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NOT MANY COMPANIES owe a good bit of their success to flatulent chickens. Not many boast two Pink Floyd exes among their key officers. And not many list Michael Milken, the eighties junk bond czar, as a major investor. But 7th Level, a computer-game maker based in Richardson, has all this and more, and in its brief but well-publicized existence, it has been scrambling to turn the glitter--and the gas--into gold.
If you aren't a parent with kids or a young male of the species, your eyes probably glaze over at the mention of CD-ROM games. But if you fall into either of these groups, chances are you know 7th Level. Of the six titles the company has released since it was founded three years ago, the highest-profile is Monty Python's Complete Waste of Time, an homage to the British comedy series featuring outrageous video clips and loony animated sequences of flying pigs and the aforementioned flatulent chickens. To date, it has sold more than 200,000 copies--a certifiable hit in an industry where sales of 100,000 are considered good. then there's Timon and Pumbaa's Jungle Games, an arcade-style romp staring the scruffy warthog and meerkat from the big-screen hit the Lion King; released last Christmas, it has already sold nearly 200,000 copies. the success of these and other titles helped 7th Level take in net revenues of $12.2 million in 1995, triple those of 1994, and boosted the company's two public stock offerings, which raised a total of $6 million. Analysts worry about both the yo-yoing of high-tech stocks and the fact that the company is still posting net losses . ($13.8 million last year) as a result of millions spent on research and development. But they think that in 1997, 7th Level will show its first profit and take in net revenues between $50 million and $ 5 million, which could make it one of the biggest game producers in Texas--if not the biggest.
Whatever the future holds, 7th Level today occupies the middle ground between the state's best-known game producers: Origin Systems, the creator of the Wing Commander series, and id Software, the creator of the phenomenally successful Doom. Origin has three hundred employees at its Austin headquarters; 7th Level has two hundred...