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[chronos4590]

and funny enough the ones you posted aren't even good examples, and IMHO I think GoWI and GoWII have better animation than III, yep call me crazy ....

Yeah i know. That was the best I could find at the moment. For an example The animation for the gorgons especially in 3... scary. But me no find gif. And while I don't think the animation in 1 and 2 are better they are still fantastic examples.

 

[evil_rad]

Old man from Silent Hill 3

 

[Gianni Merryman]

Facial animation in Wind waker was amazing indeed, almost like a real-time-graphics Miyazaki toon!

 

[SolidSnakex]

Yes. I hope all games in the future will follow this.

Very few games are going to use that tech unless there are a ton of changes made to it. It's extremely limiting to developers at this point in time.

 

[SpacePirate Ridley]

Im sad not seeing Punch-Out!! Wii mentioned more in this thread.

It has the best classic cartoon feel 3D animation in any game this generation.

It has weight (one of the most important things in animation), it has fluidity and the lip sinc is superb.
All the animations are different and its what adds character to every boxer in the game.

Not only that but the animation can always be stop in a very fluid form when you are going to give a punch to the other boxer.

I love how they use this game in animation class at my university to show how weight and character can be done well in animation.

Some examples of the awesomest the animators in this game did.
Special KO and TKO
Victories of the opponents (spoilers at the end)
Reactions to opponents to the Mac's Star Punch
Doc Louis DLC animation, just becuase his awesome.

And this is only the tip of the iceberg. This game's animation is gorgeous, I tip my had in delight to the great work Next Level did with the game.

 

[Akuun]

Muramasa? The game looked great.

 

[Dr.Hadji]

Melee and Brawl mostly because the animation conveys the important details even when the screen is zoomed out. A slight edge given to Brawl because the hitboxes are generally tighter so hits look more believable.

And Zelda SS and WW for the haters out there.

 

[Tricky I Shadow]

Red Dead Redemption.

 

[JumpingTheGun]

the anaimation blew me away as a kid. its still pretty damn good.

 

[JumpingTheGun]

any of Virgin games made for Genesis in the mid nineties:

Global Gladiators
Aladdin
Lion King
Jungle Book

etc

 

[Heart of Black]

Earthworm Jim always comes to mind.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KA9S91A66k

Super Castlevania IV was great for it's time with the whip effects and mode seven rotating sprites. Though not quite "animation".

Since 3rd Strike was already mentioned, I'll avoid regurgitating that.

Marvel Vs. Capcom 3 is a great feat, as well as Street Fighter IV. I love how Dahlsim looks, among other things, though with those games the issues of clipping start popping up as a detriment to otherwise amazing animation.

 

[Grisby]

Alice's hair in Madness Returns animated fairly nice.

Best hair I've ever seen in a game.

 

[sixteen-bit]

Red Dead Redemption.

I'm playing it now. They seem really robotic, especially in cut-scenes.

 

[Cesar]

The Ratchet and Clank games. The animation really is TOP NOTCH. And every enemy has a different dance move!

 

[Divvy]

DOAX2

This is kind of terrible.

I'd also like to mention just how bad lip sync animation is generally. Mass Effect is a pretty bad offender.

 

[Nizz]

Alice's hair in Madness Returns animated fairly nice.

Best hair I've ever seen in a game.

Wow, that is nice hair. Probably the best I've seen, seriously.

 

[Gianni Merryman]

P.N.03 bootyshake animation has just sprung to my mind.

 

[SpacePirate Ridley]

This is kind of terrible.

I'd also like to mention just how bad lip sync animation is generally. Mass Effect is a pretty bad offender.

WTF
Is the only RPG with multiple dialogs that I not find offensive when characters talk in close ups, in normal chats.
Specially the lyp sync in the aliens. Wrex and Garrus lyp syncs are wonderfull.

The Witcher 2 for example looks gorgeous, but it doenst look really good when they use lip sync during dialogs, same with the majority of this type of RPGs. Mass effect is the only that I found relatively good.

 

[Arnie]

Five pages in and no one's mentioned Battlefield 3?

This, oh lord this. It uses Fifa's ant animation engine.

 

[AlexSmash]

I'm playing it now. They seem really robotic, especially in cut-scenes.

watch yourself riding a horse.
its amazing.

 

[SpacePirate Ridley]

Oh yeah, Epic Mickey has awesome animation also. Wonderfull stuff there with the characters they did, they really came to life.

The squash and strech technique was amazing:

Props to Warren Spector and the animators that worked in it for bringing back Oswald in great form.

