The Best Game Animation of 2022

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Great video from one of my favorite YouTube channels I love Dan's passion for animation. A lot of really well animated games coming out every year and I look forward to seeing all the ones I might've missed.

👍︎︎ 50 👤︎︎ u/doubleOne7 📅︎︎ Jan 25 2023 đź—«︎ replies

I concur with one of the youtube comments.

I just wanted to give a personal shoutout to Xenoblade Chronicles 3, specifically it's facial animation. Xenoblade is already really good at ripping your heart out and the expressions MonolithSoft has been able to get out of their characters really helped sell those emotions to me.

With a tenth of the budget of a Naughty Dog game, they're still able to make you feel very emotionally invested in their characters, the eyes in particular were very impressive, almost uncanny valley level of good at times.

👍︎︎ 58 👤︎︎ u/Last0 📅︎︎ Jan 25 2023 đź—«︎ replies

Funny how even today and on next gen not even one game comes close to the animation quality of tlou part 2.. In game and facial animation in cutscenes are still the best. It's quite hard playing tlou 2 and than going back to another game and animation really feel stiff in comparison Wonder if some people felt the same. Think the only one that can beat naughty dog is naughty dog.. Wonder when they will finally show their first ps5 game. (that isn't a remake or live service)

👍︎︎ 47 👤︎︎ u/[deleted] 📅︎︎ Jan 25 2023 đź—«︎ replies

I'm not saying it should win any GOTY awards or anything like that, but I can't help but feel like COD gets shafted on things like this. The details put into it's weapon animations are great.

👍︎︎ 12 👤︎︎ u/BoyWonder343 📅︎︎ Jan 25 2023 đź—«︎ replies

A rare Dan upload, it's always fun seeing him talk about animation. Shame he uploads rarely but hey at least we have the gaming videos to enjoy

👍︎︎ 2 👤︎︎ u/ShadowTown0407 📅︎︎ Jan 26 2023 đź—«︎ replies

Can I find a list of all games shown?

