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Idle Animation

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"Master? You're spacing out a little."

The animation that is displayed in a video game when a character, especially a player-controlled character, is just standing around and the player isn't pressing any buttons. A few games may do it when you pause instead. This is done because it avoids having the character stand completely still, which feels odd and creepy because it is unnatural.

Common idle animations are, but not limited to...

  • Looking around.
  • Sleeping/stretching/relaxing.
  • Reading a book/playing a video game.
  • Playing/fidgeting with objects.
  • Commenting on the ambience.
  • Adjusting their clothes/weapons.
  • Singing and/or dancing.
  • Flicking long hair if they have it.
  • Entertaining themselves.
  • If there are two or more characters, interact with each other.
  • Getting impatient.
  • Acknowledging the player's existence.

Like Battle Intro and Victory Pose, this can be used to help characterize the player character and may also serve as a hidden Easter Egg.

Related: Emote Animation, Taunt Button and Stop Poking Me! for similar animations that are triggered by the player. For sprites which walk all the time, even when they're not going anywhere, see Hyperactive Sprite.


Examples

    open/close all folders 

    Action Adventure 
  • Afterimage: A butterfly would approach Renee and she would try raising her palm to catch it.
  • In Assassin's Creed leaving Desmond inactive too long would result in him scratching his butt and getting an earful from Vidic, among other things.
    • In all of the games, whenever you leave Altair, Ezio, Haytham or Connor hanging or perched onto something, if you look closely, you can see them shifting their weight about to keep balance, or if they're hanging against or climbing up a building, you can see their feet and calves flex as they just hang there. They'll even look around while they do this.
    • Whenever idle in a V-shaped tree branch, the character will casually lean on the tree and stare out in the distance.
    • In Assassin's Creed Origins, Senu will perch on Bayek's arm if he's left standing around, and will fly off again once he gets moving. If the player presses the Interact button (Y or Triangle) Bayek will either feed or pet Senu.
  • Metal Slug: After killing an entire screen's worth of enemies, players can actually pause for a while to catch their breath (provided it's not an Auto-Scrolling Level), at which point their commando character, after being stationary for a prolonged period, start drinking from their flasks, reload the pistol if that's their current weapon (which is odd, because the default pistol doesn't need to be reloaded at any point), doze off (complete with Snot Bubble!), shiver (if the level is in a snowy environment), and so on, until the player decides to start moving.
  • Rayman:
    • In Rayman 2: The Great Escape, Rayman will eventually check out his shoes and whistle after some time of inactivity. Leave him long enough and he starts bouncing his torso around like a basket ball.
    • In the original, he faces the screen and goes "Hello?" or looks around, or shrugs. If you're hanging from a ledge and leave him idle, he points at the ledge and mouths something to the camera, then sighs in relief.
  • The Legend of Zelda:
    • Ocarina of Time had several sets of Idle Animations depending on Link's age, and sometimes the environment. He will: fidget, glance about, tap his feet against each other, yawn, hike up his belt, swing his blade if it's unsheathed, shiver and sneeze (inside cold areas), or wipe sweat from his brow (inside hot areas). (Put on the Iron Boots and the boot tapping animation becomes particularly funny.) Link may also fiddle with his shield when he has his sword out as well, or gasp for breath when he's low on hearts.Video for all (or at least most) of them.
    • The boot-tapping animation appears in every 3D Zelda game since Ocarina of Time and even the Super Smash Bros. games as a Continuity Nod.
    • Twilight Princess has similar sequences; rather than adjusting his tights, however, he fiddles with his wrist guards. When playing as Wolf Link, Midna has a few cute idle animations of her own: she'll stretch and yawn, look around, stand on Link to look closer, or tap him to get him to move.
    • Along with Link's idle animations like stretching, The Wind Waker had an idle animation for water fountain statues, involving them almost falling asleep. Link also fidgets constantly when there is no player input, making this an example of a Hyperactive Sprite, although Link is a 3D model.
      • As a reference to his idle animations, gazing around is a taunt in the Super Smash Bros. games.
    • In Skyward Sword, leaving Link sitting down for a long enough period of time will cause him to doze off after a while, until he loses his balance.
      • Strangely, Link does not gasp for breath or bend over in pain when he is low on hearts, although all other 3D Zelda games after Ocarina of Time had this animation.
    • In Breath of the Wild, while the idle animations in temperate areas are fairly standard, heading into a cold climate while underdressed causes Link to start shivering, to warn you that you should really put on something warmer before you start taking damage. Standing still after depleting your stamina will cause Link to bend over in exhaustion until it fills back up. And if Link is left idle for long enough while shirtless, he will flex both of his biceps.
  • In Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, Alucard's idle animation works with one of his familiars: he stands in a relaxed, yet regal pose (all the hip young(-ish) vampires do it), and she lands on his shoulder. If he moves even an inch, she falls, complete with "Oof!" (but she doesn't hit the ground, being a fairy).
    • Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia does this with the Owl familiar.
    • In the Updated Re-release of Symphony, you could also equip Alucard with a specific accessory to make the fairy sing a song for you while she's sitting on his shoulder.
    • Most of the later games in the series have "poses" for the characters triggered by holding up on the d-pad. Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin has additional idle animations if you press it long enough.
      • For example, in Portrait of Ruin, holding up for ten seconds with Jonathan will make him do a MJ spin complete with hip thrust while with Charlotte it has her do a sexy spin and chest thrust toward the camera (If you're getting any ideas remember, she's 16). Holding down the button longer has them do another variation of their pose but after a while they become visually bored and return back to their normal stance.
  • In La-Mulana, when the game is paused, Lemeza sits down, eats curry, and falls asleep. Since you can pause in mid-jump, you can use this to defy the laws of physics. It's also the way to solve certain puzzles.
    • After completing Hell Temple in the remake, Lemeza gets a new animation. He dances. In his bikini.
  • In Psychonauts, Raz will do his victory dance in slow motion—in certain places. In others, he'll take a bow, dance along with the level music, or other unique things. He'll even interact with some of the items he can hold — the best involves the rolling pin item from the Milkman Conspiracy.
  • Lara Croft in Tomb Raider: Legend and Anniversary has various idle animations, ranging from her tightening the laces on her boots, stretching her arms out, and others, although this could also be seen on the title screen.
    • Attempts to recreate this in custom levels have been fairly successful, but they still happen even when Lara has her guns drawn, and even when firing said guns. This causes her to casually look around and bend down to look at her shoes while in the middle of a gunfight.
    • She's been seen to fan herself in an Egyptian level in Anniversary. Seems quite rare, though.
    • In Anniversary she'll kneel and retie the laces on her boots, even when barefoot.
  • Bubble Bobble: The bubble dragons wag their tails at a constant split-second rate. In Bubble Memories, Bub and Bob don't have the constant wagging-tail rate but still do it.
    • Bubble Symphony aka Bubble Bobble II: If you leave your character alone some more, he/she will do something else. Bub or Bob will sleep, and Coro or Kulu will sit down, shake her head as she takes out a mini-mirror out of Hammerspace and look at herself through it. When they're human, their actions are different. They all blink at the constant split-second rate. Bub or Bob will blink quickly a few times, sit down and take out his straw he blows bubbles with. He blows through it a few times, but it doesn't work, so he blows so hard he shakes around, and then sits down facing the player, closing his eyes. Coro or Kulu will happily put her hands to her mouth and do a little cheer to the left and right before facing toward the player, sitting down and closing her eyes.
  • The game based on TMNT (2007), in spite of its flaws, put a respectable amount of thought into this. When your character is injured, idling will actually cause him to start meditating and (slowly) regain health. At full health, each Turtle has his own unique idle animation.
    • Donatello sits down and does leg stretches.
    • Raphael starts shadow boxing. As the Nightwatcher, he can't meditate himself back to health and acts as if his shoulder is sore.
    • Michelangelo pops into and back out of his shell with ridiculous (and appropriate) cartoony sound effects.
    • Leonardo does what appears to be tai chi.
    • Normal idles are weaponless. However, if you don't move right after attacking, your Turtle doesn't put his weapons away and will go into a slightly more aggressive, at-the-ready idle.
  • In Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver 2, Raziel will alternatively glance around the room, scratch the back of his head noisily, hop into a fighting stance or crack his neck/back quite spectacularly.
  • In Eternal Daughter, the player character will whip a book out of Hammerspace and start reading if left idle for a while. She quickly puts it away when you move again.
  • The Borderlands series has idle dialogue.
  • Wolf/goddess Amaterasu in Ōkami will yawn, and then a few seconds later curl up on the ground and take a nap (if you get the sleep mat accessory, this will heal her at the cost of a constant money drain until she reaches full). Sometimes she does this during exposition-heavy cutscenes as well.
    • In the sequel, Ōkamiden, her son Chibiterasu will sit down when idle, and each of the partners have an idle animation as well. Kuni tries to balance on top of Chibi's head, Kagu spins around on Chibi's back, Kurow plays his flute, and both Nanami and Manpuku pet Chibi.
  • Kyle Katarn in the Star Wars games of the Dark Forces Saga does a variety of interesting animations when idle, such as trying to shave with his lightsaber.
  • Believe it or not, the console versions of the Shrek 2 game actually allow you to invoke this manually via pressing the interaction button. You can button mash it to have it cycle through randomly until you get the one you want, and certain character compositions during specific levels have unique ones between 2 or 3 of them:
    • Shrek and Donkey: one animation has Shrek pet Donkey's back while another has Shrek pull Donkey under his legs to ride him, only for Donkey to crumple under his weight.
    • Shrek and Fiona: Shrek and Fiona slow dance together.
    • Shrek and Gingy: one animation has Gingy use his cane to knock Shrek over while another has Gingy repeatedly tap Shrek on the back and dodge away before Shrek can see him, only for Shrek to catch him off-guard and crumple him into a ball.
    • Donkey and Gingy: Gingy rides Donkey like a horse.
    • Donkey and Lil' Red: Lil' Red gives Donkey an Apple.
    • Gingy and Fairy: Fairy uses her magic to make Gingy's candy cane float into the air while he's throwing it.
    • Lil' Red and Big Bad Wolf: Wolf sneaks up on Lil' Red and Jump Scares her.

