SwSh New Animations for Old Models

[Battista]

So I’m still not 100% buying it as a legitimate reason to limit us to the Galar Dex, but I was playing Ultra Sun the other day and I do see how they could stand to up the animations of the Pokémon who make it into the game.

I was training a Lucario with the egg move Blaze Kick, and when I select the move, it uses its freakin’ hands! So again, I’m not saying it was worth cutting mons for but I’m really hoping they add more animations that fit with the Pokémon like giving Lucario a kick. Or other things like that to give them more personality like their Stadium models.

Is there any Pokémon you can think of that’s particularly lacking in this department? And how would you upgrade them?

 

[Stratelier]

Try doing the Supersonic Skystrike Z-move with Hawlucha ... or, really, every bird Pokemon whose idle animation depicts it standing on the ground and not flapping in place.

It's not just one or two Pokemon or moves here and there that need an overhaul, Game Freak needs a (larger) team focused on managing the visual presentation of the franchise's key selling point: the actual creatures.

I know it's not an easy process by any means (the size of any regional Pokedex AND the scope of available moves is downright daunting), but each and every species appearing in a given game needs a thorough analysis (starting with a quick glance at its default movepool) of exactly how it might move to execute specific attacks. Like you say, Blaze Kick is clearly a kicking move, so any Pokemon capable of performing it needs an appropriate "kicking" animation so that it doesn't have to fall back on its default/generic "physical attack" animation. Then there also needs to be a review process -- people in charge of reviewing (even vicariously) the animations that actually made it into the final product, specifically to identify gaps for the animation team to fix in future projects.

(Additionally, attack animations need to have a certain interval flagged as something that can be held/looped depending on the needs of the attack script, to ensure that the Pokemon's movements visually sync up with whatever additional effects the attack renders. Again, this is something you dedicate a visuals team to, )