👍︎︎ 1 👤︎︎ u/Jiazzz 📅︎︎ Jan 29 2023 đź—«︎ replies
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Ok y’all know the drill by now.  A lot of games came out this year   and I have seen all of them. Yes, all of them. Don’t question me. Some of those games had some amazing  animation in them and I want you to   know about it. So here’s a list of some of  my favorite game animation I saw in 2022. And it seemed like that “categories”  thing worked pretty good last year,   let’s do that again. First up! Seems an appropriate place to start. It’s  where all animation started, if you think about it. And if 2D is good enough for Émile(s)  Reynaud and Cohl, it’s good enough for us. (Sorry, that joke was for, like, me and   maybe eight other people watching  this? They LOVED it, though.) The stylistic variety of 2D games that just   dropped on us in a single  year is a heck of a thing. There was that children’s book illustration  aesthetic of The Cruel King and the Great Hero. We got some cartoony antics with Blast Brigade. We got this wonderfully comfy bubble gum  vibe from Melatonin, who thought they could   release a game in the last two weeks of  December and sneak it past me, the fools. And we got this incredible  period look from Card Shark. But strewn amongst this absolute buffet of  cool aesthetics, there were a of couple games   with animation that really deserve  special mention. One of them was Cult of the Lamb The dissonant combination of “unsettling subject  matter” and “cute art style” has been done before.   Plenty of times.  But this game’s execution  on that combo is one of the best I’ve seen,   to the point that they’re able to swing  between the extremes of cutesy and disturbing   in a blink without ever compromising on  either element. And the game’s bouncy,   expressive animation plays a big  role in stabilizing this mixture. Your lamb’s motion is pitch-perfect,  from the springy-ness of their run,   to the cheerfully sinister expressions on  their face, to the satisfying snappy-ness   of their attacks, even just the sweet little  sway of their idle. But it’s not just your lamb;   you can see that polish everywhere. Your  followers, your enemies, the environment…   every little detail has been so carefully  considered, and the result is just gorgeous. My undying compliments to the team at Massive Monster. I’m going to have to start  paying closer to y’all from now on. But there is no way we’re leaving the  2D category behind until we talk about Cuphead: The Delicious Last Course Sometimes “more of the same” is the  best possible thing you could hope for. Cuphead was a singular event in game animation  history. A game which imitated the look of 1930s   American animation, and did so with a level  of care and stylistic authenticity that no one else has ever attempted and no one else will probably ever top. I mean, hand-drawn and inked animations on actual paper, layered over real watercolor painted background art. All of this set to live recorded big band music! There is nothing else like it. And now The Delicious Last Course is just giving us more. The animation is just as delightful as  before, beautifully imitating the timing,   spacing and unique style of exaggeration  that makes that rubber hose era of American   animation so distinctly recognizable.  I am still GARBAGE at the game,   but that’s ok. I’m just glad we all get to enjoy  a little more of this wonderfully-unique thing. And speaking of games which adopt the aesthetics  of earlier technological eras, let’s move on to Even within the medium of pixel animation - itself  a subcategory of 2D animation when you get down to it - there’s so much interesting aesthetic range  being thrown at us all the time! In 2022 alone, we got the 8-bit inspired style of Infernax,   paying homage to Castlevania with a few  extra gory flourishes sprinkled on top.  We got Souldiers, looking like a  lovingly-thorough remaster of some   PS1 classic that never existed but should have. We got Moonscars, a gorgeously bleak  production with player movement and   attacks that have all of the fluid detail  of rotoscoped work but with none of its   sluggishness. These moves are quick  and responsive and MMM. Very good.  And speaking of snappy attacks, we also got Jack  Move, a turn based RPG with some great style and   what might be one of my favorite basic attack  animations of the year? Just look at this punch.   BAM. Satisfying. But there were a few particular high  points that I want to call attention to,   even more so because one of them  tried real hard to evade my notice. River City Girls 2 Again, the NERVE of these people  releasing their game on the 16th of December. Thought I’d be too distracted trying to get this video finished to notice,  did you? Well your game’s animation  is great and I SAW it, so HA. I sang the original game’s praises in 2019,   and this sequel’s animation is just as fun.  All of those inventive move sets are still here,   now with more playable characters and a bunch  of new enemies, just piling on more animated   personality by the truckload. Still the best  animation the Kunio-kun series has ever had. And, hey, if you want to see even more  from this game’s animation director,   he also (somehow) found time to make a Vampire  Survivors-like Hololive fan game this year,   just for FUN. And it turns out it’s actually  really good? So maybe give that a look too. But now that River City Girls has officially  failed its stealth check, I am ready to talk about Cursed to Golf Cursed to Golf is not like a lot of the  pixel animation games I highlight here;   it is not filled to bursting with flashy  animation that is demanding your full   attention at all times. This animation knows when  to get out of the way, and that’s for the best;   you are playing high-stakes purgatory  golf. You have bigger concerns. Instead, the animation fills the cracks, and it  consistently does so with so much charm   and appeal. The way you respawn teleport  to your ball in a variety of silly ways.   