Isn't this whole thing about how HLD and its ilk all look alike, so it's a problem of originality? I kinda get it, but I like the aesthetic, so whatever. I'm sure the authors of HLD don't claim it as being original.

The characters Will be in the end on my screen say 5 centimeters. While fighting games dependand on what kind are a bit larger generally.
I actually ran into spine quite early and it seems a bit like go to animation. However i've found no deep pixel art used for it. More painted things that are straight out of photoshopped add skeleton ad mesh and go. That direction i will need to pick up with the creator first of what he wants to do. But it does seem sprine has the "faster" workflow once you understand how it works. Which kinda goes for all I guess.
Side question though Gill. I take those images are Vectors right if I'm not mistaken in which case I can basicly make 1 sprite for all resolutions or sizes not?
Also I found Spriter also nice looking they don't use the meshes though just the Skeleton's so i guess that's more tailored for true "pixel sprites".

The centimeters thing is dependent on game scale. At 1920x1080, a 5cm character would be higher res than a fighting game character.

Spine is not made for pixel art, it's practically impossible I'd say. Spriter is a bit more geared towards it, but really, if you want pixel art, you'll be animating by hand, not with a rigging tool.

The images I've shown are not vectors, the way it works is that you make them too big and scale down, which means they work on all resolutions up to a certain limit (like, if you want to support 4k screens, you have to start at a massive size). For pixel art, the opposite happens. You make the game for a 320x200 resolution or whatever and scale it up for higher resolutions. Pixels will become pretty big, that's part of the aesthetic.


So what I propose is that you make a few small tests and show us, so we can guide you better. Maybe also show us some games you consider inspiration? Everything is possible really, it just depends on the aesthetic you want. I don't think it's interesting to ask technical questions about a vague game idea. Most answers you'll get are "sure, it's possible, but is it feasible?".

Ah yes, now I get what you were going for originally. The sword is indeed correct then, but I agree that the wrists and arms wouldn't bend that way. For stuff like this, it's best to look up real martial arts stances to get it right. Never look up drawings of samurais and stuff like that.

What do you mean? 

I think his point is, why would a sword fighter ever hold a sword with the edge facing his body, away from the opponent? I think he's correct that all sword poses across all martial arts hold the edge towards the enemy, so this one would be incorrect.

Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. The wind seems to be coming from the left, so the belt makes no sense.