Very insightful mini-chat with Mike Lamb about Renegade. Sprites all pre-shifted for walk cycles, but auto-scrolled to next character block so that the fight moves don't need to be. All 8 sprites processed/drawn in one loop (Jeez!) Standard background rectangle copy/paste for pixel clearing.

He understandably couldn't remember what was used for syncing, but it probably wasn't the stock vblank. For a game that runs buttery smooth on a stock Spectrum with all that going on, it's an amazing bit of coding!