The Art and Science of Video Game Animation

Imagine a simple square that is drawn on paper. It remains motionless, inert. A shape that has width and height but zero depth. But what if that square just jumps around the page, expanding and contracting as it goes? It’s still the same flat, 2D thing, but now it has energy, personality, and motion.

This is the heart of 2D video game animation: adding movement to the flat graphics. Whether a heroic pixelated warrior swings a sword or a cartoon figure dashing across the screen, 2D animation retains the central qualities of its flat world, turning motion into a creative tool for depth and emotion.

Setting a 2D game in motion is not just a matter of drawing your characters. Movement in the virtual world is an illusion, and that illusion is built through a technique called sequencing. Picture an artist drawing a character mid-leap. But one drawing doesn’t do it. In order for that leap to register as real, they need to slice it apart into single frames, each one representing a minuscule change in motion.

It all begins with game design—figuring out how characters and objects will move. Then comes the animation concept, a kind of style guide where artists lay out the feel, flow, and style of the movement. Then, they generate frames of a series of unique images, each slightly different from the previous one, creating a seamless action sequence.

Here’s the challenge in creating animated video games: a single second of smooth animation takes 24 frames! In classic 2D animation, a new drawing appears every other frame, so an artist has to create dozens—sometimes hundreds—of images just to animate the simplest movements. Longer animation with greater detail requires more frames to maintain smooth motion.

Source: https://noitagame.com/

Let’s take that flats square drawn on paper, and add some depth. Suddenly, it’s not just a shape panning on a screen, but something that inhabits a space that you can walk around. That is the essence of 3D animation. In game animation, this shift unlocks a new level of realism. Smoke swirls in the air, lightning crackles with dynamic energy, and character movements become more intricate. Unlike 2D animation, where movement is largely implied, 3D allows for precise articulation—you can see each footstep land, every muscle shift, and the tiniest environmental details react to motion.

Animation for 3D games goes beyond just making characters move. It’s about building believable movement. 2D artists make a frame and repeat, with 3D, it becomes completely different. Sadly, there is no perfect method, but all techniques come back to two main strategies: hand-drawn and software-assisted animation.

Despite the technical feasibility of animating in 3D by drawing image by image as in 2D, this less common, painfully slow process is not used. Instead, in most modern games, software-driven techniques have taken over, with computers performing most of the heavy lifting. But even with automation, animating still demands a structured process. Here’s how it generally goes:

Modeling
Before anything moves, artists create 3D models of characters, props, environments, and basically everything else in the game world. These models start as wireframes and are refined with textures, colors, and details.

Source: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/1xYVZX?album_id=9784697

Layout & Animation
Every animation needs a setting. First, designers build the environment in which movement will occur. Next, animators determine how objects and characters move, whether a warrior swings a sword, a car skids around a corner, or a tree withstands a gust of wind. It all comes down to keyframe animation, motion capture, and physics-based simulations.

Rendering
This is where all elements—models, environments, lighting, and animations—are processed into the final visuals. Rendering converts raw assets into beautiful frames with smooth motion, realistic textures, and dynamic lighting. The resultant product is then further optimized for use within the game engine in real-time.

Sure, there are many other intermediate steps, such as creating VFX, sound effects, and tinkering with compositions. Still, the core of every 3D animation sequence always consists of those steps.

n the gaming and movie industry alone, thousands of high-quality 2D/3D models and animations are created daily. We don’t have exact numbers on popularity or even the ratio of competition between two-dimensional and three-dimensional video game animation, but we can still analyze the advantages of each.

Price

On the surface, 2D should be the more budget-friendly option. After all, complex 3D modeling, physics simulations, or high-end rendering software are not required. But there’s a caveat — 2D animation is often completely hand-done. Each frame has to be drawn, polished, and sequenced, so it’s a lengthy and painstaking process.

On the other hand, 3D animation has a secret weapon: reusability. Once a 3D model is constructed, there’s no need to draw it again for each frame. Animators may modify existing assets, reuse motion-captured sequences, and employ formless animations to save money and effort.

Demand

Forecasting the future of animation isn’t a science, and a lot can change between now and then, but industry trends provide a sound idea of what’s to come. If we take a step back and consider the big picture—from video games to cinematography, VR, and digital marketing—it’s apparent that 3D animation is the talk of the town. You have everything from blockbuster games such as Cyberpunk 2077 to lifelike VR experiences and high-end commercial presentations. 3D dominates when realism and depth matter.