    Action Game 
  • Evil Dead: A Fistful of Boomstick had standard idle animations like Ash twirling his gun around, but if left in one spot for an extended period of time, the camera would actually zoom in and swing around to face Ash head on, eliciting a "Um.... Hellooooo?" from our hero.
  • Devil May Cry:
    • In the first game, Dante has a different animation for whatever firearm he has equipped. With Ebony & Ivory, he would twirl them and put them away, whereas when equipped with the Shotgun, Grenadegun, or Nightmare-Beta, he would put one hand in his pocket while he would rest his weapon arm on his shoulder.
    • In Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening, Dante would scratch his head in annoyance, cross his arms, and tap his foot impatiently. Vergil would wipe the side of his coat and re-adjust his collar.
    • In Devil May Cry 4, Nero would inspect his Devil Bringer arm. Dante has two animations: looking around with his hands on his hips, then stretching out an arm while still looking around. The other is a little funnier — it looks like he might have dozed off standing up with his arms crossed. The Special Edition has Vergil doing a Badass Armfold pose, Trish checking her nails, and Lady stretching her arms, planting the Kalina Ann on the ground, then leaning on it.
    • In Devil May Cry 5, Dante and Vergil retain their idle animations from Devil May Cry 4; Dante looks around with his hands on his hips, while Vergil still has his Badass Armfold. Nero has a new idle animation wherein he squats until the player moves him, while V simply adjusts his hair.
    • In DmC: Devil May Cry, Dante would turn his head from side to side.
  • In Gungrave, leaving Grave idle for a while will cause him to twirl his pistols, or crack his neck, or shoot a bug that's annoying him.
  • Some games do not approve of the player remaining idle and have a way of "punishing" the gamer, an example of which being the TurboGrafx-16 Licensed Game of Disney's Darkwing Duck. If the player has Darkwing stand in one place, Darkwing will first blink and then grin, then turn to the player and glare. Afterwards Darkwing looks up towards the top of the screen directly above where he's standing, and looks defeated right before a safe falls out of the sky and crushes him flat. This results in the player losing a life.
  • In the Batman Arkham series, when Batman stands still, he will occasionally stretch his arms, rub his shoulders, fiddle with his vambraces, or crack his neck. Catwoman will sometimes examine her claws, stretch one of her legs, or give herself a cat-bath.
  • Sunset Overdrive: If the Player doesn't move while near a ledge, they might put a foot up on it.

    Action RPG 
  • Stand around long enough in Drakengard, and Caim stands in a different position, one that seems a little more relaxed.
    • In the sequel, Nowe and his allies all have a unique wait animation as well.
  • Justice League Heroes has the standard "characters complaining about standing still too long" variety. The Flash's fourth-wall-breaking remark comes to mind:
    "I'm the fastest man alive. You're the slowest gamer ever!"
  • Each of the characters in Tales of Destiny has their own animation in the "Side" window on the world map — for instance, Stahn begins to punch the air over and over (and maybe cheer, but it's hard to tell), Philia takes out a book and reads, and Leon scowls and taps his foot.
  • Marvel Ultimate Alliance has a variation on this. The characters don't have special Idle Animations but they WILL start complaining that they should be doing something.
    • As did its predecessor, X-Men Legends. In Legends II, a PSP exclusive character (Nate Grey) even complains that he should have brought his PSP along.
  • In The World Ends with You Neku and his partner both animate when left alone for a few seconds; Neku taps his foot to the beat of whatever's playing in his headphones, Shiki fusses with her cell phone, Joshua messes with his hair and Beat stretches. Most of the time a speech bubble also appears above the partner's head at the same time, allowing Neku to ask them for help. At one point, waiting long enough for the idle animation and the speech bubble to show is actually used as a gameplay mechanic.
  • In Rogue Galaxy, if you stand around doing nothing, your party members may start to complain about it; all characters have some form of idle animation. The most entertaining one is Kisala, who stretches rather fetchingly...
  • In the .hack//G.U. series, your party all have a wait animation when standing still (Haseo shakes his arm, crosses his arms and looks around, Kuhn stretches, Pi adjusts her gloves and shoes, and so on).
  • In certain rooms in Kingdom Hearts II, your party members will actually start to pace around and even appear to hold idle conversations with each other if you leave them be.
  • Golden Sun: Dark Dawn has your party members wave their arms about and spin in place if you go idle at the status screen.
  • In Dark Souls, the easiest way to tell you've become egg-burdened before the parasite sprouts is that you suddenly gain an Idle animation where you scratch at your head.
  • In Horizon Zero Dawn, let Aloy stand in one place long enough and she'll start striking some poses.
  • Titan Quest: Your character will start looking at the scenery and flip their weapon in the air when you're idle.
  • Transistor: If Red doesn't move, she blinks, rocks her body a bit, and if not close enough to an Access Point for it to rise out of the ground, she'll turn her head slightly to the direction of the Transistor from time to time.

    Adventure Game 
  • Hype: The Time Quest, in addition to every character having an extremely exaggerated breathing animation, your character, the eponymous Hype, would, if he had no weapon drawn and was left standing around long enough, draw his sword, throw it into the air and catch it back in its sheath... Many of the game's enemies also had idle animations where they would fiddle around with their weapons...
  • Discworld probably has the greatest Idle animation ever which also breaks the fourth wall. After a few minutes of inactivity the screen shifts to an extreme close-up of the protagonist Rincewind as he shouts "HELLOOOOO!!" and he taps the screen while looking around for the player. Amusingly, Rincewind in this game was voiced by none other than... Eric Idle. Idle animation, indeed.
  • The Neverhood protagonist Klaymen had several creative idle animations. In one, he pulls his head off, and holds it in one hand. He then does a talking motion with the other hand. The head imitates the hand by saying 'blah-blah-blah'. This repeats three times, and then he puts his head back on. In another animation he stretches his arms straight outwards and concentrates. Eventually, one arm retracts into the body while the other one extends at the same speed. After a while, the arms go back to normal. In a third animation, he turns one of three knobs on his chest, and his head rotates at the same speed. When his head has rotated 360 degrees, he goes back to normal.
  • In Gretel and Hansel, if you leave Gretel standing, she will start rocking on her heels, and will eventually fall asleep.
  • In the short adventure game Ulitsa Dimitrova, the idle animation is a simple yawn, followed by a little shiver from nicotine withdrawal and laying down on the ground to sleep, before a snowfall starts.
  • In Leisure Suit Larry 1: In the Land of the Lounge Lizards, every time Larry stands still for too long, a black dog walks onto the screen and pees against Larry's legs.
  • In Spirit of the North, leaving the fox alone will lead to it sitting down and eventually curling up to sleep. An achievement is tied to letting it sit idle for three minutes.
  • Przygody Reksia: In both Wizards and Time Machine, Kretes will start singing when the player does nothing. In the latter game, Reksio also gets an idle animation (namely, sitting down and sleeping) which is triggered if the player waits longer.

    Fighting Game 
  • Stand still for a few seconds in ANY King of Fighters game past '96 while playing Ralf, and he starts jumping back and forth in place. (The safest time to do this is after you knock out the opponent, needless to say.) His partner, Clark, will stretch his arms out and wiggle his fingers, showing that his regular pose can leave even him with stiff joints, Leona also has it in versions '96 through '98 where she lowers her arms and takes a deep breath. In versions '99 through XI, she assumes another battle stance with her hands forward and Whip has a similar stance to Leona in '99 through XI.
    • Duke, meanwhile, folds his arms if left idle for a short time.
    • This also extends to other games in the King of Fighters series, of course:
    • K' would fall asleep if left long enough. How would the player know? Well, when he has his hand on his hips, he usually blinks. You'll know he's snoozing when his eyes close... and don't open. Just hit any button to wake him up.
    • Vanessa does a few little jumps while she's standing still.
    • Andy Bogard, by the time of KOF 2001, would strike a series of increasingly bizarre poses, including a has-to-be-seen-to-be believed pose where he's slightly crouched down, holding his hands right in front of eyes, and peering at his opponent through them. What the hell is he doing? Who knows?
      • At one point during said idle animation, he goes into a stance reminiscent of his classic stance from the very first Fatal Fury.
    • Shermie doesn't stand — she dances in one spot and in her Orochi version, she raises her arms up and down to the breasts position.
    • Yamazaki Ryuji was crazy enough, but he loses it in his idle stance in 2003.
  • In NeoGeo Battle Coliseum, when Ai has been crouching for a few seconds, she pulls out a Neo Geo Pocket and starts playing.
  • Remy from Street Fighter III actually has about a dozen idle animations that play in sequence, although at first glance or in the heat of battle, it appears as though he's just standing still.
  • In Street Fighter V, if you idle for about 30 seconds with G, he'll strike a pose and shoot a spark from his finger skyward. This spark actually has a hitbox and deals more than 60% damage.
  • Slight variation in the Idle Animation idea: In Melty Blood Act Cadenza Ver.B, if you leave Kohaku in the crouching position for more than 27 seconds straight, she will alter her sitting animation, sprout cat ears, wave the end of her broomstick as if it was a friggin' tail, and start mumbling nonsensical stuff about taking over the Tohno mansion.
  • Every character in Super Smash Bros. (except for Steve) has a few that they will go through, sometimes relevant to their character or franchise — Mario adjusts his hat, Sonic taps his foot impatiently, King Dedede hoists his mallet over his shoulder, Pikachu scratches its ear, Snake brings his hand up to his chin thoughtfully, Lucas flails his arms, and Luigi pulls on his nose and winces when it snaps back onto his face — just to name a few.
    • This is actually somewhat important for the Links, who can use their shields to block projectiles while standing still, except for when their idle animations cause them to drop their shields momentarily.
  • Suika Ibuki from the Touhou Project fighting games staggers and nearly fails to stand upright when in idle mode.
  • In contrast to the older Mortal Kombat games, Mortal Kombat 9's fighters will now do something when standing still long enough, usually stretching a body part to keep from stiffing, such as Scorpion punching the air with both arms, Ermac who will move his arms back and forth and rotate his wrists, or interestingly, Skarlet who will do a sexy hip swing if she stands still too long.
  • In Double Dragon Neon, Billy and Jimmy will go into various idle animations if left alone long enough: these seem to differ somewhat in a two-player game and they also tell the other player to "hurry up, butt<insert random object here>" if standing in front of a doorway. They also have a dedicated "dance" move that serves no real purpose but is funny to see regardless.
  • Each of the characters in Dragon's Crown have one or two, depending on the character. The Knight removes his helmet, the Wizard creates a dragon made of flames in his palm, the Amazon looks around vigilantly, the Elf kicks the dirt off of her feet, and the Sorceress sways a bit out of boredom. The Dwarf only has one animation, where he sits on the ground with his arms folded.
  • Every character in BlazBlue has an idle animation, such as Ragna adjusting his collar or Noel shifting her weight from foot to foot. Rachel has a particularly amusing one - if you leave her crouching for too long, she'll fall asleep.
  • As just one of many unusual things in Power Instinct, the character Olof will eventually enter an idle animation in which he lifts his leg up slightly. The unusual part is that this is a counter stance, essentially performed by waiting around long enough for him to trigger it on his own.
  • In X-Men: Children of the Atom, Colossus normally does his regular power stance until he leans forward and taunts his opponent in a beckoning fashion after the second time he breathes. Magneto also does this when he normally has his hands out while levitating, he starts to spin both arms counterclockwise (when facing right) or clockwise (when facing left), leaving behind up to three afterimages of his arms in motion, though in the case of the latter it's more apparent in Marvel Super Heroes and Marvel vs. Capcom 2. This animation is later repeated in 3D through Marvel vs. Capcom 3.
  • In Party Animals, characters who stand still long enough either scratch their bottoms or twist their waists.
  • In PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale, Sackboy's crouch animation has him sit on the floor. If you crouch for long enough, he'll lie down instead and take a short nap.
  • River City Girls: The player characters bob in place when not changing location.

