge Leviathan to wreak havoc on the city), not in how the characters look. I could be controlling a fucking cardboard box if the setting itself offered interesting locales to explore and that cardboard didn't sprout Toriyama-level dialogue.
Art and design wise it died at FF7, SE was smart to release FF9 but then they abandoned that and went back to what FF7/8 was :/
I guess in your world XI, XII & XIV didn't happen. Nothing died at Square Enix after VII, certainly not their art department, that's just stupid talk.
