loneliness and isolation, reflecting Chahi's mood at the time. He did not have the original intention of the character meeting an ally, but again described the improvisation approach led him to include the alien friend, and had included specific cinematics that showed a close up of the alien to help the player imagine this world. Later in the game's development, Chahi added laser pistols, including the one that Lester carries for several effects. The idea was influenced by the Star Wars blasters, but added depth to the gameplay by giving the player more options. He also found that repeated laser fire by the enemies helped to enunciate the rhythm of the game. Chahi would later add in the plasma ball that increased the available strategy to players. Several points in the game use elevators or teleporters to move Lester between levels; Chahi had used these instead of stairways, as it was difficult to produce proper animation for these. After 17 months of development, Chahi was only about one-third finished with the game, and realized that this rate would have been impractical. He began to take steps to simplify the development, including reusing background graphics and creating building blocks that allowed him to focus more on the game's puzzles. At the same time, he began to seek a publisher for the game. He first spoke to his former employer, Delphine Software, but also sought other distributors. One, Virgin Interactive, was favourable to Chahi's game but had suggested that he change it to a point-and-click style adventure game. Chahi had considered changing the game in line with this request but realized "the effort to do this would have been too huge, and some friends who played the game loved it." Ultimately, he accepted Delphine's offer in June 1991, and set a tentative release date in November. To meet this deadline, Chahi used storyboards to sketch out the rest of the game's plot, balancing the overall pacing of the game. One ending captured on these storyboards, but abandoned, was Lester becoming the leader of the alien world. Chahi also argued for his own cover art for the game even with the time crunch for release; he had been disappointed in cover art that was foisted on his games by previous publishers and insisted he be allowed to create it for this game. The game was finished in 1991, which inspired the game's tagline: