based on the Nostromo space tug from Alien, while several of the enemies are homages to starships from popular science fiction works, including Star Wars, UFO and Battlestar Galactica. Concept art for the Andor Genesis mothership depicted it with a more circular design, nicknamed "Gofuru" due to it bearing resemblance to gofuru cookies. The design was changed to instead be the shape of an octagon as the hardware had difficulty displaying round objects, while still keeping much of its key features such as the central core and blaster receptacles. Endō created a fictional language during development called "Xevian" that he used to name each of the enemies. The blaster target for the Solvalou, which flashes red when over an enemy to signal the player to fire a bomb at it, was added to make it easier to destroy ground targets. While programming it, Endō thought it would be interesting to have the blaster target flash over a blank space where an enemy wasn't present, leading to the addition of the Sol citadels. Namco executives expressed displeasure towards the idea, with Endō instead claiming they were simply a bug in the program and leaving them in the code. The Special Flag icons from Rally-X were added due to Endō being a fan of the game. The game was originally named Zevious, the "X" being added to make it sound more exotic and mysterious, with the metallic logo paying homage to the pinball table Xenon. Location testing for Xevious was conducted in December 1982, and the game was released in Japan in January 1983. In the months following, Atari, Inc. acquired the rights to manufacture and distribute it in North America, advertising it as "the Atari game you can't play at home". Ports The first home conversion of Xevious was for the Family Computer in 1984, being one of the system's first third-party titles. Copies of the game sold out within three days, with Namco's telephone lines being flooded with calls from players in need of gameplay tips. The Famicom version was released internationally for the Nintendo Entertainment System by Bandai, renamed Xevious: The Avenger in North America. A version for the Apple II was released the same year. A Commodore 64 version was published by U.S. Gold and released in 1987. Atari, Inc. published an Atari 7800 version as one of the system's 13 launch titles in 1984. The Famicom version