Phew 
In all seriousness if someone really can pump out something like that in an hour, I would be interested to see how you do it.
- I would have really liked to see you expand upon or explore the direction conceit was taking. It feels very natural in the painted environment that you did. He couldnt do it in an hour but he was able to do something really quite nice in a couple hours and i think that putting in that extra 90 minutes of spitshine or so in ones work can really make the difference between getting something done to make progress, and getting something finished to its full potential as a piece of art.
I agree conceits version works a lot better with the background, but I am totally out of steam on this piece, I couldn't redo it again if I had to. I'll save what I've learned for the next one.
commenting on your game mockup (i know this might be a little off topic from the original intent of the post but it sort of ties back into it in some way in my head - i think). I think the background is nice enough, it gets its point across, and i think the sprite looks quite nice, and the knight sprite looks competent (i personally dont care for his shield by comparison, looks a good bit flatter than the metal in the armor), but the elements, thrown in with the style of HUD elements youve thrown in, none of them really seem to fit into place with one another, so the game screen looks rather disconnected as a result. The purples youve chosen for your yeti seem much more conducive to an icy cave or at night where the light reflects softly off the snow or something. If youre not up for redoing the yeti again which id completely understand, id at least consider studying the palette choices to have it more cohesively match its environment?
That's no mockup, that's a screenshot from the real thing. The HUD is one of those semi-temp things just to get something there, but you're right it doesn't look that good.
The knight was done a while back when I was still learning to use a wacom. It's also not pixeled.
The purple highlights might not be right for this terrain but I will probably use this sprite for another terrain also. The old RPG palette-swap / reuse-sprite trick
I have to agree with st0ven about the different elements in the mock up not matching stylistically. Mainly because of the "heavy inking" on the sprites, yet the softness of the background. Aso the cripness and sharpness of the sprites with the relitivly fuzziness of the background. And while it could just be cause I dont know what the games actually like, but there seems to be alot of unused space in the screen. The trees also just seem to big too me, compared to the sprites. I mean I guess they could be very large pines but something about them makes me see them more as smaller pine trees, and the fact that theyre in the distance makes me feel they should be a bit smaller. It could be because of the way the trees bend and tip over a bit. I think taller trees tend to be more straight, as a very tall pine bending like that might tip over (? or the trunk is thicker so the weight of the snow/leaves doesnt bend the trunk), and the pines/leaves start higher off the ground, but then again Im not a tree expert in the least. I like the yeti though.
The unused space is for the other enemies / allies, there are a total of 9 squares on each side. 9 enemies and 9 allies max. The bigfoot is on the front line in the middle. The AI puts him there.
The style differential is a problem, but there's not much I can do. Sometimes I pixel stuff, sometimes I don't. Sometimes it turns out good, sometimes it doesn't. I do the art more as a break from programming then anything. It's more entertainment then work, so a lot of times I'm experimenting. But in the interests of time I can't redo things to make them look consistent.
If you think the trees are too tall in on this background, you should see my swamp
I've got bushes as big as both those sprites