This absolutely beautiful ledge teeter.  The bounce on your little golf cart. The animation in this game just wants to  give you a little smile between those tense   rounds of roguelike golf for dead  people, and it does so beautifully. But when it comes to pixel animation games making  you smile… well, this year it’s pretty hard to top Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge Using animation to create contrast between  character personalities is always important,   but when your main cast already looks like  palette-swapped versions of each other, that need   for characterization contrast becomes absolutely  critical. And the animators on this game have   risen to that challenge. Just look at how distinct  and character-appropriate those runs feel! The amount of animated appeal coming off  of this game is higher than any previous   TMNT game has ever managed, which  is no small feat! I mean, sure,   this game is clearly setting out to deliver a  weapons-grade potency of nostalgia for those   old 8 and 16-bit turtle beat-em-ups, but the  amount of animated charm it delivers while doing   so is not a product of mere nostalgia. That  is just some quality animation work. Every part of this game is engineered to delight,   animation included, and it  succeeds. 10 out of 10, no notes. But speaking of delightful weirdos,  let’s move on to our next category… Some games simply refuse to neatly fit into  one of my little categories, but we shan’t   hold that against them. And there were quite a  few more vying for a spot in my list this year. Tinykin, for example, is a  wonderful little Pikmin-y   platformer with a 2D/3D hybrid  look that is just delightful.  And I don’t think I have ever seen a game commit  SO HARD to an aesthetic concept as RPG Time: The Legend of Wright. I mean…  look at this thing. Bonkers. But, while both of these games have some  very good animation that achieves   everything it needs to within each  respective game’s chosen aesthetic,   neither of them deliver on  animated personality quite like Young Souls It was, apparently, a very good year  for well-animated beat-em-up games,   but I can’t think of another game  that looks quite like this one,   and certainly not with this much style. Or  character! Just a couple minutes after hitting   Start, I already adored these twins, largely  thanks to just how very expressive they are. I love how stylistically distinct this game  looks in motion. The dynamic pose work,   the snappy timing… for such a small team,  1P2P Studios sure have managed to make this   2D/3D hybrid look good. Another little studio I  apparently need to start watching more closely. If you are into the idea of a co-op  beat-em-up with a chip on its shoulder,   a slightly more serious tone and personality  to spare, Young Souls will deliver. But ok, enough dabbling in 3D, let’s  go ahead and dive all the way in. Because we have got a LOT to talk about. And let’s   go ahead and start with the heavy  hitters, the Triple-est of the As. Because every year brings us a  bunch of new big-budget games   vying for the throne of “most high fidelity  realistically-rendered human character animation”. This year we saw a very impressive showing  from Asobo with A Plague Tale: Requiem. And the remake of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2  showcased some more impressive pre-rendered work   from Blur Studios, and their in-engine stuff  was certainly no slouch either. It never is. But in 2022, it is pretty hard to top Striking  Distance Studios’ in-engine results in The Callisto Protocol The thing about attempting photorealistic  human animation is that it’s not just an   animation challenge; animation like this is a  truly multi-disciplinary feat. Because you can capture   an actor’s physical and facial performance and  polish that animation data to a near-perfect   recreation of reality, but without good lighting  and good shader work… without skin that reacts   to light or creases in just the right ways,  without eyelids that deform in just the right   way as the pupil moves beneath them… without all that extremely good technical artistry from   very skilled specialists, the whole thing can  break at any moment. And the results this team   has managed in these cinematics - in real-time  cinematics, no less -  are quite impressive. Of course, when your goal is to present a  perfectly real-looking CG human - no matter   how skilled the artists or impressive  the tech - there is still no avoiding the   uncanny. Fortunately, that doesn’t always  have to be a bad thing, which brings us to The Quarry Supermassive Games has been delivering some really  impressive work with the Dark Pictures Anthology,   and it’s frankly silly I haven’t given that  work a mention in these annual roundups sooner. Now, these games are not going to fool you into  thinking you’re looking at live actors filmed on a set. I mean, neither are Callisto Protocol or Call  of Duty, that’s not my point. I’m saying that,   in Supermassive’s genre horror games, it doesn’t  matter that the characters look a little uncanny,   because the uncanny is what these games  THRIVE on. As I said in 2019 of Remedy’s   work in Control: when the entire vibe  of the game is off-kilter by design,   a realistic human character feeling slightly  unsettling only feeds into that vibe. These actors are delivering  some fantastic genre acting,   the lighting and cinematography are  on point… it is just effective work   from a studio that has gotten very good at  turning limitations to their advantage.  