How to animate a swinging rope?

Question

Swinging ropes are usually found in video games with a platform, where a player jumps on a rope to get to a neighboring platform and what not.

What math is involved in doing this. I think that somehow the end of the rope follows the outline of the circle, and the rope itself creates waves through a sinusoidal function.

Answer 1

For something physically accurate, I would go for a mass spring model:

http://nehe.gamedev.net/tutorial/rope_physics/17006/