Assets [Beta] Animancer v6.0 - Less Animator Controller, More Animator Control

Animancer is a powerful animation system which allows your scripts to simply play Animation Clips on demand and control all their details without any additional setup steps. It solves the major problems with Animator Controllers and can either replace them entirely or work alongside them on the same character.

Edit: skip down to the Animancer v6.0 post.

 

I've started updating some of the documentation for v4.0 so I've made the New Documentation separate from the Old Documentation to avoid breaking anything for non-Beta users. In particular:

• I've reworked the Why Replace Mecanim page with some new sections: Delays and Unreliability and Separation of Concerns.
• And the Events page now explains the differences between Unity's Animation Events and my new Animancer Events.

 

This is great! And good job on the documentation

 

v4.0 Beta 2 is now available which fixes a few issues and has some improvements to the first two examples: Quick Play and Playing and Fading.

I've also started using Github Issues for bug tracking, feature requests, etc.

 

v4.0 Beta 3 is now available. Anyone using an earlier version of the Alpha or Beta should update to this one since it fixes some significant issues with Animancer Events.

 

New year, New Beta version.

• Transition Assets are now included for all transition types (instead of only ClipState.Transition).
• Various improvements to the Inspector and Transition Preview window.
• The system now properly supports changing the target Animator.
• Added various assertions for invalid values throughout the system to make it easier to catch issues upfront.
• Updated the Fine Control and Locomotion examples. In particular, the Linear Blending example now demonstrates the benefits of Animancer's optional Mixer Time Synchronisation compared to the forced synchronisation Blend Trees use.
• Someone finally reported a bug using Github Issues instead of email.

 

Just released Beta 5 to quickly fix an issue that was preventing builds and a couple of other minor things.

 

I've added a new C# in Unity section to the documentation to explain the basics of scripting so that the examples can link there instead of needing to explain everything themselves. Hopefully that should make it easier for beginners and non-programmers to get into Animancer.

 

Beta 6 is now available which has various minor bug fixes and some more of the examples have been updated.

 

I finally got around to buying my own domain name so the documentation now lives at https://kybernetik.com.au/animancer. Any links to kybernetikgames.github.io/animancer should redirect automatically. Please let me know if you have any issues with it.

 

Release Candidate 1 is now available. It should essentially be the same as the final release around the end of the month, but I'm still hoping to have time to add at least one more example.

 

Release Candidate 2 is now available, which fixes a garbage allocation issue in the Unity Editor when using Animancer Events (it didn't happen in runtime builds, but was annoying when using the profiler in the editor). Anyone who download the Pro version of Release Candidate 1 should update immediately because I accidentally uploaded the Lite package instead.

 

Animancer v4.0 is now available on the Asset Store ([Lite] and [Pro]). Here are some of the highlights:

• The main public API has been entirely restructured. In particular, the Play, CrossFade, CrossFadeFromStart, and Transition methods are all now called Play with fewer overall parameter combinations, but the changes are far more extensive than that.
• [Pro-Only] New Animancer Event system for general events without needing to use Unity's Animation Events and the ability to set custom end times.
  
• New Transition Preview Window allows you to preview your transitions on your character without entering Play Mode.
• [Pro-Only] Implemented Mixer Time Synchronisation.
• Added Weapons example as well as instructions for downloading animations from Mixamo and configure their Import settings.
  
• Added a C# in Unity section to explain the fundamentals of programming in Unity.

See the Change Log for the full list of changes and remember to always delete any older version of Animancer before upgrading.

If you don't yet have Animancer Pro, check out the Reddit Thread for a chance to win a free voucher.

 

Animancer v5.0 Alpha 1 is now available for testing. You can download Animancer Lite from the documentation, or if you have Animancer Pro you can email the Invoice Number from your Asset Store purchase to animancer@kybernetik.com.au.

Major Features:

• Animancer can now be blended with an Animator Controller assigned to the regular Controller field on the Animator component, though this is subject to several limitations which are explained in the Change Log.
• Expanded support for Animation Jobs.
• Added Custom Fade system for easily fading weights using an AnimationCurve, custom delegate, or Interpolation.Function enum to tweak your transitions as described here.
• Several significant bug fixes and improvements to internal systems.

See the Change Log for the full list of features and changes.

 

Animancer v5.0 Beta 1 is now available for testing. It has various improvements to the Transition Preview Window and I've replaced the LowPolyMan model with a better DefaultHumanoid (which is just Unity's DefaultAvatar with an Animancer themed texture).

All known (fixable) bugs are now fixed. Most of the remaining tasks are improving the examples and documentation (and redoing all the marketing images and videos to use the new DefaultHumanoid model). Anyone encountering bugs should try this version and report any lingering issues before release.

Anyone who already received access to the Pro Alpha can download the Beta from the same place.

 

Animancer v5.0 Beta 2 is now available for testing. It has a couple of key improvements:

• Added optional event names to AnimancerEvent.Sequence and AnimancerEvent.Sequence.Serializable so they can be used to identify events when defining event times in the Inspector and assigning their callbacks in code.
• Added MixerParameterTween for easily interpolating mixer parameters over time.
• Replaced the "Possible animation type mismatch..." warning in the Inspector with a compact icon:
  • The icon differentiates between warnings (some animated properties aren't present in the Rig) and errors (none of the animated properties are present in the Rig).
  • You can click the icon to get a full explanation of the incompatabilities between the animations and the Rig.
  • If this feature is affecting your performance, you can disable it via the Display Options in the layer context menu.

Anyone who already received access to the Pro Alpha/Beta can download the update from the same place.

 

Animancer v5.0 is now up on itch.io and should be approved for the Asset Store in a few days.

 

Animancer v6.0 Alpha is now available for testing. As usual, you can download the Lite version from the Test Releases page or email your Invoice Number to animancer@kybernetik.com.au for the Pro version (or if you still have the download link from previous test releases it should still work).

Here's a quick summary of the new features:

• Added a new StateChange system to the Animancer.FSM system (which I originally proposed here). This is the most significant change you need to be aware of if you upgrade from an older version of Animancer in the middle of a project.
• Added Window/Animation/Animancer Tools which opens a window with various useful tools including the script for easily generating animations from selected sprites that I made recently. I haven't documented them yet, but the Change Log has a summary of the tools.
  
• Mixer Transitions can now use either AnimationClips or Transition Assets (any ITransition that inherits from UnityEngine.Object) for their children, meaning that you can now fully set up Nested Mixers using transitions instead of in code.
• Added AnimancerEvent.Sequence.RemoveCallback (which I originally proposed here).

The Change Log has the full list of changes.

Please try it out and let me know what you think so I can keep improving it as much as possible.

 

I just added documentation for the new Animancer Tools window:

Adjust the borders of many Sprites at once:


Rename multiple Sprites at once:


Generate animations from Sprites based on their names:


Change an animation to use different Sprites:


Change the Hierarchy paths used by an animation:

 

Animancer v6.0 Alpha 3 is now available.

Weaver v6.1 is also now up on the Asset Store, which includes a new Controller State Generator system for Animancer.

 

Animancer v6.0 Beta 1 is now available.

It has greatly improved support for Native Animator Controllers and a completely redone Hybrid Basics example.

 

Animancer v6.0 Release Candidate 1 is now available.

It's most significant improvements are to the Timeline binding system.

This will be the version I release on December 4th (when the current Asset Store sale ends) unless I get any more bug reports before then.

 

Animancer v6.0 is now available on itch.io and should be approved on the Asset Store in a few days. Anyone who requested access to the test releases can also download it from there.