One of the biggest improvements from Torchlight 1 to Torchlight 2 is the character animation, according to Runic Games.
In a weekend update from animators Matt Lefferts and Colin Turner, we learned a bit more about the game's A.S.S. (animation selection system).
What is that you ask? According to Matt Lefferts it's "how we handle how the character stands based on what weapon type their holding."
Pretty much anything in Torchlight 2 can be handled through the animation selection system, ranging from different attacks, how skills are cast, etc.
"Based on what unit or weapon type your holding you can override to force a new kind of animation into play," Lefferts further explained. "So if I'm holding a 2-handed sword, it has an override. If I'm holding a great axe or two swords or claw weapons, that's been a pretty powerful system to implement."
The result of this system is an increase in nearly triple the amount of animations in Torchlight 2 than seen in Torchlight 1.
"It's one of the easier things to get feature creep on 'cause we went from having, I think, 150 animations for all three characters in Torchlight 1 to closer to 250 for just one of the two genders in Torchlight 2. So we've, I think, close to tripled, in total, how many animations for the characters we have."
