This building went down in infamy after it was built and sent down to LA for Gamesday 2004. It was deemed inappropriate and was stomped to death by the staff of the LA Battle Bunker. It got the entire staff of our store a verbal thrashing for being inappropriate and not fostering the proper creativity in the hobby. It sure did make us northern Cali guys despise the ones from down south. So goes life!
No matter the sorted history I still think it was a shame that this creative ruin was destroyed.
Edit: I'd like to give a shout out to Ryan, John, Steve and Joe; those were the days guys!
Great piece! Shame about the outcome. If that's not "creative" I don't know what is. Lots of great details in there. Though I am ashamed of the staff for playing with figures with unfinished bases. ;-)
ReplyDeleteWould have worked if you'd projected what a GW store might look like 40,000 years in the future...
ReplyDeleteI think it's great. More places need to have some self deprecating humor. Don't take yourselves too seriously. It's a GAME.
ReplyDeleteof course, GW's a game company trying to sell games (and more skulls).
This is a fine example of good humor taken wrong.
I'd orginally thought this was going to be a post about GW's future. heh.
Great piece!
ReplyDeleteI even recognized Big Jim!
What an inspiring piece of scenery. A great job and a testament to how backward thinking GW is sometimes. :(
ReplyDeleteBeautiful piece of terrain, and incredibly creative. Games Workshops evil minions had no right to destroy something that clearly had so much work put into it. If anything, THEY should deserve a sound verbal thrashing. If they really wanted to claim the moral high ground, they should have returned it to you.
ReplyDeleteGreat scenery piece - you should send the pics in to the GW blog ;)
ReplyDeleteThat is awesome! Too bad some people do not have a sense of humor.
ReplyDeleteI'm flabbergasted that someone would literally destroy something that obviously took so much time and effort. Unbelievable, and very sad. Nevertheless, the pictures were preserved for history, and they look spectacular. Awesome work!
ReplyDeleteAwesome piece of work...
ReplyDeleteWow that is so Lame of GW to destroy it! Man you would think they would have a sense of humor but I guess it's all business to them sadly.
ReplyDeleteWhat a shame those guys didn't see how funny and wonderful that piece was! I would love to have something like that!
ReplyDeleteWhat kind of asshole would stomp on a work of art like that? You guys must have been mortified. They can take their notion of "proper creativity" and shove it. This is the sort of diorama you would have seen back in the glory days of mid-'80's White Dwarf. Truly a shame.
ReplyDeleteMaybe you should rebuild it as a sort of "middle finger" to them, although now those pictures will live forever out in the ether, and will be admired by a much wider audience.
Excellent. I am sure most people have felt that way about their place of employ at one time or another. Too bad the powers that be didn't see the humour in it.
ReplyDeleteWhat an awesome piece of work, and a real shame that it got smashed. As with everyone, I think that those at GW that decided to destroy it should be really ashamed of themselves.
ReplyDeleteHope you don't mind if I re-blog this.
Hilarious terrain piece! I worked at the LA bunker until 2003 and I have a good idea as to who ordered the smashing. The retail operations were ran by some real dicks back then.
ReplyDeleteEvery single GW staffer involved in destroying this awesome piece of work needs to be outed and shamed by the community.
ReplyDeleteThat was a piece of art. I cannot even imagine the kind of person who could destroy something that some one put so much work into. I mean just look at the detail....The freaking dice have all their pips. You can recognize the models on the game tables.
SHAME SHAME on all of you involved ion destroying this. You best hope you do not meet me in a dark ally.
I understand Dave Kingston is the guy behind this awesome piece being destroyed....just so the community knows.
ReplyDeleteThis piece of scenery is absolutely fantastic, and the people who destroyed it are [[self censored]].
ReplyDeleteThanks for all the comments guys, I had a feeling that the community would like the piece.
ReplyDeleteI outted nobody by name for a reason, although Stucarius nailed the ring leader.