    First-Person Shooter 
  • In Half-Life, when the player has the Snark selected but doesn't actually use it, it occasionally tries to bite at Freeman's or Shephard's finger. Another animation has Gordon/Adrian try to calm down the agitated thing by violently shaking it.
  • In Battlefield, the player usually examines whatever weapon he's currently holding in some way. If you're holding a knife, the guy practices balancing it on his fingertip.
  • GoldenEye (1997) featured some mildly amusing animations for its NPCs if the player character can sneak up behind one: guards will swat at imaginary flies (before threatening to shoot them) and even scratch their rears.
    • The same thing happens in Perfect Dark, since it used the same animation.
  • In Descent your ship bobs slightly when you are not moving.
  • In Halo, your character will start fiddling with their gun if left alone for a certain amount of time such as pulling open the cooling latch on the plasma pistol or pressing the "TEST" button on the rocket launcher (which tests the rotation mechanism). Rooster Teeth, the creators of the Machinima series Red vs. Blue, said this was one of their biggest problems while "filming" in Halo: Combat Evolved, which resulted in very short takes to prevent the "cameraman" from doing this (the animation in which the character adjusts a knob on the magnum). Alternatively, panning and/or dolly shots could be done indefinitely as turning and moving stopped idle animations from playing.
  • In the Metroid Prime Trilogy, Samus will fidget with her cannon, open a control panel on it and press a few buttons, look around idly, and occasionally put the cannon down if left alone long enough.
  • In Jedi Knight, if Kyle Katarn had his lightsaber equipped and was left alone, he would eventually check his beard, then trim it with the lightsaber. With other weapons, he'll stretch, rest his gun on his shoulder, and look around while the camera pans in a circle around him.
    • The expansion featured Mara Jade as the player character after the first four levels. Not having a beard, she passed her time by poking her saber blade in the classic 'is that hot?' fashion. Repeatedly.
    • Jedi Academy features an enemy idle where Dark Jedi will hold their lightsaber hilt horizontally in their palm and use the force to levitate it a few inches while spinning it around. Particularly funny (and puzzling) if the enemy hasn't deactivated the saber completely before beginning the idle.
  • Soldier of Fortune 2, to the point of making the hero look downright twitchy (which, in fact, might actually be in character). A particularly bad one was, when carrying the shotgun, playfully tossing it into the air a few inches, and then catching it. Unprofessional, to be sure, but the game also treated walking around as being "idle," and would trigger said animation accordingly...even when, for example, you're just rounding a corner to ambush some terrorists. And you see yourself playfully throw your gun away just before you got into a gunfight. Yow.
  • Rather than an animation, standing still for a while in Blood (1997) caused the character to start singing showtunes. The others got into it in Blood II: The Chosen; one of them throws out random "yo mama" jokes when left alone.
  • Left 4 Dead has various idle animations for the survivors and the zombies. Survivors will wipe the sweat off their face, pick their nose, roll their neck around, and shrug their shoulders to name a few. The common infected will sit down, lean against a wall, vomit, attack each other or boxes, and others. The special infected lack idle animations.
  • Waiting enough in Duke Nukem 3D will cause Duke to crack his knuckles and address the player with "What are you waiting for? Christmas?"
  • In Shadow Warrior; leaving Lo Wang idle long enough will cause him to complain about standing and eventually try to catch a fly with a pair of chopsticks.
  • In Metro 2033, if the player doesn't move for a while, Artyom will begin fidgeting with whatever weapon he's currently holding. Every weapon has its own unique animation, and some of them are pretty darn funny.
    • With the Bastard (the aptly but incorrectly named "sub-machine gun" made from scrounged-up junk) he starts to play with the selector switch and ends up breaking it off; he jams it back in after staring at it for a moment. In another animation Artyom starts tossing it up in air and after a few tosses the gun disappears, causing him to look up in confusion before it crashes back into his hands.
    • The adjustable stock on the Duplet shotgun will snap off when the he tries to lengthen it (again, jams it back in).
    • If he's holding his battery charger, he starts cleaning off grime and accidentally shocks himself.
  • Metro: Last Light also has those. Several of them are recycled from the first game, such as breaking off the Bastard's fire selector, but there are a few new ones, like Artyom catching his finger in the hammer of the Ashot shotgun pistol, or getting his finger trapped in the hinge of the Duplet when he accidentally opens it. He also plays air guitar on the AK 2012 rifle.
  • Elizabeth in Bioshock Infinite has a crap-ton of these, Word of God is that special effort was intentionally focused on it to make her more realistic. During the peaceful moments she will inspect and interact with almost everything in her environment in a very realistic way.
    • If you pay attention you will notice that Elizabeth will actually point out lockpicks and other collectables if there are any nearby.
    • Technically speaking, however, as Elizabeth is not a playable character (until the second episode of the DLC Burial at Sea, at any rate) it's debatable whether this counts as true "idle animation" as Elizabeth will often do these actions with or without the player interfacing with Booker.
  • Team Fortress 2: When playing as the Engineer and having a wrench as the current weapon, the first person view will show that the Engineer likes to thump said wrench into his open hand repeatedly while not using it for Percussive Maintenance.
  • Dead Island: Riptide has the survivors who are not being played do this in safe locations, with Logan and Xian playing with a knife for example, cutting themselves, then keep fooling around with the weapon.
  • PlanetSide 2 lacks idle animations in-game, but in the character customization screen each class has a rare idle animation, such as the Heavy Assault trooper relaxing and pointing his light machine gun skywards with one hand.

    Hack and Slash 
  • In Ascaron's Sacred, the characters eventually begin talking to you. The Battlemage mentioning that the Gods must have put in a Pause feature for a reason. The Dwarf, the only character that cannot ride, asks if you've been eaten by a horse.

    Hidden Object 
  • Leave the characters in any Playrix game in this genre alone for long enough between levels and they'll perform a wide variety of actions, from dusting furniture to playing with their pet to talking to each other or the player.

    Massively Multiplayer Online RPG 
  • In EverQuest, the old Ogre and Troll models would scratch their butts.
  • In Granblue Fantasy, most characters have simple stationary animations whenever they are not selected, or when their Charge Attack bars are not full. A limited number of newly-released characters have their own unique ones, such as Ayer tilting his neck, Drang jugging his orbs, or Yuel swaying her tail in her Water version to name a few. This becomes completely averted when the game is played on the "Lite" Graphics settings, as the characters will simply stand unless selected.
  • City of Heroes rotates through three or four different stances when a character is left untouched for more than a few seconds.
    • Also the Bat Wings costume piece will sometimes twitch and flutter as well when the character is standing idle.
    • When placing Boss and Hostage details in a player-created mission, the author can set special idle animations for the NPCs to be performing when the player encounters them.
  • In World of Warcraft, each of the playable races has a "fidget" animation, ranging from just shifting one's weight from one foot to the other (Blood Elf), to glancing warily over both shoulders (Draenei), to rolling apparent kinks out of the shoulders (female Orc and male Night Elf), to hopping up and down (female Night Elf) to alternately standing fully upright and squatting (male trolls, in one of the few moments where you notice how tall they are). Oh, and male Taurens scratch their asses. Even pets have idle animations — cats yawn and stretch, wolves tilt their heads back and howl, and a Warlock's Succubus, if left to her own devices, will occasionally swat her own backside.
    • The succubus animation is lampshaded at least once. A warlock in Stonard in the Swamp of Sorrows will, occasionally, berate her own succubus for spanking herself and checking her fingernails, since "no one cares."
    • Incidentally, it seems like all of the female fidget animations seem designed to show off Jiggle Physics. The Night Elf example is just the most obvious and infamous one.
    • In addition, the monsters and the non-combat pets have idle animations as well. For example, the Keeper of the Grove can accidentally hurt himself on his razor-sharp claw, the baby murloc pet starts dancing, the beholder uses its Eye Beam on a critter nearby and so on.
    • The armored skeletons juggle their own detached skulls. Void Reaver (a giant demonic robot) mimes revving a motorcyle. The sea giant squats slightly, causing a large green bubble to float up from his butt, then pops it with one finger and fans the air. Some things like wolves and mountain lions will interact with critters (non combative ambience) as well; a wolf will suddenly run off into the distance and bite a prairie dog to death, then run back to his original spot.
    • This is the primary feature of non-combat pets besides looking cute.
  • Aion has a variety of idle animations depending on your environment: your character will fidget in town, produce a fan if it's hot or a giant leaf from hammerspace if it starts raining, and males will randomly catch a fish with their bare hands if knee deep in water, to name a few examples.
  • In Pangya, on the shop/inventory screens, wait screens for VS games, and in chat lounges, each character will go through a few idle animations. During actual gameplay, the golfers don't have idle animations, but the caddies do, and some of them are especially amusing (such as Titan Boo digging out his ears, or Lolo running around in circles freaking out if your shot clock is running out).
  • In Dungeon Fighter Online, the male gunner will fiddle with his guns every couple of seconds when he is not moving.
  • Final Fantasy XIV provides the option for players to adjust their idle animations, or even play several in sequence at set intervals, standing or sitting.
    • Some of the minions you can summon also have idle animations. Particular of note are the Warriors of Light from the first Final Fantasy, which will do the victory dance (in all its two frames of animation) if you stand around for a while.

