Most straightforward way to make game intro/tutorial animation?

Maybe it's a stupid question but it's proving hard to find a specific answer to this, as anything "tutorial" yields a million unrelated tutorials on general animation.

I'm looking to create simple 2D animations in the editor like what you would do with an animation tool and then simply play those clips when some conditions are met.

I generally animate things through scripting but this is not what I want in this case. I've also fiddled a little with the animation state machine, but I'm not sure this is what I want either.

I guess I just to want to hit "record" and move a sprite or more around and get a clip out of it all, no states or whatever.

Thanks for any pointers,

Eneko

 

This kinda answers my question:

Except frames are inserted manually with the scrubber.

This one is a script that looks like it can record runtime stuff, but not sure if it will record live manual manipulations:

I still have to try any of this stuff.