Toss away the immediate visions of winged fairies and gnomes. We’re talking pixelated beings that are nothing more than (insert gasp here) bitmap images with color. Now what a horrid idea that is, for such sprites to exist in this age of dramatically rendered, computer-generated figures. Even so, these sprites continue to show up in videogames being produced in recent days.

Unlike CG figures, sprite characters and objects can’t be made only once. (Costume changes set aside.) Should they be the sort that moves, an artist must draw a different image for every action. Run, walk, jump, turn, duck, etc. And each time the sprite is in one size and no other: Small. Very small. No bigger than your thumbnail unless you have the game blown up on the wide-screen, then maybe no bigger than your big toenail and your thumbnail combined. Sometimes the shrunken form is necessary because a game disc can’t take the weight, so to speak, already loaded with music and memory spaces and background maps and a lot of other technical things that I couldn’t come up with in a year.