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I had a couple Oracles in PFS before the remaster, namely a Life Oracle and a Tempest Oracle. One of my players had a Battle Oracle.
Since the release of the Animist, I've switched my Life Oracle to a Garden of Healing Animist with Life Oracle Dedication and it translates the fantasy and mechanics in a very satisfying way.
When my player asked me about her Battle Oracle, my first answer was to switch to an Embodiment of Battle Animist.
And I'm now strongly thinking about my Tempest Oracle. Even if I won't go for Earth's Bile, as it doesn't really fit the Tempest theme, but I'm thinking in diving into the madness part of this Oracle with Discomfitting Whispers.
So, I'm wondering if the Animist is the new pre remaster Oracle. And I start to think it is.
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In a way, yes. Each Animist apparition lets you opt into a niche, and the vessel spell in particular lets you embody that niche, letting the class output exceptional healing, damage, or Strikes for a caster. This is what the Oracle was originally designed to do, and the additional spells conducive to that niche are exactly what the old Oracle would've wanted.
On the flipside, however, the old Oracle was also quite specialized, being locked into their niche and made to play by their mystery's rules. The Animist, by contrast, is arguably the most generalist caster in the game, as they can load on up on multiple apparitions and swap them out every day. Another key difference is that the old Oracle's niche was reinforced via passive mystery benefits, so they could lean even harder into their niche, at least in theory, whereas an Animist not using their apparition's vessel spell isn't necessarily specialized in the apparition's niche, even if they're still incredibly strong. Of course, the Oracle has a curse mechanic and the Animist doesn't, so if that's part of what the player wants to experience, that's going to be missing.
For players asking to play something close to the old Oracle, I'd thus agree that the Animist is the next best thing at the moment. However, I still believe there's room for a true specialist caster, one whose subclass defines their niche to such an extent that they can feel like they truly excel at one particular thing, more than anyone else. Although the Animist lets you pick and choose the niche you want, they're still a generalist, and so is the remastered Oracle, so in that respect both are kind of the opposite of the old Oracle.