Imagine terrorists have taken over a factory belonging to, say, Compaq Computers. It's your job to take back the factory, running with guns ablaze past corporate logos in hallways designed so you cannot avoid the brand emblazoned on their walls.

 "You run into the computer factory and the new line [of computers, which the company is trying to promote] is coming off the assembly line. They're being spray-painted, all of that sort of thing," he said. "It's the product placement, it's the brand integration, and it doesn't seem like a disparate experience where you know that you're having an ad shoved in your face."

The scenario is fictional, since Threewave has not signed a deal with Compaq, but the concept is not. Programmers in Mr. Irish's fast-growing downtown Vancouver office -- in which graphic novel- style storyboards compete for space with large flat-screen monitors -- have developed an identical fully branded game for another computer manufacturer, which he can't name until it is released.