Naturalistic 3D Animation doesn’t have to  look as expensive as possible to be great.   And to further demonstrate  that fact, let’s talk about SIfu. So many games have taken influence from martial  arts films over the decades, but I’ve never played   a game that actually felt so much like one.  And not because it replicates the aesthetic or   fighting styles (although this game certainly does  those things too), but because it captures the   moment-to-moment narrative of combat choreography  in those films. The precisely-tuned flow of   picking apart a wave of oncoming attackers one  after another, the rapid succession of problem,   solution, problem, solution. The importance of  improvisation, and the ways the environment shapes   every encounter and offers unique solutions  to that nonstop barrage of new threats.  The animation on all of these moves looks great,  the mocap has been pushed and exaggerated in all   the right ways to sell the speed of these actions  without losing that sense of grounded physicality,   and they’ve done some really fantastic cinematography work  using the gameplay camera to frame the action   and emphasize impacts. This is the kind of game  that relies on effective animation to even work,   and fortunately, Sifu’s animation achieves  everything this game needs to thrive. Just because your game’s animation  style is grounded in realistic   physicality doesn’t mean there isn’t  room for a little exaggeration or even   stylistic flair. And few games in  2022 demonstrated that better than God of War: Ragnarok To literally no one’s surprise, this game’s  animation rocks, and in all of the same ways I   already covered with its predecessor. The  gameplay animation is just as satisfying   and attentive to character and terrifyingly  polished. And the cinematic work is just as   thoughtfully delivered. Whether it’s a moment  of quiet tension or loud spectacle or intimate   vulnerability, these performers are putting  in some fantastic work. And this animation   team - which is packed with some of the most  skilled artists and engineers in this entire   industry - is delivering at 100% of their  potential. It is incredible to behold. In any given moment, whether you’re in  a story scene or in the thick of gameplay,   these characters are so fully-realized  and sincerely performed and cohesively   presented. The fact that any of us are  finding ourselves emotionally invested   in God of War characters is a real achievement  by a lot of people. Sony Santa Monica remains   a force to be reckoned with, and I’m  not seeing any signs of that changing. But while we’re on the subject of studios being  very good at what they do, let’s talk about Elden Ring You know what I love about From Software’s animators? They always know exactly where  the animation budget needs to go. As I have said in previous videos, FromSoft  games rarely feature the most polished or   expensive-looking animation in the AAA space.  There are always some rough edges here and there. I mean, they only just recently started actually  animating NPCs’ mouths when they talk in conversation.   And that still doesn’t look very good!  But that’s ok. Because this animation team  knows where the time and money needed to  go. And because of that, the animation in   Elden Ring is able to achieve what it REALLY  needs to, which is combat clarity and tone. The gameplay animation in Elden  Ring is functionally superb. This   studio has gotten so good at designing enemy  movesets and animating clearly-telegraphed   attacks that it’s astonishingly rare to find examples of enemies that feel completely unreadable in   an unfair-feeling way. These boss movesets  are some of their most impressive work yet,   and the cinematics preceding some of these  fights are some of the most unsettling,   spectacular and wonderfully  weird things I’ve seen all year. FromSoft may have quite a few imitators these  days, but none of them has ever been so brazen   as to have one of their biggest spectacle setpiece  bosses they have ever made spend the entire battle   riding a tiny horse. I don’t know how this team  manages to balance their unique blend of horror,   grandeur, melancholy and comedy so  effectively, but I love them for it. FromSoft’s animation team always knows where to  put their budget. And it’s a good thing they do,   because their games would absolutely fall to  pieces otherwise. I can't wait to see more. Speaking of things falling to pieces, though, did y’all play Aperture Desk Job? It was basically a tech demo  for Valve’s new Steam Deck,   but even if you don’t have one, this  little game is worth your time anyway,   just for the delight of seeing Valve’s animators  deliver yet another perfect comedy robot. GlaDOS and Wheatley were both fantastic  demonstrations of how much personality you can   convey with only a few moving parts. And now Grady  is here to continue this tradition of Portal games   having some of the best-animated comedic delivery  in all of video games. He’s basically an eyeball   and one arm (and a bunch of great line reads from Nate  Bargatze), and that’s all these animators need. Man, I hope Valve does more with Portal. Even just  a tech demo in this setting is a special treat. But while we’re on the subject of robots… Horizon Forbidden West I started this channel one year too late to  compliment the animation in Horizon Zero Dawn,   so it was real nice of Guerilla Games to go  back in and make another one just for me. You’re going to spend so much time fighting  robot animals in Horizon games that those   animals better look good, and boy do they.  