The handy spriting guide

[Forte]

It has recently come to my attention that maybe people who come here don't know what a sprite is after all. So this guide will be a constant work in progress to help people who don't know what/how/why about spriting.

So first, what is a sprite?

A sprite is any given character or moving object in a game. Basically if it moves and isn't in the background, it's a sprite. Go turn on your NES and play some Super Mario. Mario is a sprite. Goombas and Koopas are sprites. Even the pipes, flagpoles, bricks, and stage objects are sprites (actually they're defined in the game code as an object.. but you can rip them.)

So how do I make a sprite?

There are three kinds of sprites to be made.

Generic Recolors - The simplest and most commonly found sprite. This is when you take a sprite that already exists and recolor it to fit your needs. Normally the first sprite you'll ever edit is 8 bit MegaMan or maybe Sonic. I have personally never seen many people who custom make sprites from other games aside from Sonic and MegaMan. (There is the rare case though)

Your first recolor will probably be an eye stinging, bright red recolor of 8-bit MegaMan. If your first sprite is better than that, good job.

Next there's edits. This is when you take a sprite and customize it with things that you made yourself, or maybe you frankensteined it. Frankensteining is taking parts from other sprites and putting them onto another. Then, following your newly created sprite's color scheme, you recolor those parts. These often look good, at least they're better than just a shameless recolor.

Then, finally, there's custom sprites. These are sprites you made from the ground up. No editing, no recoloring, nothing. Just you, a few thousand pixels, and a mouse.

What's the best program for making sprites? Paint. Simple MS Paint. Never underestimate it's power.

Where's the best place to find official sprites?
Sprites Inc

The Spriter's Resource

Everyone else is free to add hints and personal tidbits of info if you wish. Also ask any questions you may have here.

[Death Dark]

As a note, not all things you play in a game are sprites.  There are two different kinds of games:  Sprite based, and 3d Based.

Sprite based games are fading out of mainstream little by little, but are still the easiest way of doing so.

3d based games are the more popular, more realistic games, but are very, very, very much harder to do.

Choose your doom.  I prefer 3d, since I can't sprite, but around here, spriting is the thing to do.

[Forte]

3D things are not sprites. 3D games use Models. Those are made using special programs, and as far as  I'm concerned as easier than sprites, but they look better... normally.

[Death Dark]

As a note, not all things you play in a game are sprites.  There are two different kinds of games:  Sprite based, and 3d Based.

That's what I said here.

Just as a question, Have you done any 3d models?

Sorry about the off topic, but if you've never done it, don't say it's easy.

[Forte]

I made CutMan one time as a 3D model. It was easier than making a sprite, that's for sure. He wasn't that great, But as a first time thing, he was alright.

[Sepuku.exe]

ok, how do i make it look like somebody's eyes are getting larger. as in shock. going from o.o -> O.O -> 0.0

[Forte]

Paintbrush tool is good for that, since the normal size on that is insanely huge compared to the average eye.

[Forte]

~Color Limits~

A very strange and oft-discussed aspect of spriting that confuses new spriters (and sometimes experienced ones) is the idea of color limits. For all practical purposes, such limits do not exist anymore, but, we should go over a few things about that first.

Q: Why did color limits exist?

A: In the old days of gaming, a system's graphics processor wasn't really that amazing. Think of how when you buy a computer, it has an onboard stock graphics card that has to piggyback on your RAM. Think of how bad your games look and how slow they run. Now, that's for complex games using 3D models and rendered environments, of course, but if we go back to the NES, the graphics processor included in it was not that strong, not by a long shot. The technical specifications on the NES allowed 3 colors per sprite, 64 sprites on screen, and typically, the screen could handle 25 different colors without causing the old screen flicker effect. Anyone familiar with any RockMan game will realize that it flickered quite often while playing those, since they more than tried to push the limits of the NES hardware.

Q: What does this mean?

A: Back then, and all the way up to the N64, making sprites for games required making sure that the sprites had as many colors as they could have, and not a single one over.


So, times have changed, right? We can do as we please, whenever we want, our gaming consoles and PCs of today don't even have to use any energy to display something as simple as 256 colors, much less 3 or 15 or something. And yeah, that's true. If you were to make a game that would run on a PC, or become an e-shop/xbox arcade/psn whatever game, if you used sprites, you barely have anything to worry about in terms of graphics stress. Most games made nowadays, in fact, use pre-rendered sprites, which have tons of colors on them to make them look as smooth as a 3D model. Thing about the color limits though... perhaps the only thing that can be said for it is that it's tradition.

Sure, maybe you'll make some sprites to make a rom hack with, or maybe you want to keep the authentic style of <game> when you make your fangame, maybe it was the style you were going for in a completely custom and unique game that you made yourself, but in all honesty, sprite color limits just don't exist now, unless you're in any of these situations.

For handy reference, common systems and the amount of colors per sprite:

NES: 3
SNES: 15
GB: 3
GBA: 15
Sega Master System/Game Gear: 15
Sega Genesis: 15
PSX: 15 (Note: Most PSX games were rendered 3D models, but games using sprites that were NOT prerendered typically followed this color limit. This is pretty much primarily for the RockMan X games beyond X3. )

Please note that even knowing that color limits do not exist, most spriters will bitch at you for days about having too many colors. Like I said, tradition.