Xenon 2: Megablast, unreleased ZX Spectrum demo

Back in 1991, I put together a tech demo for a possible conversion of Xenon 2 to the Sinclair Spectrum. The demo ran at 25 fps, with full-screen scrolling. Background graphics were fairly minimal, enough to give a sense of the game and show the scroll code working. Jason Brashill provided some nicely-detailled ship, weapon and mothership sprites, adding a bit of extra polish to the presentation.

Sadly, Mirrorsoft were not interested in moving forward with 8-bit versions of the game.

The demo was later updated to add the parallax scrolling seen in the 16-bit versions of the game. This one was a little slower and arguably looks a bit messy. I planned to send both versions to Your Sinclair magazine in an effort to publicise the project and possibly drum up enough interest for Mirrorsoft to have a change of heart. Ultimately this never happened and the project was shelved.

Thirty years on, the demos are finally getting their first public release in this video. I may publish snapshots for emulator use at a later date.

Видео Xenon 2: Megablast, unreleased ZX Spectrum demo канала Dave Spicer