A lot of the animators on this project have   actually posted reels of their work here on  YouTube (you’re looking at some of that right now),   and I recommend looking those up just to  appreciate some of the great work being done here. But the human animation has seen some improvements  too. The first Horizon game made use of a BioWare-style   modular conversation animation system to handle  the enormous quantity of dialog exchanges,   and that worked quite well. But when  they dropped that in the Frozen Wilds   DLC and instead switched to using performance  capture for every branch of every conversation,   the difference was HUGE. Seeing every little  exchange performed by an actor making specific   acting choices for each line, seeing these  characters thinking and listening and   reacting to each other as they talk… it was a  major improvement. But I was curious if they’d   be able to expand that bespoke treatment to a  full size game. And it turns out: yes. They can. Congrats to the team at Guerilla  for managing to push animation   that was already looking great even further.  Speaking of games with good  creature animation, though,   they went and released another dang  Monster Hunter this year, didn’t they? Ok its an expansion, but still. Hey Capcom? Can you give me like one year off  from having to come up with new ways to say   Monster Hunter’s animation is good? I’m running  out of new ways to say the same nice things. Can I just copy-paste some of the nice things  I said before? I’m gonna do that. [clears throat] Monster Hunter has always had some of  the most inventive and appealing-looking boss   creature animation in the business. These  are games which invite you to study and   internalize each monsters’ body language to  improve, and that can only work because of   how carefully-tuned the animations on these  creatures are. Additionally, the weighty,   expressive attack combo work for every weapon type  remains phenomenal, and the fact that the fact   that these games deliver on this much functional,  style while also offering dozens of little goofy,   completely unnecessary touches like  these will never stop delighting me. Also cats still make you food. Why are the rest  of the games not doing this yet? Did Capcom pull a   Warner Bros and patent it or something? Every game  needs this. And until every game has it, Monster   Hunter is going to keep winning Game Animation of  the Year by default. Cat made food; contest over. But while we’re on the subject of cats,   there’s one more game in this category which I  absolutely must talk to you about, and that is Stray I don’t know if I have ever seen such a  clear-cut example of animation selling a game. This is a game from a small team. And as such,  there are places where the animation might have   a rough edge of two, but it doesn’t matter even  a little bit. Because the animation on this cat   is so well-observed and so authentic-feeling that  cat-lovers took notice and the game kinda blew up. There are a lot of other games that have cats  in them, but surprisingly few of them actually   attempt to animate real cat behavior. We don’t  tend to animate cats as they are, we animate   the idea of cats, the human personalities we’ve  collectively projected onto cats over the years.   But this game tries to capture the real thing, to  present how a cat actually moves and communicates,   from the fundamentals of its body mechanics to  the subtleties of how it expresses with its tail. Real cat behavior can be pretty inscrutable  unless you are really familiar with the animals,   and it is abundantly clear that these animators  are. And that authenticity resonated. The simple   novelty of playing as a cat who actually feels  like a cat had enormous appeal, it turns out,   and there might be a valuable lesson in that. I  can think of quite a few animals that are widely   beloved but rarely presented with this level  of care when we make them a game’s primary   focus. It could be there are some very large  potential audiences we’ve been ignoring. A huge congrats to BlueTwelve Studio  for your success with this one. You gave   us something we did not realize we were  craving, and that’s a pretty rare feat. But at last, it is time for our final category... You could not turn in any direction in 2022 without   some colorful game trying to  charm you. And succeeding. Kirby and the Forgotten Land has some of the  cutest Kirby animation you have seen AND some   of the WILDEST Kirby animation you have ever  seen. I don’t know how to put to words the...  ...delighted trepidation I would feel every time  I encountered an object with THIS prompt.  