Well that is certainly a reply I did not expect, well let me see how I can address your points.
As to your disclaimer, to each their own
The old sprites have far too much contrast relative to vanilla, even the old vanilla sprites and god forbid the new vanilla sprites heh. Meanwhile the new THI sprites *still* have more contrast and harder details than vanilla and that is the style I chose. It is Close Enoughâ„¢ while still being its own thing. Also consider the old ones were just rather simple and crude recolored kitbashes, while the new sprites are actually mostly hand painted.
Exaggerated highlights, shadows, outlines, and contrast etc, looks impressive in a way. In the manner that it sort of saturates ones vision, confusing the eye with excessive detailing. Making it feel bold, but it was indeed too bold and well just fairly poorly made in general before and thus reads poorly. Stated in a different way, excessive contrast / sharpness is an easy way to approach a sprite, one might say... "Crutch" as a strong word for it.
I do appreciate the feedback, but this is the style going forward with the mod.