I had an excellent article on pixel art some time ago, lemme see if I can find it over the weekend.

But, like I said you can do pre-rendered 3D sprites. You render a frame for the ground[size=9px](for tiles)[/size], characters[size=9px](for the units graphics)[/size] and/or whatever else you want/don't want and save it as a sprite/tile for use in the game. ala Donkey Kong Country [size=9px](they were the first to put this into practice)[/size]


EDIT: Found the site. Here it is: http://tsugumo.swoo.net/tutorial/