I think that CobaltHex meant all those shiny frames like here:
www.mobygames.com/game/overlord-/screenshots
My comment was about shadows on playfield, not UI.
When i started to read challenge rules, the first thing came to my mind was Diablo. Inventory screen from it, to be precise (this pic is pretty much about that inventory screen=) So the basic idea was to draw that screen, filled with modern guns to fit the challenge. Then i became to 'improve' that idea of mine. Thought of interface, minimap, chat etc, etc. It turned out into lot of thins and in the end - background didnt get any decent attention.
Then several small bad things happened. First of all, i miscalculated the time for that challenge. I thought that yesterday was a last day to apply actually, and because of that i rushed like damned. On a side note - torrent that i downloaded seems to be broken, and my icq client suddenly decided to broke as well (small things like that pretty annoying -_-) Also i realised that submitted pic have a layer with palette turned on. I was exhausted to type any decent description as well. So much for a story of success eh?=)
Anyway, i learned a few things from that day, so it isn`t that bad i suppose. Also i feel like i need to mention that all text is pixelart as well (just in case someone got doubts about it). As for comments - i don`t get the part about flat ui. I mean... isn`t it supposed to be flat, because its... ui?
A lot of interesting things, but character could use more refinement. I think that shadows if put at 45 degree diagonals aimed at right top corner would give needed sense of volume (don't use dithering everywhere - for example flat greyish blue color would do the job for shadow on asphalt).
The HUD/UI looks great, but the sprites in the "game" itself are lacking.
not bad, but everything looks really flat, esp the ui. and pilloshading on the woman..
I see you have a P90 Sub Machine gun :) I like the chat on the bottom right where the people are talking, I am sure you had fun with that :P good luck