Lua for Game Development — Chapter 8: Animation Systems, Cameras, Cutscenes & Timeline Scripting

Animation and cinematic systems transform raw gameplay into a polished, emotional experience.
Lua is ideal for sequencing, orchestration, animation management, and camera scripting because:

Coroutine syntax is perfect for timelines.
Hot reload accelerates iteration.
Data-driven tables make timelines readable.
Engines expose animation/camera APIs easily.

In this chapter we build:

Animation state machines
Sprite animation system
Camera follow/zoom/lerp
Timeline scripting engine
Dialogue system
Cutscenes (with coroutines)
Screen/camera effects (shake, flash, fade)
Sequencers for complex cinematic flows

1. Animation State Machines (ASM)

Most games rely on an animation finite-state-machine: