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At first glance, the house in Mounds View could pass for a den of slack.
It is inhabited by five guys in their mid-20s who have discovered the secrets of no-fuss household maintenance. It features such classic crashpad elements as posters for rock bands with apocalyptic names, pyramids of socks, bed sheets sporting Shroud of Turin-style body imprints and a crotch-sniffing dog. Video games of all descriptions lie in a lunatic tangle of wires on the floor, karate trophies fight for space on bookshelves piled with science-fiction paperbacks and there are a lot of exotic guns in the closets for the occasional stress-relieving trip to the shooting range. The lights are on all night, frequently backed by music played at World War III decibel levels and eruptions of laughter and cursing. They have transformed a spacious house in a nice, staid suburb into a two-story rec room.
Welcome to the corporate headquarters of Fenris Wolf Electronic Games, possibly the Next Big Thing in the embryonic world of CDROM entertainment.
When these game gurus speak at a designers' conference where their work is being showcased, even if they're shoeless and racoon-eyed from programming all-nighter, major players pay attention.
Their first game, "Rebel Moon" will be brought to market this fall by no less a marketing powerhouse than Creative Labs, whose ubiquitous Sound Blaster cards are the de facto PC industry standard. "Rebel Moon" will be bundled in with each new 3-D Blaster sold, beginning this fall. That could mean 600,000 units by the first quarter of '96 in an industry where 100,000 sales is a hit. Microsoft has extended feelers to Fenris Wolf, and Intel is wooing them with high-end computer booty and suits flown cross
country to meet with them. These five are front-line commandos in the battle for the hearts, minds and money of America's game fans.
Fenris Wolf was the brainchild of Theodore Beale, whose business card bears the title "Imerator" under the image of a snarling snout. (A mythological wolf from Norse mythology, Fenris has an insatiable appetite for human flesh. He will devour Odin himself at Ragnarnok, the time of apocalypse, " We kind of identify with him," Beale explained.)
Beale, at 27 the elder statesman of the group, is the...