I can’t decide if I’m happy about this, but... I am  smiling? So your guess is as good as mine. But then, on the only-slightly-more-realistic side   of the stylization spectrum, you’ve also  got Bayonetta 3, serving up some absurdly   stylish combat with all of the inimitable  flair Bayonetta has taught us to expect.  Meanwhile, back in cartoon land, the  player character in Time on Frog Island   has probably my favorite run animation of  the year? It has this wonderfully bouncy   quality that also feels tightly-wound in  a way that I just love. You know you’re   looking at some good animation when a  basic run is enough to make you smile. But if we’re going to talk about  animation that makes you smile,   then I have to give some special recognition to Trombone Champ Yes I am 100% serious when I say that  Trombone Champ’s animation is great.   SIMPLE, yes, but also - just like the  animation in Say NO More and Untitled   Goose Game before it - a vital  ingredient to this game’s comedy. The awkward toots and blats of your  trombone are already very funny,   whether you are playing well or not. The  silly art and background elements behind   the note track of each song amplify that  comedy. But the piece that puts this all over   the top is your happy little performer over  there to the right, dynamically following the rise and   fall of your off-key notes, swaying with  enthusiastic, defiant glee all the while. This animated depiction of your very bad brass  solo completes the joke Trombone Champ is telling,   and any animation that can successfully pull that  much weight in an experience deserves recognition. But as long as we are recognizing excellence,   let’s go ahead and give Arc System  Works their annual trophy for DNF Duel I have spent a lot of words praising this team  over the years, so I'm gonna try to make this quick.  Arc System Works figured out the precise alchemy  required to pull off this incredibly-convincing   anime look with Guilty Gear Xrd almost a decade  ago now, and they have been tricking people into   thinking they were looking at hand drawn sprites  ever since. DNF Duel continues this tradition   with yet another payload of fighting game  animation that is just a feast for the eyes. Of course, I wouldn’t go so far as to call this  an escalation over their previous offerings. The   style is a little more stripped down and simple  this time around, not too far off from the look   of Guilty Gear Xrd, actually. But the magic  trick still works. So I guess ArcSys will have   to settle for merely continuing to do better at  this than literally anyone else in the industry.  But speaking of fighting game  animation that deserves some kudos… MultiVersus In past videos, I’ve stated that  a character’s animated incarnation   in a Smash Bros game should be a nostalgic  celebration of that character’s history,   capturing the essence of that character,  making them feel instantly familiar. Now I wouldn’t go so far as to say  that MultiVersus is better at this   than Smash Bros, because some characters are  translated and executed on more successfully than others, I think. But there is some  real great stuff in here,   including one of the most inventive  character move sets I have ever seen. You can play as Tom & Jerry in this game,  and most of their attacks involve Tom either   trying to put Jerry in harm’s way OR  taking a swing at Jerry and missing,   hitting your opponent instead. And that is a  REAL clever idea very well executed. I   can think of no better way to instantly  convey what Tom & Jerry are about as a   duo. And this bit of brilliance is enough  to ensure that I'm going to be checking in on   MultiVersus from now on just to see what new  characters are looking like. Very well done. But let’s shift focus to other battle mice in Moss: Book II This is the best little mouse  you're going to find in video games,   and she appeared in what ended up being  one of the best animated games of 2018. Well I’m happy to report that the  animation in this sequel looks every   bit as good as the first. The way these  little rodents scramble and throw all of   their tiny weight into their actions does  so much to preserve an appropriate sense   of scale in this world. Richard Lico and  his team have done wonderful work here. In fact, if you’re curious to see what  animating a character like Quill looks like,   Lico actually posted a video demonstrating his  animation process a while back, and it’s a great   little 101-level introduction to animating a  3D character using his kinda unusual but very   effective workflow. I’ll link it down below and  I recommend giving it a look. It’s pretty great   seeing an industry veteran opting to freely  share some of his knowledge and experience.  ...wait, that just reminded me. Ok, now we’re gonna talk about Masahiro Sakurai’s YouTube Channel. Yes I know it’s not a game, who cares. So! Masahiro Sakurai, creator of Kirby  and director of the Smash Bros series,   made a YouTube channel this year, and has spent  the last several months using it to teach the   basics of game development. Just brain-dumping  all of the knowledge he’s accrued over the decades in   high quality, easily-digestible, beginner-friendly  videos posted publicly for free where they can be   accessed by as many people as possible.  