    Mecha Game 
  • Another Century's Episode 3 had idle animations for a couple of its mecha. The ∀ Gundam would rotate its head then sit on the ground and hang a laundry line between its hands, while all the mecha from Overman King Gainer would break out into the series' infamous monkey dance.
  • In the Armored Core games (at least in 3 and Silent Line), your Humongous Mecha's torso will start swaying left and right. If they have hover legs however, they will unfold their standby legs and land instead.
  • Though your 'mech itself doesn't have any animations while idle, in MechWarrior 4: Vengeance and the expansions, your Lancemates will sway their torsos left and right and occasionally crouch when they're simply standing there.

    Platformer 
  • Mega Man blinks if you leave him standing there.
    • In Mega Man 7 (and possible 8 and & Bass as well), if you call Rush but don't use the utility he was called for, he will lie down and fall asleep.
  • Atmosfear: The protagonist looks around, grabs something from his pocket, lifts his hat, or crosses his arms and taps his foot.
  • Gun Witch: Beretta flexes her knees while standing in place, making her bob up and down.
  • Open Surge has plenty of these.
    • Surge plays his video game.
    • Neon blows a bubblegum bubble until it pops in his FACE. In your FACE, Neon!
    • Charge stretches his arms until he cracks his shoulders. That's gotta fucking hurt.
    • Tux just simply does Sonic's idle animation.
  • Sonic the Hedgehog: The title character would glare at the player (shown in the page image above), tap his foot and even lie down if left for a few seconds. In Sonic the Hedgehog CD, he would jump off the screen after 3 minutes of idling with an "I'm outta here!" and the game would reset to the title screen. Likewise, other playable characters have these as well - though only Tails has one as consistently as Sonic (falling asleep standing up). This trend would be carried across pretty much every game in the series, with Advance 2 replacing the "look up" feature of holding up on the D-pad with instantly going into each character's idle animation. It's also probably for the best if you don't think too hard about where Cream gets all those ice cream cones from.
    • Sonic does the same thing in Sonic Spinball, but in that particular case the HUD complains, too. "YO, MOVE IT!" Leave him alone long enough for him to lay down, and the HUD goes "ANYBODY HOME?"
    • If you leave him alone long enough in Sonic Unleashed, he'll lie down as he did in the 16-bit games.
      • Were-Sonic will crouch down, draw patterns on the floor, flick at dust and start nodding off to sleep.
      • Links if you're interested— Sonic, Werehog.
    • From Sonic Adventure to Sonic Heroes, characters will comment on their current situation or state of mind if you leave them idle. Each level has at least one unique comment per character mixed in with a couple generic ones that play in every level.
      • In Heroes, it also happens if the characters on your team are separated temporarily and some are left idle; the idle characters will make comments even if you're moving, because they aren't. This happens most commonly at points when each character has to hit a different switch (since the switches have to be hit simultaneously, this leaves one teammate idling next to the first switch found, then the other teammate idling by the second switch, until finally the leader hits the third switch and they reunite), and when you go into "Invisible mode" with Espio (which leaves Vector and Charmy idling wherever they were when he went invisible).
      • When playing as Team Dark, if you go into first-person view as Shadow, and stare at Rouge long enough, she'll actually turn her head towards you and wink.
    • If you do this in Knuckles Chaotix, you won't get a game over. Instead, Metal Sonic zooms in and attacks you, which is easily avoidable.
    • In Sonic Generations, Modern Sonic's idle animations are similar to those from Unleashed. Classic Sonic's idle animations, on the other hand, are a mix of the idle animations from Sonic 1, Sonic 2, Sonic 3 & Knuckles, Sonic 3D, and Sonic CD.
    • In Sonic Lost World whenever Sonic is falling, if you wait long enough without pressing any buttons Sonic will cross his arms and glare at the player.
    • In the iOS version of Sonic the Hedgehog 4, Sonic starts listening to music on his iPhone.
    • In Sonic Mania, Sonic has an addition to his idle animation: he still has the iconic foot tap, but after a while he transitions into a "ready to go" pose and starts bobbing up and down. Link
    • In his appearance in LEGO Dimensions, Sonic will tap his foot and grimace at you in annoyance as he looks at his wrist. After awhile, he'll fall asleep and dream of his Sonic the Hedgehog 2 sprite self running.
    • In Sonic Advance 3, since you have five playable characters in teams of two, there are a minimum of ten idle animations. Each character has one when in they're lead, and one for when they're at the back. And then Amy has an extra animation if she's in the back with Sonic in the lead.
    • In Sonic Frontiers, Sonic's idle animation changes depending how far he is in the story, which also serves to showcase that his health is getting increasingly worse. He goes from idly standing around (and playing with a Koco plush in the Japanese version) to grasping his head trying to fight off a permanent headache, to struggling to catch his breath, to outright collapsing the second he stops moving.
  • In Aero the Acro-Bat, the title character bobs his head to the music or does a handstand when idled.
  • Sly Cooper has several varying idle animations for each of the player characters throughout the series.
    • The title character's idle animations included him removing his cap and either twirling it or tossing it in the air and having it land perfectly seated on his head, holding his cane as if lining up for a golf swing, using his cane to scratch his back (resulting in one of his legs starting to twitch like a dog's), and leaning on his cane (sometimes with the cane slipping out from under him and causing him to nearly faceplant).
    • Bentley will often pull out a set of blueprints, look around nervously, perform a stationary wheelie in his wheelchair (in Sly 3: Honor Among Thieves), or sneeze so hard that it causes him to double over (yet doesn't draw the attention of any nearby guards, interestingly enough).
    • Murray will occasionally try to pull up his belt (why he wears a belt when he has no pants is anybody's guess), resulting in his hands slipping and Murray accidentally smacking himself in the face. In Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time he has new animations, include flexing, pulling a cupcake from nowhere and eating it in one bite, and pulling a piece of broccoli from nowhere and gagging, before positioning it far from himself and dropping it on the floor.
    • Some of the NPC guards will also have idle animations. For example; in the China level of Sly 3, the monkey guards will occasionally play with their shurikens, resulting in them pricking their fingers on the sharp points.
    • The characters also have idle animations that play during the character selection screen; Sly's include balancing his cane on his hand, twirling his cap, and (in Sly 2: Band of Thieves and 3) pulling out his family book, the Thievius Raccoonus and reading it for a few moments, sometimes appearing surprised by what he reads. Bentley will look at blueprints and sometimes whip out a calculator and crunch some numbers. Murray will occasionally doze off briefly before startling back awake, and sometimes produce a slice of pizza from behind his back, scarfing it down in nearly one bite.
  • Earthworm Jim had fun with this — among his idle animations were him pulling out a tiny Elvis doll... and eating it.
    • There was even a Running Gag about Jim trying to toss his gun into the air and catch it. This results in it bouncing off his head, blasting him in the face, and cautiously tossing it and having it safely land in its holster.
    • Other poses include: Playing jumprope with his head (body?) throwing a brick up and off screen (and the matching animation when it lands on his head) and twirling his gun on his finger (sometimes blowing his head off in a misfire.)
  • In Super Mario 64, Mario gets tired and goes to sleep if the player doesn't move for a long time. He dreams of pasta. Same for Sunshine and Galaxy, only without the pasta dreaming.
    • Luigi and Yoshi do the same in the remake, Super Mario 64 DS. Wario has an exclusive idle where he scratches his butt, but he'll eventually sleep as well.
    • If Mario is low on health, he'll start panting instead. On cold levels, he'll shiver.
    • If he's standing in the poisonous gas in Hazy Maze Cave, he'll start coughing and waving his hand to clear the air.
    • Also in Super Mario Sunshine, when you move Mario into the shade, he'll pant and wipe the sweat from his face.
    • In Super Mario Maker and Super Mario Maker 2, if you've unlocked the sound effects and equipped Mario with the doorbell or the buzzer, that particular sound effect will play every three seconds while Mario is idling. 2 also adds the Near Miss sound to this category.
    • Super Mario Odyssey brings back the pasta dreams. It also has a whole host of new idle animation for Mario. His basic idle animation features him yawning, stretching tiredly, tapping his boot against the ground, and limbering up his legs; a bird may also land on Mario's nose while he's sleeping. In areas with a creepy or ominous atmosphere, he looks nervous, glances around anxiously, and shudders a little. In cold areas Mario shivers and tries to warm himself, while in hot areas, Mario wipes sweat from his brow and fans himself; unless he wears a costume appropriate for the weather, in which case he'll do his standard animation. Also, if he stands near a boombox or someone playing music, he starts dancing. If he stands right above a spot which can be Ground Pounded to find a hidden treasure, he'll look at his feet and stomp the ground curiously.
    • Super Mario Bros.: Sort of. If you stay in one spot for 30 seconds, with a Hammer Brother nearby, the Hammer Brother will leave its perch, and actively start chasing you. Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels would introduce Hammer Brothers that actively chased the player from their first appearance.
  • In Banjo-Kazooie, Kazooie starts looking around and pecking at Banjo's head after a while. If this happens three times, Banjo will grab Kazooie and throttle her.
  • Yooka-Laylee, as a Spiritual Successor to Banjo-Kazooie, features a similar animation with Laylee biting Yooka's head.
  • Jazz Jackrabbit has rather goofy idle animations. Those for Spaz in Jazz Jackrabbit 2, for example, include a bird perching on his finger, at which point he promptly eats it, and shooting a passing UFO. If you start moving during the bird scene, the bird just flies away. However, if you start moving when the UFO comes, the animation still goes through, with the bullet coming out of thin air.
  • Toe Jam And Earl has a particularly awkward one where your character would fall asleep and you would have to spend several seconds Button Mashing to get the characters to wake up again.
  • Commander Keen in games 4 - 6, Keen would sit down and pull out a book to read when left alone.
    • Also in the "Pyramid of the Moons" level of Secret of the Oracle, if Keen stands on top of one of the crescent moon symbols on the floor, after a short while he will moon the player.
    • In Keen Dreams, Keen falls asleep when left alone.
  • The Amiga Licensed Game of Hudson Hawk had a nice twist on the standard 'tapping foot' animation. Leave him for a bit, he starts checking his watch as well. After some time, he starts glancing upward nervously, becoming more agitated... then a piano drops on him out of nowhere, killing him.
  • Crash Bandicoot:
    • In the original trilogy, Crash either plays with a yo-yo (sometimes tying himself up by accident) or bounces a wumpa fruit up and down (often ending up with a faceful of wumpa from above). If you leave him long enough he'll get bored of his yo-yo and start to boogie. And if he's in a level where it's raining, or there's ice and snow, he'll start shivering and blowing on his hands to try and warm up.
    • In Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy, Crash and his Promoted to Playable sister Coco both have their set of idle animations:
      • In addition to his returning idles, Crash will also get bored, start to breakdance, or play volleyball with Aku Aku with a wumpa fruit; this last animation is Official Fan-Submitted Content that made it in thanks to a contest.
      • Coco's idle animations include performing her own version of the Crash dance, sighing then tapping her foot impatiently, sitting and typing on her laptop, pulling out her cellphone to answer a call, take pictures of the scenery, take selfies with an adorably goofy face, or even have her cell phone exploding (much like the Samsung Galaxy Note 7).
  • American McGee's Alice has a number of different idle animations for Alice — a few for each of her toy weapons. Most are harmless, like performing a card trick with her deck of cards, but a few showcase Alice's more destructive side, such as accidentally hitting herself in the head with her croquet mallet or dropping her jackbomb on her foot.
  • In the original Bubsy, the titular bobcat would tap his foot and eventually knock on the screen while shouting "HELLO!?" if left alone for too long.
  • Ristar had a different one for each world, such as snapping his fingers and tapping his toes in the music-themed world. The end credits contain quite a few of them, played off as him "dancing" to the music.
    • This is actually significant on Planet Elykiki (Planet Freon in the US version): Normally, his idle animation for that world is sitting down and building a miniature snowman. However, the miniboss fight is a snowball fight, so his idle animation is then changed to making a snowball, which he can then pick up and throw at the miniboss.
  • Gex the Gecko had a large array of idle animations in his first game, such as doing a hand stand, balancing on his tail, and eating butterflies. Sometimes this was accompanied by wisecracking.
  • Pitfall Harry Jr. in Pitfall The Mayan Adventure has a number of these. Being that his primary ranged attack was a sling, he would progress from the simple "stand and breathe" animation onto progressively more intricate ones as you left poor Harry Jr. idle for longer periods of time. First he would twirl the sling once. Then he would twirl the sling several times. Eventually he would whirl it around and treat it like a pair of nunchucks. Finally, if left idle long enough, he would settle down in the Lotus Position, with hands up-turned on his knees — and begin to levitate!
  • Kenny's Adventure: Kenny jumps around and moves his arms while idling. A jaunty song even plays as he does so.
  • Kirby:
    • In the original Kirby's Dream Land, Kirby will dance if the game is paused. But, he doesn't revert to the original sprite when he's finished, playing tricks on some gamers' minds.
