I am a quite experienced pixel artist looking to team up with a programmer to create a unique and well-thought out village-builder.
Many previous city- and village-builders have put a lot of focus on expanding your settlement and generally gone for "more is better". Expanding is pretty much a no-brainer. We, however, would go for a design that promoted the use of strategic placing and planning - as the population of your village will generally be very small. Each and every single individual is detrimental to success, which means performing (what generally seems like) a basic task like constructing a building needs the perfect timing, as you also want your people to be harvesting resources in all kinds of manners in order to survive.
Here are some quick concepts I drew. Mostly to show off the kind of style I personally would wish to go for. These structures however are a lot simpler designed than the final product would be.