Animated sprites are okay, but there are a few advantages for my purpose with using text:
1. You can't predict the order of the images using image joiner. I will be using many font styles, so it is easier to spend 2 minutes editing a text file than coding around confusing sprite sheet ordering. The alternative is manually mapping out the Atlas image.
2. I want to use the Text functionality to create strings e.g scores that can be in the thousands.
3. You can use proportional fonts with no extra hassle
4. You can colour the fonts, just use greyscale tinting on the original and it can be coloured instantly. When numbers hit a threshold, you can change from Green to Red
5. Changing a number rapidly is very quick when you are just supplying a string, and the length of the string also becomes irrelevant, it's just one ID to refer to.