    • In Kirby Super Star, Kirby will eventually start falling asleep if you leave him standing alone for too long, though he wakes himself up after a time. Ultra added idle animations to each of the helpers; Parasol Waddle Dee bounces back and forth, Tac looks around sneakily, the Knights look from side to side, and so on.
    • In Kirby: Squeak Squad Kirby actually does fall asleep, and starts to dream about his strawberry shortcake before waking himself up and eating the thought bubble containing the cake. Many of his copy abilities also receive idle animations of their own; for example Wheel Kirby adjusts his hat, Animal Kirby scratches his ear with his foot, and Magic Kirby has a tiny Kirby exit from a door on Kirby's top hat before backflipping back in to Kirby's surprise.
  • The Amiga classic Superfrog has a rather worrying one — leave your frog to himself for long enough and he'll end up playing with his crotch.
  • Conker in Conker's Bad Fur Day, if left alone long enough, would juggle, play with a yo-yo, drink a soda, drink something out of a glass (and throw the glass behind him so it shattered), play Killer Instinct on his Game Boy, read an adult magazine and comment on it, or ask if there's "anyone out there" or tell himself, "I think he died" or "You'll go blind doing that" in regards to the player. Furthermore, if left in the "Sunny" area (the area with the barn), he would sit down and whistle along with the music.
    • If you left him idle near butterflies he would occasionally take out a blowtorch and try to kill them, and if left idle in the club he would dance and do the worm.
    • In the family-friendly prequel, Conker's Pocket Tales, Conker would play Donkey Kong Land on a Game Boy, complete with the bonus round music.
  • Spyro the Dragon:
    • The original game series has Spyro turn to look impatiently at the viewer. Occasionally, the dragonfly Sparx flutters up into the screen.
    • ''Spyro: A Hero's Tail': Spyro curls up and falls asleep if left standing. This is particularly amusing when he's left on the bed in an Elder's hut.
    • The Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning: Spyro will begin dancing if left alone for long enough.
    • Spyro 2: Season of Flame also had him stretch.
  • Wario Land:
    • In Wario Land 4, Wario has regular idle animations like jumping rope, and a few that only appear in certain circumstances. Leave him alone during the timed escapes and he'll run in place and flail his arms, and apologize for freaking out once you move him again. Wait on the surface of a body of water and he'll start splashing in a panic as if in fear of drowning - not that it matters, as he has Super Not-Drowning Skills.
    • In Wario Land: Shake It!, Wario actually says "Get on with it!" if you've not made him do anything for a while.
  • Donkey Kong:
    • Donkey Kong Country: If left alone, DK beats his chest, Diddy takes his hat off to scratch his head or starts juggling, Dixie blows a bubblegum bubble and drinks from a juice box and Kiddy tugs on a loose thread on his romper suit until he tugs too hard and falls over. NPCs also did this.
      • Unfortunately, when cutscenes were added to the GBA remakes, the Kongs still did this when they were meant to be having a conversation. This makes it look like the Kong family all have a bad case of Attention Deficit Disorder.
      • The SNES versions lampshade this by making Cranky Kong hit the younger Kongs with his walking stick when they lapse into their idle animations while he is talking.
    • In Donkey Kong 64, each of the characters has their own if left alone, which include juggling oranges, swatting away butterflies, and catching and eating flies.
    • In Donkey Kong Country Returns, DK will pull out a Nintendo DS and play with it, then toss it away.
    • By far, Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze has the most idle animations of any game in the Donkey Kong Country series. Donkey Kong will scratch his armpit, or play a Nintendo 3DS XL with one of four games; Animal Crossing: New Leaf, Super Mario 3D Land, Mario Kart 7, or Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D, with music and sound effects from each. If one of his friends is on his back, they each have their own idle animation; Diddy will look around, then cheer on DK while he plays one of his games; Dixie will look around, then groom DK while he plays one of his games, and Cranky will read a newspaper while DK plays one of his games. When one of DK's friends are alone, Diddy will remove his hat and sing, or yawn, Dixie will do a handstand, or play an imaginary electric guitar, and Cranky will clean out his ear with his cane.
      • In the Nintendo Switch version of the game, Funky Kong will eat a banana, then wipe his surfboard with the peel, or spin his surfboard on his finger. Donkey Kong also now plays Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze on the Nintendo Switch, and if Diddy or Dixie is on his back, they will play it with him. If Cranky is on his back, DK will offer him a controller, only for Cranky to turn it down and read his newspaper, then smack DK on the head with it when he finds out that DK is playing as him.
  • In Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, the Prince will brush the dust off his clothes and generally act amusingly fastidious. In Two Thrones, you'll get even berated by the voice in your head if you stand still for long enough.
  • In Lady Sia, if you leave the title character alone for a while she will check her hair or redo her ponytail. She may occasionally pull out a cell phone and talk on it for a few moments (notable because the game seems to take place in a typical medieval fantasy world with steam/coal/gear based technology).
  • Monster Bash (starring Johnny Dash) literally breaks the fourth wall with its idle animation; if you leave Johnny too long, eventually he'll load a stone into his trusty catapult and fire it directly at you, "smashing" your monitor.
  • In Duck Dodgers Starring Daffy Duck, if you left Daffy alone for long enough, he would go on an absolutely massive rant about how nobody was playing with him, and he was getting sick and tired of waiting around — including several Looney Tunes Continuity Nods.
  • In Maui Mallard in Cold Shadow for the Genesis, SNES and PC, Donal— Ahem, Maui has a few of these: looking at a map or a dead muddrake, twirling his gun on his fingers (sometimes droping it, and shooting his own face by accident) and pointing his gun around in a badass pose. His alter-ego, Cold Shadow, had only one: playing hoop with his staff.
  • In a game as focused on motion as Mirror's Edge, it isn't surprising one of these is thrown in. If Faith is left standing still for a while, she'll begin looking at her nails.
  • In the Sega Genesis version of Taz-Mania, Taz would throw a tantrum and tap his foot impatiently if left alone for a few seconds. During this, the music would change to an appropriately restless melody.
  • Jak and Daxter has a fair number of idle animations, particularly in the first one. One cute example: Jak claps his hands, Daxter jumps into them, and they play a little tossing/juggling game.
    • A particularly funny one from the second game has Daxter make goofy faces at Jak while he looks angrier and angrier before finally laughing.
  • Ratchet & Clank also has several. Most consist of just Ratchet (or Clank) looking around, though he'll shiver and wrap his tail around his legs on snowy planets. On the weapons select screen in Ratchet & Clank (2002), Ratchet will play with the currently selected weapon, with unique animations like juggling the Glove of Doom 'bots, twirling the Blaster, or plugging his ear to test out the Taunter. Speaking of weapons, leaving the screen idle at a vendor will also get you some funny ones: the attendant may ask you if you're going to buy something, or "Help, I'm trapped in this box!" may scroll by on the ticker trail.
    • Some enemies have idle animations. For example, in Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando, the Thugs-4-Less henchmen may play Rock–Paper–Scissors with each other, and the tribesmen on Barlow and Joba talk and tell (non-audible) jokes.
    • Exclusive to Ratchet & Clank: Up Your Arsenal: due to Clank starring in the Show Within a Show Secret Agent Clank, one of his idle animations has him jump and strike a karate pose before landing.
    • A Crack in Time added a slew of new idle animations. If Ratchet doesn't have a weapon out (i.e. is holding his wrench), he might throw his wrench in the air, adjust his gloves, tap dirt out of his boots with his wrench and others.
  • In Yoshi's Story, Yoshi will start marching in place and humming (very cute) and occasionally look towards the camera. The health meter is a happiness meter, so if Yoshi's hurt, it'll be nervous and start panting rapidly, then try to take deeper breaths.
  • Tomba! has several idle animations in the second game. For example, he starts hitting his chest.
  • Sparkster from Rocket Knight Adventures would rock left and right happily when idle, then he would eventually cross his arms. Then he'd remove his goggles and cheerfully emit a word balloon saying Let's go! along with a high pitched noise. Quite adorable.
  • In LocoRoco 1 and 2, leaving the controls alone for a few seconds makes three muimuis (or buibuis) pop up on the lower left corner of the screen who are shown singing to the background music (assuming the song is a level theme, not one of the locoroco themes).
  • In Captain Claw, wait long enough Claw will start saying silly things like ''Hello, I'm not getting any younger, I'm growing impatient, "At least bring me something back from the kitchen'' or ''I'm waiting'', most in snide tones.
  • The Ren and Stimpy game for Game Gear plunged either of the eponymous characters into darkness when the player hit pause - showing only their googly eyes on a black screen. Unpausing reveals either Ren scratching his butt or Stimpy adding to his spit jar - after a couple seconds they'll look up at the player in embarrassment and then flash an awkward grin.
  • In Aladdin (Virgin Games), normally Al would just pivot between the left and right as if looking for trouble. Leave him alone long enough, though, and he'll pull out an apple, absently juggle it in a hand, and even duplicate his trick from the film of rolling it down from one elbow to the other.
  • The eponymous Bug tries to flex his muscles, only to find out that he can't breathe after inhaling in too much air, thus gasping it all out.
  • In one of the Kim Possible games, Kim will (among other things) flip her hair or check her grappling gun when idle, and Ron will twiddle his thumbs or have his trousers fall down.
  • In Ape Escape, Spike will either play around with one of his gadgets, play with a yo-yo, pull out a boom-box from Hammerspace and jam out to the music, put on shades and stand around, looking cool, lie down on the floor and rest, or even try to do handstands, sometimes on one hand.
  • In Stinkoman 20X6, if Stinkoman is left standing, he will start to yawn. In the level where you play as 1-Up instead, 1-Up will blow snot bubbles instead.
    • The game plays with this in a cold level, where the idle animation ends with him freezing into a block of ice and taking damage.
  • In Kao the Kangaroo, Kao skips with a jump rope, or turns around, tries to startle the player with "Boo!" and laughs.
  • The Lion King: Young Simba will look with awe at a passing butterfly, and eventually pounce on it, catch it in his paws and only release it when the player moves. D'aww.
  • de Blob has various different animations, including one for each type of mission you're on (granted you have enough time to see that, since most missions have a short time limit). His standard animations include being a mime, laying down and giving a thumbs up, and looking around and pointing to his arm to tell the player to hurry up. On Bif's missions, Blob will be putting up his dukes, and then he flexes. On Arty's missions, he looks like he's inspecting the area. On Zip's missions, he's sorta jogging in place, and then stretches. For Prof's missions, he doesn't appear to have any changes, but when his idle animation kicks in, he'll rub his hands together like he's planning something. But that's not all. If you're standing nearby Raydians, he might wave to them, or make a "run along now" motion with his hands.
    • In De Blob 2, his standard idle animations are pretty much the same as the first game, but he will also juggle his ears. If you're in water, he'll splash a little. If you're inked, he'll be grossed out and try to wipe the ink off him. If you're in a paint pool while inked, he'll look like he's drowning. When he's not inked, he'll look like he's giving himself a bath. When you get out of water or paint pools, he'll shake himself dry. If you stop right after you smash a paint bot, Blob will pat his belly like he just had a good meal. After you smash Inkies or Blancs, Blob will either flex his "muscles" or pretend put a gun in a holster.
  • In Tiny Toon Adventures: Buster's Hidden Treasure, if you leave Buster alone for a few seconds, he will tap his foot impatiently in a manner similar to that of Sonic the Hedgehog. Leave him alone for a few more seconds, and he will fall asleep standing up.
  • Video Game/{Shantae}}:
    • Shantae: Risky's Revenge: When Shantae is at full health and standing still, she'll do a happy little dance. When not at full health or critical she'll breathe normally and adjust her top. When nearly dead, a.k.a under 1 Heart, she'll hold her arm and breathe heavily.
    • Shantae and the Seven Sirens: When not running around, Shantae doesn't stay still, shuffling left and right when while her hitbox is over open air.
  • In The Adventures of Lomax, the titular character looks around when standing still.
  • The Smurfs (1994): Leave your Smurf standing there, and you'll see him either shaking his butt from side to side or just yawning.
  • In Iji, the title character will look around when left to her own devices.
  • In Shovel Knight, the eponymous knight's armour and Plague Knight's robe will respectively shimmer and wave in the air if they are left standing.
  • While waiting for you in LittleBigPlanet, Sackboy may stretch his head back and yawn, hang his head down in boredom before shaking it to return to normal, sit down for a moment, or look down and place his hands on his zipper.
  • In A Hat in Time, Hat Kid has a number of adorable idle animations; among others, she may jump in the air enthusiastically a la Toon Link, balance her umbrella on her finger, or pull out two dolls and play with them, making them smooch and smash them together before embarrassingly putting them away.
  • The Hero in Drawn to Life will dance, complete with an air guitar.
  • The bears in Berenstain Bears' Camping Adventure have two each, for variation. Brother plays with a frog, and moonwalks; Sister jumps rope, and plays with a hula hoop.
  • Spot from Cool Spot had several animations, including snapping his fingers to the music, cleaning off his shades, and playing with a yo-yo.
  • Fresh Minty Adventure: For Minty's multiple states:
    • Minty blinks if she doesn't otherwise move.
    • When she's riding a Timberwolf, it breathes when not otherwise moving.
  • Going Under: Jacqueline drops her weapon, pulls out her phone and sits on the ground if not moving for a while.

