Lets assume i want to make a platformer with character customization, meaning different armour, different head, different weapons. this wont be pixel art, more like stylized assets.

Now i have guy with a shield and weapon (separated, he can buy a new shield that has a different shape than the previous one. is there a way to create an empty model that will be animated individualy ( will include move, different attack animation for differnt weapons etc ) and then i can add different assets that will follow the animation?

its not possible to create a different sprite for every possible combination of assets

is there way to do what i discrided above? what is the workflow i need to use to achieve that result

You're probably looking for the concept of "skeletal" or "modular" animation, which you might create using packages such as Spriter or Spine amongst other options. Both packages have a video on the homepage that might help to give you an idea of how this type of workflow can be achieved.

You can of course use more traditional art software and then do all of the animation work yourself in code, but an existing package may save you some work, or if not might at least give a good idea of the possible functionality.

Does that help? :)

thanks a lot man , just what i was looking for

I did a bit of a series on this that might be helpful. It ultimately started with Creating dynamically equipable characters, that might be useful. I did a series of follow up posts about loading a 3D model to create a 2D sprite and bind weapons to bones using LibGDX if that's your thing.

great article , thanks a bunch

In simple terms the easiest way to approach this is to split the sprite down into as many small parts as possible, all items of clothing, weapons, shields etc should be different parts, and the limbs should be scalable, rotatable sprites.

You can then use rotation/scaling matrices to position and rotate the limbs, in much the same way as skeletal animation but much simpler.

I have a character like this in my game that takes up the full screen, and i went simpler still and used a sprite sheet for mouth positions and his body definition, e.g. is his hand up, or down, and is he holding a file of papers, or nothing in the other hand, etc.

I always stick to the same advice, "keep it simple"!