So, I’m very inexperienced when it comes to making any kind of assets to use in a game. But I’d like to make my own once I’m confident enough to build my first game when I’m done with some courses.
What programs can I use? I know Blender does 3d models and animations, and some 2D animation. But what do I use to make characters in a 2D game? And how would I give them fluid animation? So adding a skeleton that I can manipulate.
I currently have Krita and Blender if that helps.
Blender is the best 3D software if you don’t want to spend absurd amounts of money (Maya is the industry standard and it’s $1785 USD a year for example). Blender is great, just stick with that for anything 3D.
Krita is a good 2D software, and its “Wrap Around Mode” is fantastic for making seamless 2D tiles. You can use Unity’s built in 2D skeletal animation to animate your characters, I’d recommend starting with this as it’s very intuitive and has a fast workflow. You need to save your Krita files as PSD and then manually change the file name to be PSB though, as Unity only accepts PSB files (Krita can’t save or read PSB files).
If you’re willing to spend some money, I personally prefer Clip Studio Paint. It’s adding a subscription service soon, but you can still buy the current version with a one time payment. Go for the $50 USD “Pro” version, the $219 USD EX version is pretty much useless for game dev. CSP can also save and read PSB files, so I find it much easier to use with Unity.
If you’re serious about 2D skeletal animation and don’t mind investing some money, definitely go for Spine Pro (one time purchase of $329 USD). Most bigger studios have in-house tools (vanillaware and ubisoft for example), but Spine Pro is used in tons of games, and it’s the absolute best 2D skeletal animation tool on the market. They have runtimes to export your rigs to pretty much any game engine, so your experience using it won’t be wasted if you move away from Unity.
A cheaper Unity specific option at $49 is AnyPortrait. I’ve only used it a bit, but it’s functionality very similar to Spine, I personally find it more difficult to pick up though. The support email will answer any questions you have if you do decide to give it a try.
For pixel art, definitely go with Aseprite. It’s actually insane how good that program is and it’s only $20 USD; there’s even a steam version.
I know that Clip Studio Paint, Spine Pro, and AnyPortrait all have free trials, so give them a go if you’re interested.
Good luck!