Yes i think it's a easier, "just" using skeletal animation. It would be nice to see your avatar to really block al things, and i think they add a lot more animations, cause Marian said in peek #2 that animations in with the 2D char's used too much space, and you don't have that problem now, so adding more animations.
Like Marian says in the peek #2:
With low-polygon characters, you don't have such limitations. Once the model and the skeleton are finished, you can add any animation you want without getting even close to the amount of data needed for pre-rendered animations. Because of that, we've been able to add a lot more animations in Riftrunner. The fights, for instance, are a lot cooler. And the nice thing is also that the animations softly blend into each other.