    Puzzle Game 
  • Ever Forward: Maya has multiple animations if she doesn't walk. She can:
    • Look around
    • Put her hand on her chin
    • Wipe her forehead
  • In A Monsters Expedition Through Puzzling Exhibitions, the protagonist monster turns to face the player and waves an arm if left idle for long enough.
  • In Pac-Man 2: The New Adventures, leaving the pause screen idle too long causes Pac-Man to tap on the TV screen and wonder where you've gone.
  • In Gruntz, no matter what tools your gruntz are holding, there are always some amusing comments they can say and things they can do with them while idle.
  • All three main characters in The Lost Vikings do this. Since in the game you control only one of them at a time, effectively leaving the others alone, you get to see these fairly often.
  • In Karoshi 2, leaving the salaryman standing will make him pop out speakers and start listening to music.
  • Nibblers: Any Nibbler or Lizard can have a few of these, from looking around to:
  • In Pokémon Café Mix, every Pokémon has one, such as Pikachu standing upright and twitching its ears and Eevee crouching down and ruffling its fur. Some employed Pokémon also have a special, longer idle animation that occurs after waiting a particularly long period of time, such as Squirtle withdrawing into its shell and Lucario conjuring an Aura Sphere and then gazing at it.
  • Animal sprites in Eras of Alchemy each have a set of idle animations. They'll sit, sleep, shake their heads, and shuffle around a bit. Each sprite has its own unique animations that cycle randomly.
  • This Starry Midnight We Make: Every character has an animated part of their clothing which moves even if conversations aren't progressed. Usually something like Unmoving Plaid.