Those SoCal guys just took 40k way too seriously, while we were laid back and enjoyed the hobby up here.
@ Strucarius & Big Jim - I knew it!
ReplyDeleteAnd yeah, they took it way too seriously, like we were supposed to be some sort of military outfit at that store. I doesn't surprise me either that it was violently destroyed instead of just throwing out in the trash, if they were that peeved over it.
I absolutely love stuff like this. This ranks right up there with MekDonalds and "The Latest Codex" models. I particularly like Marlboro man in the corner.
ReplyDeleteThose who can't laugh at themselves are just the worst sort of people - serious business and all that.
I am so stealing this idea. I used to own a store...that's where my love of the hobby developed and I am definately making it as a terrain piece now.
ReplyDeleteFor some, anything witty counts as impassable terrain.
ReplyDeleteSad to hear of such an end to something so clever.
Hey man. What a rad piece of terrain! It's disgusting that a bunch of store boys decided to trash it cause they didn't like it or respect you guys enough just to send it back. It shows a real lack of common courtesy and I can imagine the sort of environment that would have led to that. A real shame that some people don't understand their job is to help people with their hobby, inspire them and finally sell stuff. Unfortunately that seems to get lost too often. Glad you've got some photos of it. It really is a great piece with heaps of detail, I particularly like the detail of the dice.
ReplyDeleteI love it! I can see GW's concern, but c'mon, that's just awesome!
ReplyDeleteI am touched by everyone's comments!! I had a gas building the piece and working with Jim and the crew. I built it for fun, and a little outta my frustration with the corporate mentality GW was shoveling at the time. I am happy that it can live on in cyberspace and continue to inspire and remind everyone that... "it IS just a game." have fun! ~Ryan
ReplyDeleteTime to rebuild the store, jim, if for no other reason than to give a giant finger to the so cal GW guys, even if it is many years later.
ReplyDeleteHeck, I think a nationwide GW store Rubble event would be fun, :)
Hey Ryan, I am glad that you popped in! I told you that the 40k community would dig the piece!
ReplyDeleteNarceron, it is in the works my friend! I kinda like the idea of a Nationwide GW store rubble event, let me think on that one!
"For some, anything witty counts as impassable terrain."
ReplyDeleteAwesome Mike.
Im just not seeing what is WRONG with the piece that it wasn't univerally declared as awesome by all the GW stores. So odd.
ReplyDeleteoh wait Im getting it - the whip and the chains keeping people like slaves. Lame that they would get upset about that.
ReplyDeleteI just re-post this in my blog,and another colleague have done the same in his own blog.Here people are astonished with the story!
ReplyDeleteLinks:
http://descansodelescriba.blogspot.com/2011/05/alucinante.html
http://w40ktenerife.blogspot.com/2011/05/el-futuro-de-gamework-shop.html
Unfortunately some of the comments have been lost...
Greetings from Spain!
Absolutely fabu-tastic! I hate that they wrecked the terrain. No one should ever do that.
ReplyDeleteGreat job though! I'm impressed!
I also set up a post to link to this. Great work on it. Probably should not have sent it away though, best as a store joke put away when district managers showed up.
ReplyDeleteI used to work for GW also. This is an utter scream and I am amazed at the LA Bunker's actions to this work.
ReplyDeleteIt is creative, funny and was a work of love. For them to say it wasn't creative, encourages the hobby, etc...I want to know what kind of brain dead, pot smoking, hippie zombies that at working there. They should be fired for acting very unprofessional, destroying anothers work, discouraging their creative nature. Really?
I can say, there is some arseholes in GW that need to lighten up and understand it's a hobby and it is about fun! It isn't a cult for gods sake!
Now if you will excuse me, I have to pour some blood onto the alter, whip my wife until she screams for more, study my book of forbidden knowledge and then spend the rest of the eve in my lab working on my new zombie plague.
