Homestuck/Characters/Sprites

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

Maimed Clown. Undead Cat. Impaled Crow. Omnipotent Dog. These four shall be held in reverence for the eternity they serve to cut short.

Sprites are a game construct provided to all players of Sburb, intended to give the player a Spirit Advisor in the form of someone/something they know and trust. They are initially generated as a formless glowing orb known as the Kernelsprite, and are given form by the player; this is achieved by "prototyping" an object, or putting an object into into the sprite, at which point the sprite takes on the form, attributes, powers and (if it is/was alive) mind and personality of the object.

Every sprite can be prototyped twice, which adds the properties of the second object onto the sprite and, if the second object is/was alive, overwrites the personality of the first object with that of the second. Prototyping twice is optional and can be done both before and after entry into the Medium, but a sprite must be prototyped at least once before entering if the session is to be successful. Whenever a prototyped sprite enters the Medium, its properties are transferred into the "prototyping" towers of Prospit and Derse, which shares the properties among the game's Mooks and the Requisite Royal Regalia wielded by the White and Black Kings and Queens[1]. Additionally, the prototyping allows the Skaia Battlefield to develop, evolve and become ready to bear the universe the players are destined to create. As such, if there are no pre-entry prototypings, the game becomes Unwinnable.

All the sprites are examples of:

  • Back From the Dead: A sprite uses the form and memories of a deceased individual to create a trustworthy companion for its owner. Based off the ultimate fate of Jadesprite, it seems that prototyping a corpse as sprite actually brings it back to life, as Jadesprite serves as a living dream self for Jade's ascension to God Tier.
  • Color Coded for Your Convenience: Their colors are close to that of their player's.
    • Later, we find out that their colors are the same that each player's corresponding Post-Scratch counterpart uses. The sole exception is Jaspersprite, who is slightly purpler than Roxy.
  • Crutch Character: Sprites protect a young, inexperienced player from harm when they first enter the game, but a player must eventually leave them behind. It is possible to bring them back later, but as equals rather than betters. And it seems in normal sessions they ultimately die as well.
  • Exposition Fairy: To a limited extent. It seems like this is a role they share with a land's Consorts in a normal session, but the trolls largely take over the exposition role by Acts 4 & 5.
    • Nannasprite and Jaspersprite introduce John and Rose to their myth arcs early on.
    • Davesprite subverts the trope. He doesn't say much about Dave's arc to him on camera and actually goes and takes care of some of it himself behind the scenes when it doesn't look like Dave is going to.
    • Jadesprite averts it entirely by being completely useless; Tavrisprite averts it by being Driven to Suicide immediately.
  • Metamorphosis: All kernelsprites can be prototyped twice. The first time sets a form, and the second melds new traits into the sprite. As mentioned above, prototypings done before entry also applies to the monarchs and, in Mix-and-Match Critters form, to the imps and other monsters of the game.
    • If both prototypings are done at once, the result is a hodgepodge of traits from both.
  • Mon: Type 2, at least until no longer needed as a Crutch Character. Once a player climbs their echeladder, they get a medallion which can be used to summon them, and the by time characters are ready for God Tier, they wander off and fade into the background, having served their purpose as a guide.
  • New Powers as the Plot Demands: The powers of a kernelsprite are ill-defined, but one thing they seem to universally have is a beam attack, often augmented by summoned objects. A few have displayed other random powers at opportune times. Nannasprite can act as The Medic, Jaspersprite has Tentacle Ropes, and Davesprite ...can deface posters from a distance.
  • Out of Focus: You can count the appearances of sprites in later acts on one hand and have fingers left over. Nannasprite is the only one who gets any significant amount of screentime.
  • Our Ghosts Are Different: They are game constructs rather than proper ghosts (except for the ones who were ghosts to start with). It's notable that they show more properties of traditional ghosts than actual ghosts in the setting do.
  • Spirit Advisor: They explain what the kids must do on their journey...
    • Cryptic Conversation: ...to a point. Subverted with Davesprite, who thinks that's all nonsense and offers to answer any questions Dave wants to know.

Pre Scratch Human Session Sprites

Nannasprite / Nanna Egbert

John Egbert's sprite. Rose Tier-1 prototyped it with a giant maimed harlequin doll. After entering, the Harlequinsprite accidentally Tier-2 prototyped itself by knocking over the urn containing the ashes of Nanna, John's grandmother who was killed thirteen years earlier in the meteor collision which brought John to Earth. While certainly wise and helpful, she does strongly lean toward pranking everyone and everything.

Her Post-Scratch incarnation is Jane Crocker.

Jaspersprite / Jaspers / Frigglish

Rose Lalonde's sprite, and the only sprite double-prototyped before a player's entry. It was prototyped with the taxidermied corpse of Jaspers, her long-dead cat from childhood, and the eldritch princess doll Rose made from one of Mom's passive-aggressive gifts. He doesn't know much, because he's a cat.

During his time as a cat, he disappeared from Rose's life due to Roxy's fooling around with her appearifier. She then adopted him, naming him Frigglish after one of her mother's wizard characters. She was very attached to him, until she accidentally killed him during an appearifier experiment.