    Real-Time Strategy 
  • Every single infantry unit and non-vehicle hero in Star Wars: Empire at War and its expansion will look around and do other things while waiting. Fighters and bombers also slowly fly around in formation in a circle, as if they were orbiting something.
  • Command & Conquer had a number of idle animations for your soldiers, such as doing push-ups or, in the case of grenadiers, limber up their arms.
    • Infantry in Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun and Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2 look around in different directions and have two idle animations, some examples include Attack Dogs playfully wagging their tail, Tanya tossing her handguns up in the air before catching them, Conscripts yawning from boredom, Boris swapping the mag of his AKM, etc.
    • Many if not all of the mecha units in Tiberium Wars and Kane's Wrath had various idle animations. Special mentions go to the Juggernaut pecking the ground with its cannon barrels or the Nod Redeemer spinning its torso around in a crazy fashion or reaching with its massive claw to adjust something on one of their legs
    • Infantry and walkers actually have a separate set of animations for when they're not selected, typically milling about before snapping to attention when selected, adding visual feedback to selecting your units. They'll stay ready while stationary until you deselect them. Regular vehicles and base defenses, meanwhile, traverse their turrets to scan their surroundings when left idle.
  • Not so much idle animations, but in Company of Heroes in the later versions of the game, the squad will start having conversations amongst themselves.
  • Dawn of War:
    • The Force Commander occasionally kneels and prays to the Emperor, while Priests rev up their chainswords.
    • The Ork Pile O' Gunz building has a funny one: when researching something, two Gretchin are seen diving in the pile Scrooge McDuck style, digging out weapons and throwing them.
    • Every single Chaos unit will twitch, growl, curse, flail their limbs, grasp their heads, and generally act as the psychotic psychopaths they so very much are.
    • Psykers often have breakdowns where they start laughing like mad, for the same reason as the Chaos units.
    • When capturing a point, Kroots will occasionally do the Tusken Sand Raider rifle-shake.
  • Warcraft III:
    • Footmen will sheathe their swords and quaff something from a canteen.
    • Skeletons will pop their dislocated legs back into place.
    • Ancient Protectors (think Ents) will shake themselves vigorously, dropping leaves and/or bats.
    • Blood Mages will throw back their shoulders, hands on hips, and laugh.
    • Blademasters squat down and hold their sword upright, like they're meditating.
    • Liches cross their arms in the Egyptian-sarcophagus pose.
    • Grunts scratch their butts.
    • Orc Warlocks bang their shields.
    • Gnolls scratch their ears dog-style.
    • Mountain Kings (dwarf hammer-and-axe fighters) juggle their hammers.
    • Keepers of the Grove throw seeds on the ground.
    • Trolls backflip. Especially bizarre when they're sleeping.
    • Spiders rearrange their legs one at a time.
    • Shamans will float in midair as though they are possessed.
      • These animations play even in cutscenes. This can create several Narmy moments when Kael tells story of his people (destruction of their homelands) and his laughing idle animation plays...
  • While units in Starcraft 2 don't really have idle animations, some of them can be ordered to dance, including the Colossus, a robot so big it can be targeted as an air weapon.
  • Units in Aztec Wars keep looking around when idle, and they have special animations such as the Musketeers dropping their weapons and hastily picking them up again.
  • Every single unit in Battle Realms has an idle animation. Unusually, certain units' passive effect are tied to their idle animation. The Lotus Blade Acolyte sharpens his swords (increasing his damage for his next strike), the Alchemist releases spores (healing friendly units slightly), the Powder Keg Cannoneer spreads salt around him (increases friendly units' defence) and the Kabuki Warrior juggles (increasing nearby peasants' speed).
  • In Planet Blupi, if a Blupi is left alone for a while, he'll either wave his hand, scratch his head, or play with his yo-yo.
  • In Age of Empires II, Gbetos will start tossing their knives in the air and catching them if left alone. Since Gbetos are a civilisation-specific unit and are generally kept pretty busy, many players will likely never see this.

    Role Playing Game 
  • Persona:
    • In Persona 3, the protagonist will put his hands in his pockets, and then look around, yawn, and stretch. In all versions of the game during battle sequences, the characters will also have idle animations while waiting for their turns, such as Aigis doing her iconic robotic pose.
    • The protagonist of Persona 4 will scratch his head, yawn, and look around. In addition, all the party members have their own animations in battle: the protagonist will relax his stance and roll his neck, Yosuke will fiddle with his weapons and nearly drop them before grabbing them at the last second, Chie will constantly bounce in place and strike a martial arts pose, Yukiko plays with her hair, Kanji lays his weapon down and cracks his knuckles, Teddie constantly rocks back and forth, and Naoto's revolver is twirled.
    • In Persona 5, the protagonist will tighten his gloves whenever you don't touch the controls during dungeon exploration, and play with his glasses and hair if you stop playing while wandering around Tokyo. Your entire party will also lounge around, study their surroundings and perform other unique animations when you remove them for your control in a Save Point safe room.
  • Paper Mario:
    • In Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, When left idle for too long, Mario yawns and both him and the partner he has out will fall asleep.
    • In Super Paper Mario, all four playable characters (Mario, Luigi, Peach and Bowser) will fall asleep. Also Tippi will perch herself on the player.
  • Xenosaga Episode III. Whoever is your onscreen avatar will have a specific animation (Shion jumps up and down, Ziggy spins his robotic wrist, chaos adjusts his gloves, KOS-MOS looks back abruptly as if she's startled, and so on).
  • On the Chrono Trigger overworld, Crono frantically leaps up and down, exuding sweatdrops and waving his arms, if left alone for five seconds. The other characters have different animations, the coolest definitely belongs to Magus; he just strikes a pose and lets his cape billow in the wind.
    • On normal screens, every character's idle animation would be to turn to the screen, maybe blink a few times and turn back to the direction they were facing. Stick around long enough they may keep on looking at the screen and start machine-gun blinking.
  • Every character in your party in Planescape: Torment has a few of these. Fall-From-Grace will stretch her wings, Morte will play catch with his own jaw, and Annah can be seen using the tip of her tail to scratch behind her ear.
  • Dragon Age II (as well as Dragon Age: Origins) has a set of idle animations, mostly involving looking around or stretching, one of Bethany's makes it look like she's yawning.
  • Perhaps appropriately, considering it's a Sega game, Vyse of Skies of Arcadia will cross his arms and start tapping his foot.
  • Mana Khemia: Alchemists of Al-Revis features this type of animation for all player characters, in and out of battles.
  • In Pokemon Yellow, if you stand still for a long time while Pikachu is following you, Pikachu will eventually start looking around randomly. If you jump down a ledge and leave Pikachu above, Pikachu will jump from side to side, spin around, or step in place.
    • Now that the games are in 3D, idle animations seem to be standard. The protagonist of Pokémon X and Y will look at their feet and stomp one foot if they're left alone for a bit. They'll also throw their arms back and stretch.
      • The Pokémon themselves all have an idle animation they exhibit in battle. Most species also have one in Pokémon-Amie, and it's usually extremely adorable, often being a Happy Dance or some other expression of joy.
    • Pokémon Sun and Moon allow us to see the idle animations of trainers in battle as well.
  • Every species of Pokémon in the 2D entries of Pokémon Mystery Dungeon series has one. Among other things, sit and 'twitch', bark at nothing, splash around in the air, or be somewhat annoying like Ampharos, which appear to be insisting you pay attention to them by jumping in place and thrusting their (completely smooth) chests out. And in Gates to Infinity, your partner will look around, yawn, or eventually doze off if you idle while in an area that allows for free movement.
  • In Eternal Sonata, Polka sneezes every once in a while if you don't move her. It's the only time she does, despite frequent references to her illness in the story.
  • In Baldur's Gate II every playable race has the same idle animation of leaning back and stretching their back muscles. It can lead to odd moments where you leave characters standing around and all of a sudden they all start stretching at the same time. Impromptu aerobics session?
  • The main characters of Mother 3 have idle animations, but they're not a whole lot to look at.
  • Mass Effect:
    • The party characters in the first game will look around, stretch their necks/backs, and occasionally wander off if left alone. Shepard will look around and stretch, but remains where you left him/her. When it was released for PC, characters got their own unique idles in the infamous lift loading sequences. Except Shepard, that is.
    • The squad members in Mass Effect 2 stretch various parts of their bodies. Garrus rolls his neck, for instance, while FemShep does arm stretches.
  • If you stand around outside of battle in Shin Megami Tensei IV, Burroughs will "helpfully" inform you that you're spacing out a little. She may also ask if you're consulting with your demons, which is fitting if you set down the 3DS to look up a guide for one of the less intuitive quests.
  • Final Fantasy XIII:
    • Each character cycles through unique idle animations. Hope sways back and forth and occasionally clasps his hands together. Lightning and Fang both put their hands on their hips, while Vanille crouches down onto the ground with her hands on her knees. Sazh scratches his afro, and Snow punches his hands together.
    • The characters also have idle animations when on chocobos. From the Final Fantasy Wiki: "When Lightning overlooks the horizon, the chocobo will look at every corner ahead of it. Snow will pose with his head up high. Fang sits sideways, and when stopping, she will stretch out her arms and yawn. The chocobo Vanille rides will doze off, and she will try to rouse it. Hope and Sazh will caress the chocobo and the chocobo will return the gesture."
  • In Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII Lightning has a wide variety of idle animations depending on her current outfit. She also has a Stop Poking Me! version where she gets dizzy if the player spins the stick.
  • In The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, if your character is equipped with a one-handed weapon and is standing still, on rare occasion you can see him/her reach for the weapon and check if it's properly attached to their waist.
  • Fortune Summoners: If left alone long enough, the characters will stop just bobbing up and down, and do specific actions:
    • Arche does leg or arm and head stretches.
    • Sana rubs her eyes, or looks around.
    • Stella fixes her hair ribbons, or taps her face in thought.
    • Chiffon blinks, or does a few punches.
  • Fallout: Human characters in the original two games will occasionally fiddle with their equipped weapon - replacing the magazine of an SMG or briefly propping their sledgehammer on the ground. Robobrains twirl their torsos around in a distinctly bored fashion, the dog head of a Centaur will nip at their human heads, and Super Mutants scratch their butts.
  • Science Girls!: Spratlings jump up and down even when the player's activated window, isn't the game window.
  • The Epic Battle Fantasy series: A frequent source of Shout Outs, in the later games, and occurs every game:
  • Sakuna Of Rice And Ruin: Tama blinks and Kokorowa's gears keep spinning while waiting for player input during cutscenes.
  • The four games of The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel provide an absolutely massive roster of playable characters and almost all of them are controllable on the field. Listing specific idle animations for all characters would liklely take all day, but to name just a couple examples, main character Rean Schwarzer will cross his hands, pumping them, and say "Okay!" while Fie Clausell will rub one of her eyes and mumble "Sleepy." Also, all of the characters will blink at regular intervals.
  • Haven (2020): Kay and Yu will share a health-replenishing kiss if left standing for long enough. Leave the game idle for longer after that and the two of them will sit down on the ground.