Source: https://store.epicgames.com/en-US/news/cyberpunk-2077-phantom-liberty-takes-players-through-treacherous-quests-to-unlock-a-new-city-and-ending

On the other hand, the clean, expressive look of 2D is foundational to mobile games, app interfaces, advertisements, and web design. Even entertainment-wise, 2D remains king—through TV series like Arcane marrying 2D visuals and 3D animation, or indie games such as Hollow Knightshowing that the hand-drawn animation technique still enchants gamers.

Which one is more relevant today? Both. It isn’t a case of siding with one camp or the other — it’s about having the right tool for the job.

Quality

Quality is tricky to measure. What makes an animation "better"—fluidity, detail, realism, or sheer artistic style? In reality, it all comes down to who creates it. Skilled animators can make both 2D and 3D animations look breathtaking, but their approach differs.

From the perspective of graphics, 2D and 3D are in completely different leagues. 3D wins if your aim is realism — lifelike movements, complex textures, dynamic lighting. But if your project is more creative, or artistically unrestricted, then with 2D, the world is your oyster. Games like Ori and the Blind Forest prove that hand-drawn video game character animation can be just as mesmerizing as the ultra-detailed character rigs of Horizon Zero Dawn.

Ultimately, the best animation immerses players, tells a story, and serves the game's vision. From the cinematic grandeur of 3D to the handmade charm of 2D, both styles have delivered memorable experiences.

In terms of game design, animation also can be divided into two categories: CGI (computer-generated imagery) and in-game animation (made using the game engine). The first one feels more like a movie, while the second one is less refined due to the restrictions of the chosen engine. However, with the latest advancements in game engines, this may no longer be the case in the future.

At their core, CGI animation and in-game animation follow the same principles, but they serve very different purposes. CGI is pre-rendered, meaning every scene is meticulously crafted before the player sees it. Let’s recall a breathtaking cutscene in Final Fantasy XVI or a hyper-detailed cinematic sequence in The Last of Us Part II. The lighting, angles, and compositions are all planned out in advance, ensuring a polished, cinematic look. Many of the most visually impressive video games animated with CGI rely on this technique to deliver cinematic cutscenes that feel like high-budget films.

Source: https://nordic.ign.com/final-fantasy-xvi/68690/review/final-fantasy-16-review

In contrast, in-game animation is rendered in real-time, meaning it must adapt to player inputs, physics, and dynamic interactions. Although this limits the extent to which the visual fidelity can be predetermined, it makes gameplay feel fluid, responsive, and immersive.

With in-game animation, people are free to move the camera and control the field of view. This freedom places a huge demand on animation quality—every movement must look natural from every perspective. The most important thing is responsiveness. The instant a player taps a button, the action it represents must fire off — be it a perfectly timed parry in Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice or a string of rapid moves in a brawl in Street Fighter 6. Relative time delay of any kind, even one with no added milliseconds, can shatter the immersion and lead to a mediocre experience while gaming, particularly in action-heavy or competitive games.

Source: https://www.gamesradar.com/sekiro-shadows-die-twice-preview/

Another important aspect of in-game animation is that it requires a lot more unique animations for various actions. Those are coded into the game engine by programmers. For example, a simple jump isn't just a single animation—it consists of multiple stages, each coded into the game engine and triggered in a specific order:

1. Preparation (Idle to Jump Start): The character shifts weight and crouches before taking off.
2. Airborne Motion: The actual jump animation plays, adjusting for trajectory and momentum.
3. Landing Impact: The character bends their knees upon hitting the ground, absorbing the force.
4. Return to Idle: The character resets to a neutral stance, ready for the next move.

Now that we’ve covered the types and methods of animation let’s examine the real challenge: how difficult it can be to integrate certain animation techniques into games.

We are 100% sure that you are familiar with all popular video game genres. Some have more mechanics and features, others much less. The more complex your project is, the harder it will be to create animation for it. Let’s start moving up from the simplest projects to the hardest.

If you’re building a puzzle game, such as Tetris or Candy Crush Saga, your animation needs are about as simple as they come. No characters, no technical choreography — just basic shapes moving around and settling in on the screen. Animators just need to ensure these transitions flow nicely and are visually rewarding. Want to use one that’s got some flair? Simple gameplay can have a bit of dazzle by providing flashy destruction effects, bursts of particles, or a shake of the screen. Even with minimal movement, video games animated in this style can still engage players with satisfying visual effects and smooth transitions.

