Favorite overall animation in video games.

Rather it's fluidity, style, realism (or convincing enough verisimilitude)... whatever catches your eye the most in a game's animation.

I actually like the classic Resident Evil games zombie animation, particularly Resident Evil 2. The low frame rate adds to the OMFGWTFISTHAT factor.

Guilty Gear series, of course. Even their walking animations and Idle Animation is full of swag

I like the look of 8 Bit Castlevania. The Belmont Pimp Walk is the best 4 frames of walking animation ever, and the whipping animations have that OOMPH to them. Later games in the classic series would build on this.

edited 4th May '11 8:03:14 PM by Schitzo

ALL CREATURE WILL DIE AND ALL THE THINGS WILL BE BROKEN. THAT'S THE LAW OF SAMURAI.

Source SDK Faceposing. Also, good stop-motion.

The animation in Quake II is really smooth. Same with Unreal.

"Hipsters: the most dangerous gang in the US." - Pacific Mackerel

I also like the fight animation in God Hand. Every type of punch and kick you can think of and more. That's a hell of a lot of attention to detail there.

ALL CREATURE WILL DIE AND ALL THE THINGS WILL BE BROKEN. THAT'S THE LAW OF SAMURAI.

Most of my favorite animations are intro animations from sprite games Yeah, they look awkward and stuff, but shut up.

^Speaking of which, the Voxels in Command And Conquer: Tiberian Sun were pretty good.

"Hipsters: the most dangerous gang in the US." - Pacific Mackerel

Motherfucking Odin Sphere!

Best sprites I've seen in a long, long while!

One of my few regrets about being born female is the inability to grow a handlebar mustache. -Landstander

And building on Castlevania: I like Symphony Of The Night as a whole. God that is one gorgeous game.

ALL CREATURE WILL DIE AND ALL THE THINGS WILL BE BROKEN. THAT'S THE LAW OF SAMURAI.

Anything Vanillaware.

edited 4th May '11 8:38:33 PM by Signed

"Every opinion that isn't mine is subjected to Your Mileage May Vary."

I always liked the animation of Samus in Super Metroid, Fusion, and Zero Mission. I also agree with the rest of you, the 2D Castlevania games also look great.

WHAT A HORRIBLE NIGHT TO HAVE A DIALOG BOX INTERRUPT GAMEPLAY.

Second.Second. Though I can easily think of a lot of kicks and punches they did not implement.Meh. The sprites (they're actually not sprites, but amalgamations of sprites) are beautiful, but the animations themselves I found stiff and jerky. Muramasa was pretty smooth I thought, though.

Some others:

• Metal Slug series
• Hotel Dusk Room 215 (choppy, but it fits the sketch-like style)
• Cortex Command
• Yakuza series (the special attacks/finishers are extremely painful looking)

On the other side of the spectrum, Bethesda's 3D games (Oblivion and Fallout 3 at least) have absolutely terrible animations. There is nothing more ridiculous looking than in Fallout 3, crippling both legs then running around diagonally in a circle.

Shame of me for forgetting to mention Metal Slug.

Double goes for a lot of Neo Geo games. Especially The Last Blade.

ALL CREATURE WILL DIE AND ALL THE THINGS WILL BE BROKEN. THAT'S THE LAW OF SAMURAI.

3rd Strike of course.

Ghost Trick's animation is gorgeous, especially considering the DS's limitations.

edited 4th May '11 9:36:48 PM by Perseus

Trans rights are human rights.

A Boy And His Blob (Wii). Gorgeous hand-drawn animation sprites, and luscious painted backgrounds. Gorgeous.

Speaking of stop-motion, The Neverhood is a sight to behold. You can see the thumbprints in the clay. Now that is a mark of love.

Also, while this is a very odd thing to mention, Opoona has the best damn renditions of dancing I've ever seen in any video game, ever. Which is a weirdly specific thing to point out, but seriously—the NP Cs in that game love to dance, and by golly, do they dance. In addition to being spectacularly animated, it's well-choreographed too.

"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada

Seconding Odin Sphere. Everything about that game is beautiful.

'twas brillig.

Oh man, how did I forget this one? The sprites are so incredibly expressive...

edited 5th May '11 4:26:26 AM by Deathonabun

One of my few regrets about being born female is the inability to grow a handlebar mustache. -Landstander

Oh yes, I even avatarized one.◊

Right now, I'm mainly enjoying the animations in Disgaea's cutscenes (though I only have the DS version]].

edited 5th May '11 4:31:31 AM by Medinoc

"And as long as a sack of shit is not a good thing to be, chivalry will never die."

Metroid Prime's arm cannon. The sheer amount of detail they put in that thing, along with how smooth its animation was, really helped the immersion factor. They had a separate charging animation for each beam, for example.

Also, 2nding 3rd Strike.

edited 5th May '11 5:12:25 AM by Scardoll

Fight. Struggle. Endure. Suffer. LIVE.

I always loved the animation in the Megadrive/Genesis version of Aladdin. It's so fluid, it looks like an interactive cartoon.

edited 5th May '11 10:28:39 AM by AceNoctali

"Your kindness gives me the presentiment I can be reborn. Now, I want to believe at least in you." - Kaori Yae

Final Fantasy XIII (including unrendered) and the Ratchet And Clank Future two-parter, hands down.

I like Oblivion's graphics too, but for the scenery and the menu designs only—the people are just a little too far out in the Uncanny Valley for me. And the bodies are segmented which should not be.

edited 5th May '11 12:52:29 PM by annebeeche

Banned entirely for telling FE that he was being rude and not contributing to the discussion. I shall watch down from the goon heavens.

I really enjoy the animation in Wario Land Shake it. The anime styled animation is suitable for Wario, and it even captured the charm from the original games but with cartoony animation. And that is what makes it good.

Since somebody mentioned The Neverhood for good animation. I would say that Curse Of Monkey Island and Lesiure Suit Larry: Love for sail deserve a mention as well. Curse is the closest thing I can get for Monkey Island getting a hand-drawn animated feature with good quality, and Lechuck has some good animation movement in this game.

Love for Sail is a slam dunk and what makes cartoony animation good, and its suitable for a series like Leisure Suit Larry. If they ever make another game of Larry(if they can get Al Lowe) they should make with animation similar to Love for sail.

Watching the sprites move on Third Strike, Blazblue and Garou is awesome.

Infamous. Cole's movement just looked so ridiculously natural.

GTA IV. Facial expression needs work, but the body posing and movements are good. Running feels like running.

Happiness is zero-gee with a sinus cold.