The way her telescopic arms work has always been fudged in-game and in art, so I'm wondering if I should animate Pinafore cleaning the family portrait with this sprite-chain arm.

Three reasons to be going after the treasure:

What's taking me so long? Designing assets for the volcano level. Also, allergies.

Boom boom acka-lacka-lacka boom, boom boom acka-lacka boom boom.

Still working on it.

There's definitely treasure around here, but it'll still take a while 'til we reach it.

Well, this might give you an idea of the kind of scope my cutscenes will go.

I probably should hire voice actors, but I think I'd rather do what I can without money first.

Some big motions require big animation.

The least I can do is try to get the big motions right before drawing all the other details.

Plan B for this sequence.

Now with real-time cleaning action, and a stretching sprite for the arm.

...well... This is awkward.

Yes, I CAN make an animated background within a matte, with a shifting color palette. However, I realize this doesn't look like lava, no matter which way you shake it.

...the effect's cool, though.

As the first major cutscene, I have to show the scale without going crazy with drawing too much.

As such, these two DemoBots up front do a bit of acting, and we never see them again.

Line work first, then shading.

Also, if you're asking "where's her hair?", that's gonna animate separately.

I might have to put this in a little black box on-screen, but that's no problem for me.