As a graphics programmer, the most charitable interpretation I have here is that in 2D all the animations are baked into texture atlases. A 3D model would re-use its textures during animation, in 2D it’s a new one.
But I don’t see Factorio as being a VRAM pig, even with all their animations, which you could certainly improve on from the simplistic “every animation frame is a whole new texture” model.
But I don’t see Factorio as being a VRAM pig, even with all their animations, which you could certainly improve on from the simplistic “every animation frame is a whole new texture” model.