Hello Highrisers ,

zanimate here. I’m a Senior Technical Animator at Pocket Worlds.

Today we’re pulling back the curtain on one of the biggest updates so far: a full rework of the core avatar animation. After the success of Snugglins, we wanted to bring the same animation standard across the rest of Highrise. For longtime players, this should feel like a fresh take on the avatars.

You can experience the new animations once they go live in the 4.22.10 update.

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What Changed?

The old animations often looked stiff and repetitive. Feet slipped across the floor, idle loops dragged on, and the core moves needed polish.

Old Walk

Old Run

This update rebuilt the core animations from the ground up. Avatars feel more grounded, natural, and expressive in motion. It also gives the animation team a stronger foundation for the future.

This includes reanimating walk, run, jump, sit, and standing. Additionally, we added a new jog animation that bridges the gap between walking and running. On top of that, we added six directional angles for each movement speed. This helps to reduce foot sliding and keep avatars grounded.

Updated Walk, Jog, & Run (multiple angles)

We also changed all the idle and dress-up animations and included randomized breaks.

Idle Breaks

Updated Dress-up Animation

Finally, we reworked the face and hair meshes. They now have better alignment with tattoos, facial hair, and accessories.

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Peek Behind The Scenes

Highrise avatars move because they’re built on a skeletal structure called a rig. The old rig had big limitations. It had disconnected limbs, off-centered pivots, and a lack of inverse kinematics. The entire avatar was a series of independent elements. This resulted in even simple movements being slow and tedious to animate.

Old Rig

So over the course of a couple months we upgraded the entire rig itself. With added inverse kinematics, connected limbs, and aligned pivots, the avatar had more natural movement. Additionally, the rig interface is now cleaner to work with.

Updated Rig

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How We Made It

We wanted this to be more than a cosmetic update. It needed to set us up for the future while keeping all the legacy content players already use.

• Compatibility Layer: Instead of reanimating hundreds of old animations, we added constraints that can be switched on or off. These constraints were used as a compatibility layer which allows us to toggle between old and new rig modes. This preserved existing animations while letting us create new ones with the upgraded system.
• Root Motion: We introduced root motion so movement now comes directly from the animation itself rather than being applied artificially. This reduces sliding and gives more natural timing and nuance.
• Idle System: We developed a weighted random system with short animated breaks that always branch back to the base idle. This aids in preventing repetition and keeping things efficient.
• Playtests: Throughout development, we ran multiple playtests with different outfits, accessories, and emotes. These surfaced bugs, clipping issues, and pacing problems, which we fixed before shipping the final version.

P.S. Yes, it is 100% twerking compatible.

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Looking Ahead

This animation upgrade is just the start. With a stronger rig, we can create more expressive movements and expand what avatars can do in Highrise.

We can’t wait to show you what’s next. You might even see some new animations sooner than you think

You can experience the new animations once they go live in the 4.22.10 update.