Source: https://artreview.com/how-candy-crush-trapped-us-in-the-machine-zone/

Next are point-and-click adventures, which are extremely reliant on static backgrounds and limited character movement. The focus is on interaction animations — picking up objects, inspecting clues, and subtle facial expressions that animate characters. Games like Monkey Island and Broken Sword leverage expressive yet limited animation in the service of storytelling, while more modern titles, like Disco Elysium, take it a step further by adding slight motion effects to interactions to enhance how they feel. However, even in these cases, video game character animation is crucial in making interactions feel responsive and immersive.

Source: https://www.npr.org/2021/04/07/984537466/disco-elysium-the-final-cut-is-a-grimly-gorgeous-genre-bender

Now we’re taking it seriously — games that involve real character movement. At this point, even basic transitions won’t do the trick anymore. Instead, jump-and-run games and physics-based puzzlers add dynamic character animations that respond to the player input.

The best example? Super Mario Bros. The animations are simplistic compared to what we see today, but here was a huge step forward from static puzzles and point-and-click. Everything Mario does — running, sliding, swimming, jumping — has to be animated. And it’s not just him — every enemy, projectile, and environmental effect needs some degree of motion.

Once you've mastered the basics, platformers crank up the challenge. These games build on jump-and-run mechanics but add more complex actions, like attacking, shooting, and swinging. Think Celeste, where every dash and climb must be snappy and responsive, or Hollow Knight, where movement animations are seamlessly tied to combat.

Source: https://store.steampowered.com/app/504230/Celeste/

The general rule of thumb with animation is the more models and characters on the screen, the more complicated the animation process. However, there are some exceptions where the animation workload remains relatively low despite large numbers of moving elements.

Turn-based and real-time strategy games, such as Warcraft III or Heroes of Might and Magic III, simplify this process by using the same animations for identical units. If you’ve watched one orc grunt swing an axe, you’ve watched them all.

Another genre that doesn’t demand excessive animation is racing games and highly detailed simulators. In Gran Turismo Forza Horizon, most of the motion happens within the physics engine, so animators are tasked with solely animating vehicle suspension, collisions, and small environmental effects. Likewise, in life simulators such as The Sims, an action dictates an animation, meaning that a lot of precise, step-for-step movements aren’t always necessary.

Source: https://www.ign.com/articles/forza-motorsport-review

Now, onto the real animator nightmare: 3D action adventures and first-person shooters. Just think for a moment about how many unique sequences a game like Call of Duty or The Last of Us Part II needs. Each weapon requires animations for shooting, reloading, aiming, and manipulating it. Character behaviors need to be slick too — running, crouching, climbing, dodging. Enemies interact with gameplay in unique ways, ranging from reacting to gunfire to meeting players. In strategy games, for instance, there’s typically one animation that represents a whole unit type, but action games require hundreds—often thousands—of unique animations that all need to blend together seamlessly, onscreen, in real-time.

The way we approach character movement animation in a 2D game varies based on the art style. Less motion means each movement is more powerful. We see this with pixel graphics — when there’s less detail on screen, any minute movement pops, so animation gets particularly important.

Also, did you know that even 2D games use a three-dimensional space for scene-building? It helps the game engine determine which sprites appear closer or farther away—just like in classic titles like Doom and Wolfenstein 3D.

You might be looking for another cool way to do sprites and handle them, procedural animation is the answer. In Rain World, character movement isn’t drawn frame by frame. Instead, a script dynamically repositions key points and bones in a way that would make the character able to interact with physical objects in real-time. This means animators don’t have to painstakingly recreate every little movement, making animations more dynamic and responsive.

Source: https://nordic.ign.com/rain-world/1747/review/rain-world-review

With the transition to 3D, animation complexity skyrockets. Developers have to do more than build standard movements such as running and jumping to account for environmental interactions — walking through water, trudging through crowds, or traversing rough terrain. Consider how Ezio and Altair move in the early Assassin’s Creed games. Instead of being drawn manually, their animations dynamically conform to obstacles using software-powered skeletal systems with physics integration.

A well-tuned skeleton rig can make animating much easier. Jumping, running, and attacking movement cycles can be reused on several character models, making it time-efficient and cost-effective. That said, there’s only so far this goes — games with diverse character designs, especially in the fantasy and sci-fi realms, often require unique animations that can’t be copy-pasted.

That’s where motion capture (mocap) comes in. Originally used in film, mocap revolutionized game animation by capturing real human movement and applying it to digital characters. It makes the process much quicker, but it’s costly — many studios still embrace traditional animation. Even the big developers occasionally favor a bespoke approach. For example, in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (2019), instead of using mocap, Infinity Ward chose to perform reloading and firing sequences by hand, probably for more control and creative freedom.

