[4][5] The game employs 16-way scrolling[6] over a multi-coloured starfield and runs at a fast rate[7] on both the BBC Micro and Acorn Electron hardware.

The game was instead renamed Deathstar and a new title screen designed, allowing it to be released as an unofficial clone by Superior Software in 1985.

[13] An in-built cheat was discovered to have been left in the BBC version of the game and was published in the March 1989 edition of Micro User magazine.

[17][18] A similar title Mega Apocalypse, also for the BBC Micro, was due to be released by Martech Games Ltd, but was ultimately abandoned half-finished in 1988.

Users who played with this hardware would hear the speech chip say "R, R, R, I an complete" (using the letter "R" repeated for the laugh, and "an" instead of "am"), though this is not a line from the arcade original.

Roland Waddliove, writing in Electron User magazine stated that "DEATHSTAR is a super fast, all-action arcade classic", "it's the sort of game that you can't put down" and "you've got to have just one more go".