Games Workshop Group (often abbreviated as GW) is a British manufacturer of miniature wargames, based in Nottingham, England.

It also owns Forge World (which makes complementary specialist resin miniatures and conversion kits).

[8] However, having successfully obtained official distribution rights to Dungeons & Dragons and other TSR products in the UK, and maintaining a high profile by running games conventions, the business grew rapidly.

[9] In late 1978 Games Workshop provided the funding to co-found Citadel Miniatures in Newark-on-Trent.

[13][14] For a time Gary Gygax promoted the idea of TSR, Inc. merging with Games Workshop, until Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone backed out.

[15] The company's publishing arm also released UK reprints of American RPGs such as Call of Cthulhu, Runequest, Traveller and Middle-earth Role Playing, which were expensive to import (having previously done so for Dungeons & Dragons since 1977).

Games Workshop expanded in Europe, the US, Canada and Australia, opening new branches and organising events in each new commercial territory.

Having been acquired by private equity firm ECI Partners the company was floated on the London Stock Exchange in October 1994.

[23] In late 2009 Games Workshop issued a succession of cease and desist orders against various Internet sites it accused of violating its intellectual property generating anger and disappointment from its fan community.

The new terms and conditions restricted the sale of all Games Workshop products to within the European Economic Area.

[29][30][31] The presence of Games Workshop in the East Midlands has led the region to become the centre of the wargames industry in the UK, known as the lead belt with numerous other companies founded by former employees.

[38] In conjunction with the promotion of The Lord of the Rings film trilogy in 2001, Games Workshop acquired the rights to produce a skirmish wargame and miniatures, using the movies' production and publicity art, and information provided by the original novels by J.R.R.

Games Workshop had a strong history in boardgames development, alongside the miniatures and RPGs.

Fantasy Flight subsequently released revised editions of Talisman and of other former Games Workshop boardgames.

[159] Each Warhammer campaign has had a new codex published with the rules for special characters or "incomplete" army lists.

[173] For a brief period in the mid-1980s GW took over publication of the Fighting Fantasy magazine Warlock from Puffin Books who had produced the first 5 issues.

[174] There was also a fortnightly series called "Battle Games in Middle Earth", which came with a single or several free Lord of the Rings SBG miniatures.

[181] Games Workshop illustrators also published artbooks covering parts of their commissioned work for the company.

[183] Since 2010 Black Library has produced a monthly eBook called "Hammer and Bolter" with the focus on short stories set in the different Games Workshop universes.

[184] In the late 1980s the death metal band Bolt Thrower wrote lyrics dedicated to the Warhammer 40,000 universe and used 40k artwork on the cover of their second album, Realm of Chaos.

A fragment of D-Rok's song "Get Out of My Way" was used in the computer game "Space Hulk", published by Electronic Arts in 1992.

[187] In the early 2000s the German label Art of Perception produced a 12 part soundtrack vinyl series followed by three CD compilations.

[188] In 2009 the Singaporean death metal band, Deus Ex Machina released I, Human, which makes numerous references to the Warhammer 40,000 universe, particularly the Adeptus Mechanicus faction.

"Blood for the Blood God" was the second trailer released, and portrayed orks and Dark Angel marines fighting along with an inquisitor, much in the style of the Epic 40,000 video game cut scenes, but little information was given on this short film aside from a shot of a berserker of Khorne (available in YouTube but flagged by Games Workshop, removing the movie).

Games Workshop announced in July 2007 that they would not give permission for the film to be released because of issues between Anglo-American copyright and Continental European Droit d'auteur.

Terence Stamp, Sean Pertwee and John Hurt head the cast of voice actors.