Thanks for playing!
The art took up most of my time in this jam! I checked my time tracker today and it clocked me actively working in Aseprite for over 35 hours during this jam.
I think the real secret is a TON of parallax layers (there are a total of 9 not including the ones for the plants) plus some experimentation with lighting and alpha channels. I also think the limited pallet did a bunch of work as well.
The boss was inspired by this guy (I am sad that I did not have the time to implement the glowing eye patch / flashing that it does irl: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATWHi88fQRI&ab_channel=BBC