Gameplay Animation: How to Give Your Character Clear Attitude and Identity

Identity Precedes Animation

A new character lands in your pipeline. The rig is ready, Maya is calling, and your schedule whispers "go ahead, set a key... just one."

The temptation? Start animating right away.

Classic mistake.

If you animate before knowing who you're animating, you'll create soulless movement. A character that moves, yes, but a character that exists? No.

In production, experienced animators don't touch the controllers right away.

They start by understanding the character: its attitude, identity, emotional and physical mechanics.

This deep understanding then guides every decision: how it stands, where it places its weight, what tension inhabits its body, what energy it radiates... even when motionless.

In this article, I'll show you how I build this foundation in production.

Not silhouette. Not readability. Not yet.

Just one essential question: who is your character, and how does its body tell that story?

🎁 FREE RESOURCE THIS WEEK

Download the Character Pose Explorer (Pipeline section )

A 4-page production tool to explore your character's identity

and validate your 3 signature poses.

Free download

Methodology: Building Identity Before Setting the First Key

When a new character arrives in production, I don't touch the rig right away.

Here's how I proceed:

STEP 1: Gather Information (Character Design + Game Design)

Before touching Maya, I start by asking question

Character Design Side: Understanding the Being

I want to know:

• Who is this character? (background, personality, state of mind)

• What references exist? concept art, poses, visual research

• What visual energy does it convey? elegant, brutal, nervous, imposing...

• What physical elements influence its movement? injury, heavy armor, asymmetry, weapons...

Here, I'm looking for the being, not the action. What lives inside the character.

Concept art from the book : The World of Ghost Recon Breakpoint

Game Design Side: Understanding the Role

Then, I want to know how it exists in gameplay:

• What's its role? boss, mob, ally, hero...

• What archetype? tank, agile, ranged...

• What actions are planned? signature attacks, special movements...

• How should the player read it? threatening, opportunistic, calculating...

• What sensation should it convey? heavy, fast, unpredictable, unsettling...

Here, I'm looking for function, not psychology. What the player should feel.

STEP 2: Define the Identity Profile (Physical, Emotional, Gameplay)

Now that I have all the info, I need to translate it into body language.

This is where the character truly starts to exist.

I always build identity in three layers: physical, emotional, gameplay.

If one is missing, the poses become unclear.

A. Physical Profile: Postural Logic

Here, I define the character's internal mechanics. Just how its body functions.

I ask myself:

• What's its relationship to weight? heavy, light, fluid, broken...

• Where's its center of gravity? low, high, mobile, fixed...

• What's its base tension? relaxed, vigilant, tense, explosive...

• How does it breathe? calm, jerky, restrained, full...

This physical profile is the foundation of all your poses. Without it, you're animating a mannequin.

B. Emotional Profile: What Inhabits Its Soul

Here, I define the internal state, the one that colors every action.

I ask myself:

• What's its dominant state of mind? confident, suspicious, jaded, enraged, calm...

• How does it react to danger? charges, anticipates, avoids, endures...

• What's its base energy? high, low, controlled, chaotic...

This emotional profile gives the character its flavor.

Two characters with the same pose will never have the same attitude if their internal state differs.

C. Gameplay Profile: What the Player Should Feel

Here, I connect identity to gameplay function. Because a character can be fascinating... but useless if its reading isn't clear.

I ask myself:

• How should the player perceive it? threatening, negligible, unpredictable...

• What instant reading should it convey? dangerous, opportunistic, passive...

• What's its movement speed? Walking, running

• How will its animation transitions be? Quick, nervous, smooth

This gameplay profile ensures your posing serves the game, not just aesthetics.

STEP 3: Create an Inspiration Moodboard

A character's identity never comes from nowhere. It's built from visual, gestural, and emotional references that will feed your intuition.

The goal here isn't to "find pretty pictures." The goal is to capture the character's essence.

Objective

Gather 10 to 20 images that capture the character's essence:

• its attitude

• its energy

• its body mechanics

• its relationship to the world

The goal isn't to copy but to understand what makes it unique and build your body vocabulary.

What We're Looking For

• Static poses to capture attitude without depending on movement. Varied attitudes to explore multiple possible facets of the character.

• A general atmosphere that reflects its energy, world, internal "climate."

• A coherent visual style realistic, stylized, raw, elegant... according to the project.

• Animal references if relevant: predator, prey, feline, bear, insect... (always useful for understanding body mechanics).

• Body details hands, gaze, micro-tensions, subtle imbalances.

This moodboard should give you body vocabulary, not an aesthetic checklist. And above all, it should make you want to animate this character.

Example moodboard: my character is an Emotional Colossus

Useful Sources

• Sports photos: tensions, anchors, imbalances

• Dancers: body control, expressiveness

• Animal references: gait, posture, preparation for action

• Captures from games with strong identity: Splinter Cell, God of War, TLOU...

• Concept art from other games or projects

You're looking for body clues, not "cool" images.

STEP 4: Define the Line of Intent for Key Actions

Now that I know who my character is, I can define how it does each action.

This is where identity becomes movement.

For each cycle (Idle, Walk, Run, Jump, Attack...), I write one sentence of intent.

Not "what it does." How it does it.

Examples:

❌ Generic version "It walks toward point B."

→ Says nothing about the character. → Anyone could walk like that.

✅ Embodied version "It walks while constantly watching its back, ready to pounce."

→ Now you know who's walking. → And you know how to animate.

STEP 5: Test Exploratory Posing (Without Looking for the "Right" Pose)

Even with a simple style, a drawing board already allows effective exploration of key attitudes.

