04-05-2012, 06:52 AM
That top one isn't as bad as you think. It's not front pose, but it's not totally top-down, either.
Zelda perspective (and Mystery Dungeon and countless others like this), has an interesting way of doing front poses. For that, they tend to draw most of the characters almost as though they were facing the screen, not looking down. Good references would actually be the Pokemon overworld sprites from HG/SS, since you can get an idea of 4-directional sprites at that sort of perspective.
Zelda perspective (and Mystery Dungeon and countless others like this), has an interesting way of doing front poses. For that, they tend to draw most of the characters almost as though they were facing the screen, not looking down. Good references would actually be the Pokemon overworld sprites from HG/SS, since you can get an idea of 4-directional sprites at that sort of perspective.