Firstly, the palette is really, really bad. No offense, but you didn't really do very well as far as colour choice goes. Choose a different shade of green, and choose a slightly more orange/brown yellow.
Secondly, you appear to be shading the sprite as if it's flat. Link is 3D, and when you shade a hat like it's a pointy box, it doesn't really look like it. Using an extra shade of each colour might also help tremendously; I don't recommend using more than that, but one more would seriously help. We're not on a GBA, and we're not limited to a certain number of colours per sprite.
Lastly, the animations need a lot of work (although I'm certainly not the person to ask on that), and "flipping" which leg is lit up from the side usually isn't enough to tell the person looking at it that the legs are actually moving.
The sprites, overall, need a lot of work, but I think that you'll get there with a bit of help.
Secondly, you appear to be shading the sprite as if it's flat. Link is 3D, and when you shade a hat like it's a pointy box, it doesn't really look like it. Using an extra shade of each colour might also help tremendously; I don't recommend using more than that, but one more would seriously help. We're not on a GBA, and we're not limited to a certain number of colours per sprite.
Lastly, the animations need a lot of work (although I'm certainly not the person to ask on that), and "flipping" which leg is lit up from the side usually isn't enough to tell the person looking at it that the legs are actually moving.
The sprites, overall, need a lot of work, but I think that you'll get there with a bit of help.