At this stage, I have:

• the identity

• the attitude

• the physical/emotional/gameplay profile

• your moodboard

• your intents

Now, I can play.

I'm not going to produce a final pose or validate an idle, I'm going to explore how this character exists in its body and how the rig behaves.

Objective

Create 5 to 10 quick, imperfect, throwaway poses that test:

• how it balances (or doesn't)

• how its weight falls

• how its internal tension reads

• how its attitude manifests

• how its energy circulates through the body

• how it "inhabits" space

These poses are identity tests and technical limitation tests.

How to Do It

• Pose quickly.

• Don't clean anything.

• Don't fix the fingers.

• Don't look for beauty.

• Look for the character's truth.

I want to see what works, what sounds false, what surprises, what opens a path. I can then rework the most relevant poses.

Example: 30 minutes of posing to explore your character. I'm testing my inspiration

What This Step Brings

• I identify what sounds right for this character.

• I eliminate what doesn't belong to it.

• I discover ideas I wouldn't have dared propose in validation.

• I create concrete body vocabulary, not theoretical.

• I prepare my brain to animate this character naturally.

This is the step where identity goes from paper... to body.

Before going further, I want to clarify something:

In production, I can spend several days (sometimes an entire week) doing only these steps.

Looking for who the character is. Understanding how it exists. Finding references that match it. Testing poses, discarding them, redoing them. Assembling the puzzle.

At this stage, I'm not animating yet.

Yes, it may seem like a waste of time.

But in reality, it's the opposite:

Once the puzzle is solved, all animations become faster, more coherent, and easier to produce.

I'm no longer searching. I'm executing.

That's why this phase isn't a bonus.

It's the foundation.

4 Pillars to Strengthen Attitude

Now that we know who the character is and how it embodies its actions, here are the concrete tools to transform this intent into credible poses.

Pillar 1: Active Gaze

The gaze is the first vector of intelligence.

Even an opaque helmet can "look" through head orientation.

A character that looks exists. A character that looks at nothing doesn't exist.

In practice:

Avoid a fixed, neutral, centered head. Unless you want a robo

Pillar 2: Postural Imbalance

A perfectly balanced character is a soldier on parade. Not an individual.

Attitude is born from controlled imbalance.

In practice:

Break the axis of symmetry:

• Hips on one side, shoulders on the other

• Weight on one leg

• Spine in S or C

Test question: "If I draw a vertical line down the middle, are both sides identical?"

If yes → make it asymmetrical.

Pillar 3: Micro-Gestures

The hands express what the character doesn't say. This is often where its charisma hides.

Even motionless, they reveal its internal state: tension, relaxation, tightness, elegance, restraint.

In practice:

Look for the right form, not the action. A hand placed with intent is enough to give character.

Pillar 4: The 3 Signature Poses

To crystallize identity, create 3 key poses that reveal the character in 3 different states.

Pose 1: Idle (Neutral Posture)

• How does it stand when doing nothing?

• Where is its weight?

• What's its base tension?

Red flag: overly neutral pose, symmetrical, without intent

Good practice: subtle asymmetry, weight on one leg, visible micro-intent

Pose 2: Offensive Pose (Threatening State)

How its body expresses the intent to attack: where tension concentrates, which zone advances, and how its posture becomes more aggressive.

This pose reveals:

• its aggression

• its way of attacking

• its relationship to risk

Pose 3: Defensive Pose (Protective State)

How it closes up, contracts, or pulls back to protect itself. Where it places its weight to absorb or avoid.

Which body zone becomes priority (torso, head, flank...).

This pose reveals:

• its vulnerability

• its caution or fear

• its survival logic

What These 3 Poses Reveal Together

• the character's internal logic

• its postural coherence

• its gameplay role

• its attitude in the three most readable states for the player

  
  

  If you change characters but these 3 poses remain identical... there's no clear identity.

The Splinter Cell Conviction Example (by Gilles Monteil)

Gilles Monteil showed me a pose done during the Splinter Cell Conviction reboot, when the team was redefining Sam Fisher.

The direction was clear: more savage, more visceral, inspired by a predator.

Gilles sums it up perfectly:

"Posing allows you to iterate quickly on creative direction. Even if the pose doesn't end up in the game, it clarifies the fantasy you want to create for the player."

This is exactly the role of posing: a tool for reflection and alignment, not a deliverable.

What This Example Shows

In this version, Sam isn't "an undercover agent." He's an urban predator.

And this identity reads immediately in the pose.

This posing works because it seeks to embody an intent.

Why It's Useful

These poses allowed the team to:

• validate the artistic direction

• align the character's fantasy

• define a common body vocabulary

  
  

They weren't meant for the game, but they guided everything that followed.

That's the value of attitude posing: you're not producing an asset, you're setting a compass.

Conclusion: Identity Is a Foundation, Not a Decoration

Attitude and identity aren't details you add afterward.

They're structural choices that guide every pose, every tension, every action.

When you know your character from the inside:

• poses become obvious

• choices are coherent

• actions tell something

• the player feels it before it even moves

This is what transforms clean animation into embodied animation.

And above all: all this work isn't wasted time.

The identity you build here becomes the basis of all your animations.

It guides your idle, your anticipation, your recovery, your transitions.

It saves you time, because you're no longer improvising: you know exactly how this character exists in its body.

So ask yourself the only question that matters:

Who is your character?

When you answer it methodically, everything else aligns.

FREE ! Download the Character Pose Explorer (Pipeline section )

January Challenge Complete!

Thank you to everyone who shared their contributions

on character attitude and identity.

I hope my feedback helped you and encourages you

to join the upcoming challenges.

February's theme is coming soon: Gameplay Silhouette and Readability.

See you soon!