If you are looking for 3D animation software, there are only a few free comprehensive programs that can satisfy all your needs. One of them is Blender. It was introduced in 1994 and still stays true to its open-source nature—it costs nothing. Blender is the choice of professionals who know what they are doing. It comes with a gigantic arsenal of tools and can be overwhelming for beginners, but its extensive collection of manuals makes the learning curve less extreme.

This software allows one to create both 2D and 3D graphics, works on Windows and Linux, and can perform simple curve modeling and quick renders. For advanced visual effects, Blender has integrated packages with smoke and fluid simulations, tools for modeling soft bodies, and weight calculations.

Animate by Adobe is the picklock that opens all doors in the world of animation. However, a picklock without skills and knowledge won’t help you much, so prepare for extensive training. A rookie designer will require dozens of hours to master all the features packed in AA. But an experienced animator who knows Adobe products will create his first animated clip in a matter of hours.


Adobe Animate has a long feature list. The software lets you set framerate, render in any resolution up to 8K, and synchronize your workspace with other Adobe products. It is available on Windows and macOS. The main problem with this amazing software is its price: $20.99 per month.

Animate by Adobe is the picklock that opens all doors in the world of animation. However, a picklock without skills and knowledge won’t help you much, so prepare for extensive training. A rookie designer will require dozens of hours to master all the features packed in AA. But an experienced animator who knows Adobe products will create his first animated clip in a matter of hours.


Adobe Animate has a long feature list. The software lets you set framerate, render in any resolution up to 8K, and synchronize your workspace with other Adobe products. It is available on Windows and macOS. The main problem with this amazing software is its price: $20.99 per month.

This program impresses with its convenient, user-friendly interface and variety of features for creating and manipulating 3D content. Digital artists praise its extensive functionality, which is great for video game character animation. You will be surprised to hear that it is free to use.

Here are the features we love the most in DS: photorealistic rendering, drag-n-drop editor, powerful modeling tools along with VFX, and the ability to set certain actions on repeat. You don’t have to be a seasoned modeler or animator to start working with Daz Studio. Changing the shape of any object, character, or scene can be done easily after some training. As you grow more proficient with the program, you will be able to add multiple objects and characters to scenes, manipulate their appearance, alter the background, tinker with lightning, and set up multiple cameras.

Toon Boom Harmony is one of the top picks for every animator that works in the 2D field. The software comes with all the tools you need to create animated clips in almost any art style. Would you like to go with paper drawing or maybe a paperless style? Here you are. Need puppet animation or traditional skeleton rigging? Not a problem!


The program is universal and efficient for both professionals and rookies. For example, the creators of the well-known animated series Rick and Morty use Toon Boom Harmony for their production. If you need something a bit easier for animation tasks, we recommend you check out Toon Boom Studio.

If you are planning to do a gaming project and you lack experience in the industry, the first logical step to take is to fill the gap with knowledge. By that, we don’t mean that you should learn how it all works and how animations are done, no. Instead, we suggest you start with a consultation with expert game developers such as Argentics Studio. We will analyze the whole project you have in mind and advise where to start and what technologies to use. Whether you need assistance with quick outsourced jobs or require A to Z development, our managers will find the right solution.

We have experience working with independent developers, gamedev studios, and big publishers, so we know how to conjure mesmerizing worlds, memorable characters, and smooth animation for them. When budgets are limited, it is a common practice to outsource game design, animation, and art production. With us, you can simply select what services you need, and we will take care of the rest.

Years of experience in game development, dozens of talented specialists who love what they do, and an extensive portfolio of works prove that we are capable of doing literally anything for projects of any complexity. Feel free to reach out and consult with our managers at any time!

The five core principles of video game character animation are:

1. Weight and Momentum: Movements should feel natural based on a character’s size and speed.
2. Anticipation and Follow-Through: Actions should have proper buildup and completion for realism.
3. Exaggeration: Adds impact and clarity, making animations more readable.
4. Timing and Spacing: Controls movement speed for fluid and responsive animations.
5. Secondary Motion – Small details (like hair swaying or clothes moving) add depth to animations.

VFX (Visual Effects) in video games animated environments enhance realism and immersion. These include explosions, fire, weather effects, magic spells, and environmental destruction. All created using shaders, particle systems, and dynamic lighting.

Yes, but they are different roles. An animator focuses on movement and visuals, while a game designer plans mechanics, level design, and player experience. Some animators transition into design by expanding their skills.

At Argentics Studio, we bring passion, expertise, and cutting-edge technology to every project. Whether you need high-quality animations, concept art, or full-cycle game development, we’ve got you covered. Let’s turn your vision into an immersive gaming experience