Well, yes, it did, I even managed to copy-n-paste those aliens in my own personal mod-soup back then....
Actually there were even two transformations happening to that Ethereal Leader (if that was the name)
First it was a Ethereal 2x2 with a blue shield bubble (really nice graphics btw)
After you destroyed that it turned into a Xcom2012 inspired 4-armed 1x1 Ethereal without shield, but with a nice helmet, and then, when destroyed once again, it turned into a 1x1 blue-energy-crystal.
Of course the spawned units have to rely on built-in weapons, I don't think that equipping them like normal aliens works, but that is a minor problem.