There is no one place/document that relates to color palettes in pixelart. This talk you speak of comes from many directions. In pixelart many feel that the less colors you use the better. This comes from the history of pixelart. Other palettes come from platform specific pixelarts, c-64, NES, for example. Many others use restricted color paletttes as a challenge to use other pixelart skills (dithering, for example) to create a piece. Of course then there's the dollers who make palettes and forever after own that palette and will hunt you down if you 'steal' their colors. On certain other works a piece can have row restrictions which limit color usage and requires color planning. Most of these things come from a time before computers/gaming had the ability to use millions of colors. We the pixelartists, are the keepers of this flame. There is no longer a need to be so restricted but we strive for purity.
As to your own game development, experimentation, reference materials and artistic choice should be all you need.

E: typos


Edited by jalonso - 11 October 2006 at 8:55am

Also, snader pointed out an intresting site to me.

http://colourlovers.com/
It revolves around colors.
They have palletes of all kinds.

Doesn't explain the importance of good color choices though...


Edited by Souly - 11 October 2006 at 1:16pm