Billboarding
A sprite is a 2D flat plane that always faces the camera. By swapping out the texture, the illusion of a 3D model can be achieved while keeping the geometry extremely simple. This strategy was very common in the early days of 3D video game development.
Mario Kart 64
Section titled “Mario Kart 64”
Mario Kart 64 makes heavy use of the billboarding technique. All of the racers in the game are actually 2D sprites whose texture is dependent on the way the racer is being steered. This was probably a necessary simplification considering the development team’s lack of experience with 3D game development and the desire for the game to support up to 4 players.
Sprites
Section titled “Sprites”The racers aren’t the only sprites in the game. Many background elements such as trees and enemies are also sprites. Some of these entities only have “front-facing” spritesheets, however the spritesheet for the boos in Banshee Boardwalk give a “360-view” of the entity.
As the camera moves around the sprite, we see different angles of the sprite “scene”. It gives the semblance of a 3D model but in reality, a 2D plane is being used and the texture is sampled in such a way to show the correct sprite.