Animating the movements and characters and such in games is an art in itself; what in your opinion are some of the best examples of animation in games, and what about them impressed you so much?

Well, one that immediately pops into mind is Cuphead, with its Disney/Betty Boop style.

One that I'm looking forward to (only demo so far) is Forgotlings, with its Studio Gibli inspiration.

One from the past that impressed me back in 80s was Prince of Persia, with its use of rotoscopy based animation (Karateka was first few years before it, by the same developer), sort of a precursor to mocap of 3D era.

One that will dominate in the future of 3D games is AI trained motion (I've been watching some Two Minute Papers on it in last year or so, it's astounding).

Team ICO's games (Agro and Trico in particular, they're just insanely animal like), NieR Automata, The Last of Us Part 2, and several Chinese games (Wuthering Waves, Zenless Zone Zero, The Hidden Ones, etc).

The first game to wow me in animation was the original Prince of Persia, which still holds up!

The last of us 2. I don't care what people say about that game but those animations look like they are happening dynamically on the fly. I know how the animations work in the game but I still felt like I done stuff that was a once off type deal and the majority felt like the animations were being created in real time.

Naughty Dog, Ubisoft, Rockstar, and Arc System Works have all had amazing animation in their own way. If Blood Message is legit though it may have them all beat.

Ratchet and Clank games especially Rift Apart

Technically, TLoU2 to me.

But Zenless Zone Zero animations are ridiculously good and really gives the "modern anime" vibe life. It's so fluid, really impressive.

Haven't played the hand-drawn Rayman games but just watching some gameplay shows how amazing they look.

I second that.

The first time I played Rift Apart it felt like I was literally playing a PIXAR movie.

Yeah ZZZ's animations are crazy good, so expressive and stylish.