God of war door portal animation similar techniques

so vfx is very broad so i decided to just ask this type of complex static mesh animations, can anyone intrododuce me to some technique that i can ise to make a the naiamtion they used for the portal door in god of war ragnarok.

i discovered VAT but i feel like theres a more simple method on doing those kinds of thing.

like magical bridges building itself or smoething. im very sorry for the lacking description i just really dont know how to describe it hahahaha