Recently been fascinating with pixel art… Wondered if one could do it in Blender too… First experiment:
Here’s video version: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/_mKchoTzqXc
I expected it to be harder, but it’s super simple to do that:
It’s not perfect, but I think it might be a viable workflow with maybe a better shader (toon-like) and maybe with models specifically made for it…
I would’ve never thought to try that, but with all the procedural stuff available in Blender, it does make sense that it can actually do this. Neat!
The more I think about it the more approaches one could take here, like eg.:
… and I think there are many, many more things.
The thing is (I’m not a 2d artists), is that probably doing that in 2D would be 10x faster 
Well, there’s a good chance that’s objectively true, but it also depends on the skillset of the artist. The path of least resistance is going to be different for everybody, and likely also different for specific use-cases depending on the pixel art style you want (you did mention toon shaders for example).
This is definitely a worthwhile thing to explore even if a 2D guru would suggest that this workflow is suboptimal =)
I have also recently been trying/wanting to mix pixel art with blender. I found this video below that offered a free add-on which one-click sets up the render settings for Pixel art. Below my floating islands image with the render settings updated using the add-on.
Pixel Art with eevee - FREE blender addon (youtube.com)
Now of course, I did not use its Material set ups which also create pixel-shaders for your items. There are a few videos on how to use it, but I didn’t like the look as much.
I am planning on learning to mix my 2D pixel art skills with Blender in the near future, so I appreciate you showing the tools you used for this too! It looks great!
Ha! Well said. Path of least resistance will be my 2nd name for those kinds of explorations 
Oh, that video is cool! Thanks for the link!
They look great overall, but somehow look also to high-res for what in my mind is pixel art style. But outlines are great, and this is one of the things that I’m missing.
