Thank you ever so much for the reply and for giving feedback. You saying it's good enough for a selection procedure really boosts my confidence and motivation on this.

It's funny, I actually had a more shaded version before, but decided to go for simplicity, and I quite like how effective it looks. Again I'm new to this, so if you could tell me about the normal map or provide me with that sample, that would be greatly appreciated. It does peak my interest and anything to make the sprite look better.

I will try and tweak the animation later today, see if I can make the head a stronger point as well. Before I ended up with this I had the head turn around more, with the other eye being visible at a point in the animation as well, but I thought it was maybe too much. Definitely will adjust the lining on the clothes and make them 2 pixels thicker and the white wider.

This is my quick concept for the swords, in the end the character is supposed to dual wield twin swords. They do have a tad of a glow on them.



Also for the character holding the sword when running, originally I didn't have him hold it, but in case of time constraint, only have a few weeks left, I decided to put the sword in, just for if I can't get a different walk cycle done in time with the sword. Here's the originals, except for the sword there's no difference.