Seemingly just because he feels like it! This is a wonderful thing. And it should become  a trend. Of course, I know better than most   that it takes a lot of time and a non-zero  amount of money to create this kind of thing,   which is why you don’t see a ton of individual  gamedev veterans opting to tackle this sort of   project. But they shouldn’t have to. Game  studios everywhere should be funding little   internal projects like this, especially  the big studios who have the resources to   spare and a lot of veterans on staff with a  wealth of experience and knowledge to share. Heck, if you’re wanting to get that kind  of initiative started where you work,   I will HELP you. Just reach out  to me. I would love to help make   there be more things like what  Sakurai-san has created here. If you haven’t already, go subscribe to  his channel. It is a wonderful initiative   from an industry legend who has a  lot of valuable knowledge to share. Anyway, speaking of… uh, some  kind of Nintendo-based segue Mario + Rabbids: Sparks of Hope It has been really fun to see Mario  characters put into the hands of more   animation teams outside of Nintendo.  You can always feel that team’s   unique fingerprints and stylistic  sensibilities on the resulting work.   And Ubisoft’s Mario + Rabbids crossovers  have been an especially delightful blend. I LOVE how the Mario characters look in  these games. Their motion is a little looser,   a little squishier, more exaggerated, but not  so exaggerated that it stops feeling like a   Mario character. It honestly looks great on  them. And the rabbids have always had some   of the best goofball slapstick animation in  gaming, so of course they still look great. We don’t see a lot of this extra-cartoony  3D animation work in this medium,   so games like Mario + Rabbids are a pretty special   treat. Kudos to the teams at Ubisoft  Milan and Paris for their work here. But this wasn’t the only top tier showcase of  Mario animation 2022 gave us. Because we also got Mario Strikers: Battle League This YouTube channel began with me singing the  praises of Next Level Games’s animation team,   and for good reason: they are extremely good at  animating Nintendo’s core roster of characters. These animators have not missed a single  opportunity to squeeze character into every   action, even the ones that are likely going to go  unnoticed in the chaos of play. I am constantly   spotting all these little character touches, and  I’m reasonably certain that distraction is causing   me lose more often. But it’s all so fun to look  at that I haven’t yet found it in me to care. This is a very polished showing from a team  who frequently outdoes Nintendo at animating   their own characters, and yet another fantastic  demonstration of how much character-based variety   you can pack into a list of actions shared  by a big cast. Phenomenal work as always. But there is still one more game that deserves  recognition this year, and that game is Potionomics. This indie gem has been charming a lot of  people, and for good reason. These characters are   delightful, and the level of animation fidelity,  personality and sheer expressive appeal they’re   delivering in considerable quantities is pretty  incredible coming from this small of a team.  Making great animation for games - at ANY scale -  is always an art of delivering the most bang   for your buck, of prioritizing where to spend  your limited budget for maximum impact. Or,   put another way: making great game animation  means finding ways to strategically constrain   scope so you can avoid wasting resources  needlessly. And this game is very good   at optimizing its bang per buck  and making every animation count. The way they present conversation exchanges using  a library of looping “emotion” poses (basically   a more animated version of Persona character  portraits)... the way they carefully stage every   scene so the animators can focus on tuning each  pose to a single camera angle… the way they have   characters pop into a lively gesture as a means  to transition from one pose to the next rather   than creating a thousand bespoke transitional  animations from every pose to every other   pose... there’s just a lot of smart decisions  here, and the results speak for themselves.  This game is a joy to look at and just a  treat in general. Huge props to everybody at Voracious Games; you’ve already made me  love every character you’ve introduced me to,   and I’m excited to see where you go from here. But I think that is finally all of them! Were there any games I missed? Obviously not. I was testing you. Like I said: I saw every game. But if you do still wish to argue a case for the animation of   some other 2022 game, you may formally submit  your appeals in the comment section below. Now if anybody needs me, I have like four videos in  progress that need finishing, so I’m gonna go and uh… yeah. Thank you for watching, and I hope  you have a lovely 2023! See you next time! [♪♪]
Info
Channel: New Frame Plus
Views: 218,111
Rating: undefined out of 5
Keywords: 2022, retrospective, favorite, best, list, Cult of the Lamb, Cuphead, River City Girls 2, Shredder's Revenge, Young Souls, Modern Warfare 2, Sifu, God of War, Ragnarok, Elden Ring, Horizon Forbidden West, Monster Hunter, Sunbreak, Stray, DNF Duel, Sakurai, Mario + Rabbids, Mario Strikers, Battle League, Potionomics, animation, explained, gameplay, New Frame Plus, New Frame +, New Frame+, game animation, animator, video game, Daniel, Floyd, Dan, Extra Frames, Extra Credits, PlayFrame, top 10
Id: Kwn32j8_-p0
Channel Id: undefined
Length: 30min 56sec (1856 seconds)
Published: Wed Jan 25 2023
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