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The Aparoids, the main enemy forces of Star Fox: Assault, are in some ways a homage to the Galaxians from the Galaxian/Galaga franchise, a fixed shooter series about fighting off invading alien insects that was originally created by Namco (now Bandai Namco), who also developed Star Fox: Assault. One of Assault's producers from Namco, Tsuyoshi Kobayashi, admitted to this in an interview with Nintendo Official Magazine. Something similar for me was how I thought since this was a collaboration with Namco, the makers of "Galaxian"/"Galaga", I decided to bring insects to the image of the enemy. (Laughs).
One could say that Star Fox: Assault's story of the Aparoids (which more or less act as expys of the Galaxians) invading the Lylat System could be a meta reference to the fact that this game was a Nintendo x Namco crossover and collaboration, which is also emphasized with the collectable Special Flags (which have appeared in several Namco developed games) found throughout Assault's campaign, as well as there being unlockable old Namco arcade games like Xevious, Battle City, and Star Luster, at least in the Japanese version (only Xevious was available in the western versions of the game).