 

[WillyFive]

Mass Effect is a pretty bad offender.

I forgot how terrible the animation is for those games. Hard to watch.

 

[Pietepiet]

The Iconoclasts:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgSwUHjwyKY

There's amazing detail in the animations in this game. Play it, the video doesn't really do it justice cause it smudges the pixels.

http://konjak.org/index.php?folder=4&file=30

 

[i-Lo]

I am surprised no one posted pictures of KZ2 and KZ2's and KZ3's myriad death animations and A.I movement and locomotion from cover to cover respectively.

On a more curious note: Did KZ3 dial down and the "Hit reaction system" from KZ2?

 

[kai3345]

I forgot how terrible the animation is for those games. Hard to watch.

 

[flintstryker]

4 pages in and no Vanillaware love? I am disappoint.

I love the art for these games but, i would say despite how impressive the artwork is the animation is no where near good enough to match with the quality of the art, I would rather less impressive art with better animation actually.

 

[flintstryker]

come on guys don't tell me i killed the thread

 

[Granger Danger]

I find that the animation is great during gameplay, but it's horrid during cut scenes. The character models too, god they're so ugly and weird looking during the cut scenes, especially the cut scenes. And their robotic movement.. Uncanny valley for me.

Yeah I was talking about gameplay, the cut scenes are awful.

 

[RoboShmup]

Banjo Kazooie Nuts and Bolts has some underrated animation

http://vimeo.com/4454784
The first two clips on this demo reel are not Banjo Kazooie, but the rest is.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIFQoh2Mz_c
And a good clip of Grunty.

 

[Durante]

The last time game animation really wowed was the TLG trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EHzHoMT5eRg&hd=true
Over 2 years ago now, I hope it makes it out this year.

 

[Lijik]

The squash and strech technique was amazing:

I find jumping in Epic Mickey to be fun just because of that.

 

[Natetan]

super metroid

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTdeRhhSh1g&feature=player_detailpage#t=16s

 

[Solune]

I love the art for these games but, i would say despite how impressive the artwork is the animation is no where near good enough to match with the quality of the art, I would rather less impressive art with better animation actually.

I really think the gif I posted doesn't do the game justice, It's the only one I could find browsing the Muramasa thread and I don't even have gifs of Odin Sphere or GrimGrimoire. The level of detail the put into it is quite astounding to me anyways.

I guess in terms of animation I was impressed by Brawl, but other than that I'm having a hard time remembering what has wowed me other that what's been posted in this thread.

On another note those Battlefield gifs are quite amazing, hype.

 

[KageMaru]

Five pages in and no one's mentioned Battlefield 3?

Actually I mentioned it on the top of page 4 =)

Alice's hair in Madness Returns animated fairly nice.

Best hair I've ever seen in a game.

Funny thing is that game runs on an engine that's usually criticized for having horrible hair (UE3).

 

[Stripper13]

I really think the gif I posted doesn't do the game justice, It's the only one I could find browsing the Muramasa thread and I don't even have gifs of Odin Sphere or GrimGrimoire. The level of detail the put into it is quite astounding to me anyways.

I guess in terms of animation I was impressed by Brawl, but other than that I'm having a hard time remembering what has wowed me other that what's been posted in this thread.

On another note those Battlefield gifs are quite amazing, hype.

I played alot of Muramasa and nothing really stood out for me animation wise. It was beautiful and well designed - but outside of maybe the giant octopus in the background in one stage, everything was standard fare. It didn't help that the animations of the playable characters were among the worst in the game in terms of variety and transitions.

 

[Mista Koo]

No Ghost Trick in this page?

The only game that really amazed me with its animation. I usually don't notice how good the animation in a game is unless I'm looking at GIFs/ or looking for it.

All these pages and no one's linked the amazing Darkstalkers and the Twelve Principles of Animation article? Lots of good gifs and detailed explanation there.

http://art-eater.com/2010/07/test-1-darkstalkers/

Nice find, thanks!

 

[bgassassin]

I'm SF3 biased as well and will get my #1, but Ghost Trick is pretty awesome looking too.

And I'm giving an honorable mention to Super Mario 64.

I wanted to find something with Mario tiptoeing, but couldn't.

 

[Special J]

Damn, how big is that team? Rivals the animation in Shank.

1

 

[Finaika]

This gif shows the heavily anime-inspired way of limited animation, where the character just stand perfectly still and the only thing that animates is the hair, cloth, background trees etc because of the wind (rampant in anime intro sequence).

It looks nice yes, and gives an illusion of good animation, but hardly what I called superb animation.