  • Cat Smile: Not only does Jaspers have a cat face, the :3 shows up in his Spritelogs.
  • Chekhov's Boomerang: Turns out his disappearance meant he traveled to the Post-Scratch Universe, where he spent time with Roxy, until he died in an accident involving a book, a teleporter, a suspicious perfectly white cat, and a misguided notion to prove something.
  • Cloudcuckoolander: Being just a cat and having all that Sprite knowledge dumped on him makes him especially hard to understand.
  • Foregone Conclusion: Between his Meaningful Rename, the fact that he was a corpse when he returned to the Beta timeline, and Roxy's freakout over the successful Appearification of the unabridged Sassacre's, his demise could be seen coming a mile off.
  • Freudian Couch: Young Rose, being a fan of psychiatry, often held psychoanalysis sessions with Jaspers while he was alive.
  • Half-Dressed Cartoon Animal
  • Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: Jaspersprite is one of the tallest kernelsprites shown, following only Becsprite when he trails his long ghost tail behind him. Compared him to Rose here.
  • Leitmotif: The aptly-named Chorale for Jaspers, though it was bootstrapped into being one of Rose's themes.
  • Meaningful Rename: Roxy names him Frigglish, after a wizard character in her mother's book series. Said wizard got crushed by a giant book.
  • Mentor Mascot: Subverted. Jaspers was Rose's pet first and doesn't consider it his place to tell her what to do, i.e. to follow her quest, and when he does suggest things to her, he's too childlike to explain it properly. This is a factor in why she goes Off the Rails.
  • Mix-and-Match Critters: After being prototyped with the Eldritch Princess, he gains tentacles while retaining a cat face.
  • Morality Pet: For Rose. He's one of the few people she openly shows warmth towards. When she leaves him behind, it's a subtle but important step onto the path which leads her to becoming a pawn of Doc Scratch and the Horrorterrors.
    • Likewise with Roxy, who immediately freaks out when he dies.
  • Posthumous Character: For the first three acts, at least.
  • Put on a Bus: Rose gave him her old laptop and let him go off and chat with Nepeta to his heart's content.
    • The Bus Came Back: We get to see one of those conversations near the end of Act 5. Then afterwards he was taken with Rose's land by Jade. He appears in the Post-Scratch Universe in Act 6, taken from before he became a sprite and now his sprite form has been seen on the battleship with John and Jade.
  • Replacement Scrappy: In Universe usage; he was never as fond of Roxy as he was of Rose, though he grew to love her in time.
  • Talking Animal: After being prototyped.
    • Rose also reveals that non-sprite Jaspers told her a "stunning SECRET" just before he disappeared. Then subverted when the "stunning SECRET" was later revealed to be "MEOW", and doubly subverted when said "MEOW" unlocked strings of mismatched letters M, E, O, and W in Rose's subconscious that connect with the base pairs G, C, A, and T. When the combination of pairs is spliced into another creature's DNA, it will give them powers just short of a GOD.
  • Wholesome Crossdresser: Ends up being prototyped with Rose's Kernelsprite, which in turn is then prototyped with Rose's Eldritch Princess doll, creating Eldritch Princess Jaspers.
  • Wingding Eyes: As a corpse.

Davesprite

Dave Strider's sprite. In one of her fits of dream-cloudcuckoolandery, Jade Tier-1 prototyped with a recently-slain crow accidentally impaled with a katana. Shortly after Dave's entry, another Dave from a Bad Future travelled back in time to cause things to happen properly, and then Tier-2 prototyped himself. Davesprite is obviously quite similar to Dave in personality, but having spent four months dealing with the deaths of his friends in his Bad Future made him slightly more emotional than Dave.

In the Bad Future whence he came, future-Dave had Tier-2 prototyped Lil Cal instead, an act he perpetually regretted. In the alpha reality, Dave was about to do that, but the arrival of future-Dave prevented that from happening.

Tropes which apply specifically to Calsprite:

Jadesprite

Jade Harley's sprite, and the source of both the problems facing the kids and trolls and one of their solutions to the problems. While Jade was distracted trying to enter the Medium, Becquerel Tier-1 prototyped himself into the sprite, unintentionally giving Jack Noir and all the Underlings access to his Reality Warper powers. After entry, Jade Tier-2 prototyped her deceased dream self's taxidermied body, but it initially backfired - the revived Jadesprite was thoroughly distraught about being pulled out of the afterlife and proved to be little more than a blubbering goddamn pansy.

Later, when Jade ascended to the God Tiers, she effectively merged with Jadesprite, gaining all of her powers and knowledge. See Jade's section here for tropes, as Jadesprite and Jade are virtually one and the same. For tropes applying specifically to Becsprite, see Becquerel's section here.

Troll Session Sprites

Lususprites

With the exception of Aradia, all of the trolls Tier-1 prototyped their sprites with the recently-slain corpses of their lusi, their guardians prior to entry and did not Tier-2 prototype. For tropes relating to the Lususprites, see the Lusi section here.

Aradiasprite

Alone amongst the trolls, Aradia Megido did not prototype her lusus, as its corpse was unavailable. Instead, she Tier-1 prototyped her sprite with the desecrated head of the blue Frog Temple, an act which proved critical to the trolls' success. After entering, she tier-2 prototyped it with her own ghost, thus reviving herself and giving herself access to all the knowledge sprites possess (among other things); to better facilitate playing the game, she later possessed an Aradiabot constructed by Equius. When Aradia ascended to the God Tiers, Aradiasprite "died" and her robot body exploded as her consciousness was transferred to her new fully-alive God Tier body.

For tropes relating to Aradiasprite, please see Aradia's section here.

Post Scratch Human Session Sprites

Tavrisprite

Jane Crocker's sprite. Prototyped post-entry like all the Kernelsprites of the B2 universe will be, it's the product of Gamzee prototyping the corpses of Tavros and Vriska. They were prototyped at the same time, so Tier-1 and Tier-2 are indistinct. It exploded shortly after its creation, splitting itself back into Vriska and Tavros in the afterlife.

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  1. ↑ which can be used by an Prospitian or Dersite should they get ahold of them, which is where the problems with Jack Noir begin
  2. ↑ Jade did something with her powers to go through the wall in the scene linked above, so no clear answer there.
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