It is a sad day when even a bit of satire is considered inappropriate. Too bad the piece got destroyed. I'd say make another one and send them the photo's.
ReplyDeleteThe outcome is tragic but that just adds to the humor of the ruin.
ReplyDeleteOh, BTW I reposted it to my blog.
ReplyDeleteThis was a fantastic piece of work, I too am adding my voice to the cacophony of discontent and disgust. :(
ReplyDeleteThis sir, is the greatest thing ever.
ReplyDeleteYeah I remember that, I was actually there for the stomping, and it was Kingston, Lucky I was just a red shirt at the time so I didn't get to go to the "Meeting" after the stomping but it was still wrong. Let them take it home at least, lots of effort was put into it. But us NorCals always seemed to get in hot water whenever we went to LA Games Day. Big Jim, were you still with us when we went to visit the store and we showed em how to give a demo game? We got chewed out because we showed them up.
ReplyDeleteThis is fantastically imaginative. I think it captures the flavor of GW's product line; being somewhat caught between morbidly comical and comically morbid. If I was a GW affiliate store, this would be in my front display case. And as the manager, I would demand to have myself represented by a lovecraftian horror. I would love to see more creative works of this nature.
ReplyDeleteTop notch good sir... top notch.
ReplyDeleteInability to laugh at oneself is the first sign you're doing it wrong.
I am posting this over to my blog, it is an epic piece of work. I actually would love to do something for my FLGS here.
ReplyDelete@egrutt, yeah I was there for the scolding for out-demoing the SoCal staff, too fraking funny.
ReplyDelete@Zog and SCE thanks and I agree!
@Charles awesome send me a link.
I worked for Kingston out here on the east coast in '98-99, and the story makes total sense based on my experiences.
ReplyDeleteGreat terrain, amazing story.
Here's more of the story behind the GW terrain I built...
ReplyDeleteMy name is Ryan Hartnett and I worked for Games Worksh for a year back in the early 2000s. I built the damaged GW store with GW workers. Or store was the smallest in the cell located at Stonestown Shopping Center in Dublin/Plesanton California. It was so small it looked like a closet. But we had the BEST team and managed to be the #5 highest selling store out of the 150 stores in the US. We were an unorthodox team by GW standards and we managed to confound and confuse upper management at our success. Basically we chose to sell products our way and NOT the GW way. This was not appreciated by upper management. Our Manager David Chack had our back 100% and did what he could to protect us and "our" style of work. However over time they got to him and transferred David out of our store. In case you haven't guessed it yet, there's a sinister story behind my price of terrain. Once David was removed "they" could focus on having me removed. They hired a thug manager(who "they" got rid of later too) to come down on me in hopes of me quitting. I eventually did. The thug manager is depicted in his black shirt, whip in hand, next to the painting table. I am represented as the red shirt chained to the painting table. All of us had our roles. John, the muscular redshirt, is at the demo table. Jim at register. And Steve was notorious for disappearing on smoke breaks. The inception of my idea for terrain was spawned from my experience working for GW. It was time to build terrain for Games Day. And everything was to be sent to Southern California. I was feeling the pressure of not being wanted so I thought I'd send a message of how I felt through my work. I came up with the destroyed GW store and a...big pink strip club called "Sisters of Battle" complete with brass poles! Needless to say this wasn't appreciated by upper management. Especially the regional manager...we shall call him "Dick." The word is that Dick and his psycophants had some kind of bonfire and filmed the destruction of my little GW store. After that and the pressure I got from the thug I decided to leave GW. My experience wasn't all bad though. I met one of my very best friends there and keep in contact with them still. Jim was the one who posted these pics on his blog. And now C.J. Has found and posted them. I am so happy that my little GW store is back from the firey ashes to rise again, like a Phoenix, to be enjoyed!! I get a special satisfaction knowing that it can live on, and that it wasn't stamped out by Dick. LOL 😂