Overview: Building the Foundations of a Gameplay Animation Locomotion System

Before talking about turns, banking, or speed variations, I wanted to go back to what supports the entire system: the foundations of locomotion.

Idle, walk, stops, starts.

These blocks define the feeling of control, the coherence of transitions, the readability of intentions, and the way the character actually responds to player input.

Over the past few months, I’ve broken these bricks down one by one.

Because they are structural: they determine the stability of the system, its fluidity, and its ability to evolve toward more advanced mechanics.

Before diving into the next topics, I wanted to take a moment to step back.

To look at what these foundations bring, what they require, and why they need to be solid before going any further.

Idle — The anchor point

The Idle state isn’t a waiting pose, it’s the anchor point of the entire locomotion system. It defines posture, stability, the coherence of entry and exit transitions, and the way the character “exists” before even starting to move.

A solid Idle allows clean transitions into starts, stops, and all future movement states.

Related articles on Idle:

• Challenge

• Idle : the unseen foundation of gameplay

• Interview with Yogesh Batra : Idle, system and responsiveness

• Designing an Idle : method and production workflow

  
  

Walk — The first step into motion

Walking is the first block where animation truly meets gameplay constraints.

It’s where the character’s moving attitude is defined, where the system’s metrics take shape, and where key structural decisions are made, such as whether or not to use root motion.

It’s also the moment where you verify that everything connects cleanly back to Idle, with no break in intention.

This is the stage where locomotion starts to exist as a system, rather than a sequence of isolated animations.

Related articles on Walk:

• Challenge

• The walk : first constraint of gameplay animation

• Interview Farhanaz Kassee‑Elahee Walking, storytelling and animation

• Building a gameplay walk : method and calibration

Stops — managing the halt

Stops are one of the key elements that shape the feeling of control.

They handle deceleration, inertia, the direction of the halt, and the way the character responds to the player.

Having a Stop on each foot provides the best reactivity and cleaner transitions.

For NPCs, directional Stops are essential: they ensure consistent, readable, and believable halts in every orientation.

Stops also need to absorb sliding during transitions, handle speed variations, and connect cleanly both to Idle and to Walk.

Related articles on Stops:

• Challenge

• Stop : the first transition that puts your system to the test

• Interview Monika Smolicz : from mocap to gameplay

• Building a stop : conventions and engine constraints

Starts — Triggering Movement

The start is the moment where the player feels the character’s responsiveness most directly. The quality of a start often comes down to a single frame, the one where the character leaves Idle.

This movement defines the initial impulse: direction, acceleration, clarity of intention, and how the character reacts to player input.

Grouping starts by side allows you to cover all angles with a small number of animations.

Starts also need to handle speed variations, avoid sliding on launch, and connect cleanly both to Idle and to Walk.

Related articles on Starts:

• Challenge

• Where responsiveness happens

• Interview carlo andrei mercado: thinking of animation as a system

• Crafting a start : the impulse under pressure

 LOCOMOTION FOUNDATIONS KIT

For those who want to go further, I’ve gathered all the resources related to these four core bricks into a single Pack.

It includes:

• a main guide

• a complete guide on Idle

• a complete guide on Walk

• a complete guide on Stops

• a complete guide on Starts

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It was designed to support gameplay animators, animation leads, production teams and anyone involved in building a locomotion system

The full pack is available for 25€.

It’s a solid foundation for understanding and building gameplay locomotion.

Download

Consistent Foundations

Together, these four bricks form the foundation of gameplay locomotion:

• a stable Idle

• a coherent Walk

• clean Stops

• responsive Starts

This foundation is what ensures the system’s overall consistency: clean transitions, readable intentions, controlled metrics, and reliable responses to player input.

Once these fundamentals are in place, you can build the rest: directional transitions, speed variations, vertical impulses, advanced behaviors, and more complex mechanics.

What I Learned

This series of articles didn’t teach me locomotion, I’ve been practicing it for years, on proprietary engines as well as AAA productions.

But it taught me something else, something valuable for my craft.

First, it pushed me to formalize things I used to do almost automatically.

This work already existed within teams ( comparing approaches, explaining things to juniors, refining systems) but never with a level of precision intended for teaching.

Putting structure into choices I made consciously (where to cut a start, why an asymmetric Idle complicates the combinatorics, or how perceived latency differs from actual latency) forced me to clarify what I already knew how to do.

Then came Unreal. I’ve mostly worked on proprietary engines at Quantic Dream and Ubisoft.I had to relearn a new engine, for the fifth time in my career… and the early stages are always difficult, accepting becoming a beginner again on topics I otherwise master, questioning habits, exploring new ways of thinking, and spending a lot of time figuring out where the right nodes and best practices live.

But that friction is valuable: it forces you to revisit your assumptions and build more robust solutions, with a cross‑engine perspective.

In the end, this series is as much a pedagogical tool for you as it is a process of clarification for me.

What’s Next?

The foundations are in place.

In the coming months, we’ll explore the bricks that complete the locomotion system:

• turns in motion

• banking

• turn‑on‑spot

These elements will allow us to cover the full range of animations that make up locomotion, moving from a basic, coherent setup to a complete and advanced system capable of absorbing gameplay constraints.

Once this structure is in place, we’ll finally be able to dive into more expressive and fun animations, including jumps and combat, both of which rely entirely on the strength of the locomotion system.

The system is starting to take shape!