. . . No animation timeline? No good palette control? . . .
Yes, animation timeline.
Not a big Photoshopper are you? PS has always had indexed color mode, too. Allows palette control, but disables things like layers and all other RGB mode functions. Beyond a shadow of a doubt, PS is NOT intended for pixelling. But I do all my pixel work in PS and so does Elk. We both get decent results I think, hehe.
For the record, I recommend Pro Motion for pixelling. Not PS. Most are overwhelmed by scary ol' PS.As for the rocks. I say yes; they're over-detailed. Mainly I say that because you admit to a bad lack of control when pixelling, as if the end-result of you pixelling isn't what you want. You even posted the rocks image here for feedback. Obviously then, there's something wrong. You don't need
us to tell you that. The fact that you felt compelled to post here for crit is evidence enough that you need to change something, is it not? You need to be happy with your own work.
And unless your foreground stuff is super high-contrast and bright I doubt the OP's bg tile is working. Post a whole scene so we can see it in context.
Garish palette too, dude.
