Jennifer Scheurle ( Earthlight): The first Ragnarok Online ones! They’re pretty old school, though :D. With this theme remaining a constant throughout, the image of a bird annoying a bear manages to naturally and effortlessly inject banter, personality, and life into the bear and bird duo without the player even needing to give them something to do Fortunately, this is not the case for Banjo and Kazooie, for whom every fundamental aspect of gameplay and presentation was designed to compliment and reinforce the sense of shared adventure they experience together. Idle animations are all about pure character expression, but thinking of ways for just one single character to express and emote by themselves can be tough when they have little to work off of. Little effort from the designer and quite an effect.īonsai Treehouse ( You Are Worthless): A bird poking a bear on the head ( Banjo Kazooie). Not only was there dragons, a parallel universe, trolls, and saxophones, but Simon was also like me - he sometimes took out his Walkman to chill even though things got rough. The way a sorcerer listens to his favorite tape in the middle of danger and adventure, it makes Simon/you a cool cat and not a weak nerd.Īlso, as a developer I think it made quite an impact on me. It's also cute and endearing.īaby Duka ( D A S H): Simon the Sorcerer (the first one) where he takes his Walkman out of his hat and just chills to the music. 3) He breaks the fourth wall to say it to the player (as was the fashion at the time). 2) He speaks the only text dialogue in the entire game. 1) It gives us character detail we'd find nowhere else in the game he takes off his hat to reveal hair. Tomm Hulett (Director at Wayforward): Let's go with Sparkster's long idle in the original Rocket Knight Adventures! It's a pretty weird one. It's one of the most elaborately animated sprites in the game, and in a genre where slime enemies are as common as air, it felt like they wanted to have the best slime of them all, putting extra time and excessive frames to prove their spot, which is sort of charming in a way. There's no shortage of games today that struggle giving an appropriate response during the transition from an uncontrollable state, let alone one that can happen in virtually any point of the game.Īs an extra mention, I do have a soft spot for the common slime enemy from Breath Of Fire IV. For as many complex movements as that game had, bringing Mario in and out of that state and reacting appropriately if interrupted is pretty robust for such a small thing. "Idle animations are one of the many ways a game tries to convince us that it contains a living, breathing world."Īnother thing to consider is that Mario can fall sit down and fall asleep literally anywhere if not interrupted. Considering the monumental challenge of making a game as playable and complete in a relatively uncharted genre, the attention to detail was amazing. I still remember going to eat dinner having forgotten to pause the game and finding Mario asleep. The fact that if you would leave the controller alone, Mario would just kind of lounge out of boredom was such a nice little detail. For being one of the first true 3D platformers, the game had so many small details that made the massive polygons come alive. Of course, I can't forget mentioning Mario in Super Mario 64. I loved them though! I used to wait just to watch what a character did. you won't remember correctly if ever asked. which I guess is a side effect of idle animations. There are so many titles that come to mind, but now I'm not sure if I'm remembering right. I think, maybe, the '90s were the golden age of idle animations. It was fun because that detail added more personality. Nathalie Lawhead ( Everything is going to be OK): Earthworm Jim had some of the most fun idle animations that I can remember. While very few devs agreed on what games had the most memorable or enjoyable idles (except Earthworm Jim, which everyone apparently loves), all pointed to just how much they made these characters feel alive for them, fleshing out the worlds they belong to with only a few frames of animation. With that in mind, Gamasutra recently checked in with a broad array of developers from around the industry to learn what idle animations they most enjoyed, as well as what it was that they liked about them. Idle animations, those little bursts of motion that trigger when a player leaves a game alone for a bit, are easy to overlook but key to conveying subtle (or not-so-subtle) aspects of your game's characters and atmosphere - if they're done well.
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