    Simulation Game 
  • In The Sims series, Sims will, without fail, do at least one of these (there are several per age category and, except for toddlers, gender) while in Create-A-Sim.
    • They do in the game itself if you have Free Time installed, and depends on what hobby has the highest enthusiasm level. Sims can now whistle, drum on legs, practise ballet (music and dance); practise football throws or shadow box (sports); rub their stomachs (cuisine); frame hands (arts and crafts); read while walking (film and literature); stretch wrists (gaming); general stretching (fitness); or do a logic puzzle (science).
    • Up until Free Time, if the Free Will option was turned off Sims who were left alone would eventually stand still and stare directly at the player until their moods sank low enough to start complaining. If Free Will was on, they would still do this, but more often than not they would quickly wander off to find something else to do.
    • Sims who are in the second or third trimester of pregnancy will sometimes rub their belly and talk to it soothingly, or whine and rub their back as though it's aching.
    • In The Sims 3, they occasionally do animations relevant to their traits. Handy Sims will twirl a wrench in their hands and evil Sims will laugh evilly. They also do these in CAS when picking traits.
    • In The Sims Medieval Sims have Idle Animation in CAS, as well as almost always doing something in the main game while the active Sim is there (though usually an interaction with another Sim or an object, rather than strictly a self-interaction), leading to the occasional Funny Background Event like a spontaneous Bar Brawl, Golems and fully-armored knights dancing, or people sending parrots to attack each other.
  • The player characters in Spiritfarer turn their Everlights into toys (a yo-yo for Stella and a ball of yarn for Daffodil) and play with them when left idle.

    Shoot 'Em Up 
  • The 3-D Battles of WorldRunner had the player character sit down, cross his arms, and yawn. He also takes out a cigarette and starts smoking it when the game is paused, which Nintendo somehow forgot to take out in non-Japanese versions of the game.

    Stealth-Based Game 
  • In Hitman: Blood Money, Agent 47 will dance if left idling on a dancefloor in two levels.
  • Unique soldiers in Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops all do one which fits their personality. The most amusing is Ocelot, who does a ridiculously exaggerated exhausted slouch, and then suddenly whips out his revolvers and starts posing.
  • In Splinter Cell: Blacklist, when Sam is hanging on to the side of a building and left to idle, he will shift his stance around and move his arms so they don't go numb. This later becomes a tipoff in the last level, when the character you're controlling uses different idle animations, in addition to alternate stealth takedowns. This is a tipoff that it's not Sam in the suit, but Briggs.
  • In Thief: Deadly Shadows, the only game in the series with a third-person view, Garrett has a different idle for every weapon. His blackjack he weighs thoughtfully, his bow makes him stretch and limber his shoulders, and his dagger sees him thumbing the blade to test its edge or even flipping it and catching it again by the handle. He also stands in different ways, depending on whether he's on or between missions — for the former, he's hunched and warily looking around; for the latter he's standing straight up, more relaxed and confident.

    Survival Horror 
  • Resident Evil:
    • In Resident Evil, Jill will tap her gun against her leg. All playable characters and their comrades will have an idle animation if they stand around too long, which is amusing when a monster is approaching them, and they're just casually tapping a gun in boredom.
  • Silent Hill 4: The Room: Henry will usually have a different wait animation depending on what weapon he's currently holding. For comedic value, try it with the chainsaw.
  • Haunting Ground: Fiona will look around nervously. Hewie has his own share of wait animations, ranging from him sitting or lying down while wagging his tail to him sniffing the ground in an attempt to find something.
  • Fatal Frame: Leave the heroine standing still in a safe room for too long (one where no ghostly apparitions will come looking for her), and bloody handprints will appear on the screen.
  • Eternal Darkness has a very creepy idle animation; one of the chapters is from the point of view of a man who's slowly becoming a zombie as he gets further along. Late in the chapter, leaving him standing still and holding a sword will have him experimentally impale one hand on his weapon, pull it off the blade, and then look at it, as if checking to see if it hurt.
    • Most characters will do something with whatever weapon they are carrying while idle. Alex will swish the gladius through the air, Lindsey will check the ammo in his .45 and so on.
  • In Parasite Eve 2 If left idle with 60+ health, Aya will take a step back with her left leg, hold her weapon in her right hand and flick her hair back with her left arm, letting it fall back to her thigh then repeat.
    • If Aya's health is hovering just around 30-50ish, she'll look anxious and teeter back and forth a little, on edge about her current state.
    • If she's on really low health, however, (Below 30ish) Aya will slump forward and start breathing heavily, worn out and exhausted.

    Third-Person Shooter 
  • In BIONICLE Heroes, a Toa Inika would either knock on the screen, nod off to sleep, or play hacky sack with his head. When playing as a Piraka, he'll eventually grab the camera, yell, and spin it around.
  • In Dead Space, Isaac will rub the back of his neck, shuffle his feet, stretch his shoulders, stand up a little straighter and, eventually, aim the muzzle of whatever weapon he's carrying in a slow arc from left to right; he even quite sensibly has a 'nervous glancing' animation that's active if you only pause briefly. He'll also read the text logs or objectives if you bring them up.
  • Uncharted has a variety, such as Drake wiping dirt off his face or looking around the environment. Drake's Deception also added special animations for whenever Drake takes cover, including peeking over the top of low cover or checking his weapon to see if it's in good condition.
  • Warframe: Every Frame in the game has two animation sets: "Agile" and "Noble", which dictate how the character's idle stance appears. Certain frames even have unique idling animations depending on what weapon they're currently using.

    Turn-Based Strategy 
  • The "second generation" Worms games have idle animations that range from glancing around, to take off their eyebrows and wearing them like a mustache to taking a piece of dirt (they are worms, after all) and eating it. The worms also have two different breathing animations, a normal(ish) looking inhale and exhale cycle for healthy worms and a "panting" animation for injured ones (injured worms also don't play any of the other idle animations). They also have idle quotes, which are often quite hilarious.
  • Battle for Wesnoth has some units that do some idle animations when you're not clicking on them. You can change the frequency of the animations.
  • Heroes of Might and Magic 6 has some pretty silly ones, such as creatures using their weapons as mock guitars or, in case of crossbowmen, pogo sticks.
    • The 4th game has nothing BUT silly idle animations for every unit on the battle screens. Heroes can be seen saluting, praying, stopping their spinning heads, thwack their misbehaving staffs, take off their hair like a wig and scratch their bald heads, and so on. Creatures have most you can expect, and some not, like the Monks taking out a tablet or a bible and whapping themselves in the face with it.
    • And for extra contrast, gold golems subvert this with a jarring lack of idle animation. They just don't budge, which says a lot in itself.

    Wide Open Sandbox 
  • Alba: A Wildlife Adventure: Among other things, Alba will often lean down to tie her shoe.
  • StarFlight would have the spaceman in Starport start tapping his foot if left idle for more than a minute.
  • Grand Theft Auto:
    • In Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, CJ will sway from side to side and sing a few bars of a random hip-hop song if left to his own devices. Also, if left idle in a populated area, the camera will shift to an over-the-shoulder view showing what CJ is paying attention to. He always eyeballs the nearest cop, with attractive women coming a close second.
    • Back in Grand Theft Auto 2, the player character would light up a cigarette.
    • Niko in Grand Theft Auto IV has a wide range of idle routines depending on whether he has a weapon equipped. While unarmed, he might scratch his head or adjust his sleeves, and if it's raining he'll hold out his hand to feel the droplets or try to shake himself dry. If he's holding a rifle, he'll aim it off to the side, and if holding a pistol, he'll use the barrel to scratch the side of his head.
  • Cole from inFAMOUS has different idle animations according to his current karma. On good karma he'll straighten his shoulders and thrust his chest out in an superhero-like posture, on bad karma he'll get into an exaggerated laid-back punk stance with his torso leaning back and his pelvis jutting forward. Then, still according to karma, he will start playing with his lightning powers, dusting his clothes off, stretching, spitting onto the ground and so on.
  • Alex Mercer from [PROTOTYPE] sometimes coughs into his hands once he gets out of his distinct ready-stance, but there's also a unique idle when he's infected with the parasite: he'll hunch over, looking exhausted, then clutch his shoulder and loudly groan with pain. As well as different animations depending on what power is activated.
  • In a very odd car-based example, in Burnout Paradise putting your car in brake for a few minutes will have the camera fade out then fade back in to wide panning shots (in black-and-white on earlier versions) of the beautiful scenery and highlights any outstanding features of the landscape which changes depending on the time of day and where you are currently. The shots are even accompanied by some of the most famous classical pieces like the "The Four Seasons" that they (initially) forgot to mention was part of the tracklist.
  • The Player Character in Saints Row 2 will perform different actions in certain areas (lift weights in the prison yard, dance, look through binoculars, etc.).

    Miscellaneous Games 
  • An old ZX Spectrum game Draughts Genius does this. In the game, you played draughts (checkers) against Albert Einstein. If you took too much time thinking over your move, old Al would yawn several times and then fall asleep. He'd wake up immediately after you made your move. How old does that make this trope?
    • One of the oldest examples is Boulder Dash for the Commodore 64, where Rockford would look straight ahead and tap his foot impatiently if left idle.
    • In the C64 game Little Computer People, released in 1985, the little person would "knock" on the inside of the screen to get your attention if you were ignoring him and doing nothing.
    • Similarly the Amstrad CPC version of the Trivial Pursuit board game has a question-master character, TP, who struts back and forth across the screen with an appropriate noise when asking questions. Take too long to press the answer button, and the strutting becomes more impatient - almost like tutting.
  • The Rudies in Jet Set Radio Future dance if left alone. Each character has a different animation, all of which can also be seen in the GG's garage.
  • In The Fairly OddParents!: Enter the Cleft!, Timmy would take out a book and read it.
  • In Hey Arnold!: The Movie for Game Boy Advance, Arnold listens to music on his CD player and Gerald bounces and twirls a basketball.
  • In No More Heroes, Travis Touchdown will impatiently tap his foot if he stands around in Santa Destroy for too long. Or touch himself.
  • Every LEGO Adaptation Game has them, and they vary between characters; some scratch their head, some twirl around, some point a wand or sword. Hermione has a particularly amusing one where she puts her hands on her hips and taps her foot, as if to tell the player to get on with it.
  • Dungeons of Dredmor: The player will whip out some kind of handheld device and play with it.
  • The 1994 Lupin III game, Lupin the Third: Hunt for the Treasure of Legend!, for the Super Famicom, has the titular thief turn around and light up a cig if you keep him waiting.
  • In Dr. Mal: Practice of Horror Mal taps the screen with a pencil.

    Toys 
  • Tamagotchi: When left idle, Tamagotchis move back and forth across the screen, whether by walking, hopping, dancing, or flying. In later generations, their animation ties to their mood.


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