Medieval Human Demolition
Medieval Human Demolition - also called Human Demolition, the Wrecking Ball game or Last Man Standing - is a four-player inflatable where everyone climbs onto their own pedestal and swings a padded wrecking ball at the other three until one person is left standing. The base is decorated like castle stonework, and two tall brown columns arch up and meet overhead, with the ball hanging on a line from the top of the arch.
The rules take about ten seconds to explain. You stand on your pedestal, you swing the ball at the others, and you try to knock them off without coming off yourself. You can duck it, shove it away, or if you are quick, catch it and send it straight back at whoever sent it. The ball is padded, so it knocks you off balance rather than doing any damage, but staying upright on a wobbling inflatable while swinging a great padded boulder about is harder than it looks.
Setting it up
The arena is 28ft by 28ft, so roughly 8.5 metres square, and it wants flat ground with a bit of room round the edge for people to gather. It runs off an electric blower, so we either plug into a mains socket within reach or bring a generator. We can send one of our operators to run it for you, or set it up and hand it over for a responsible adult to supervise, whichever suits the event.
Who it suits and where it works
It is a big piece of kit and it pulls a crowd, which is half the point of having it. The rounds are short and people get knocked out quickly, so the queue keeps moving and there are usually spectators waiting their turn. We have taken it to council festivals, corporate fun days, school events and private parties, and it tends to suit teenagers and adults more than little ones because of the balancing and the swinging.
A lot of our work is festivals. Lucy Soal, in Community Services at East Hampshire District Council, has booked us for their festival five years running and said the activities we bring are "an absolute key element to our success and the reason that some kids keep coming back". It earns its keep at corporate days for the same reason. Chris at FIL Investment Management had our team running the activities at a three-hour event and said there "must have been 300 people coming and going during the three hours", with the staff "encouraging people to join in whenever there were spaces, which I'm pleased to say were not very often".
Other head-to-head games
If you want the same idea in a different shape, the Rock 'n' Roller Gladiator Joust puts two players on a single base that rocks and spins, and Gladiator Jousting is the straight two-player duel with pugil sticks on raised plinths. The Bungee Eliminator and Pole Jousting are two more one-on-one contests, and the Multi-Sports Arena is worth a look if you want several games going at once. We have set it up alongside the Human Table Football at festivals. The rest is on the Games and Sports & Competitive pages.
Medieval Human Demolition hire across Hampshire, Surrey, Sussex and London
We have run Monster Event Hire from our unit in Havant since 2002, and it is still the two of us, Joanne and David, with our own staff and our own kit. Nothing is sub-hired, so the person who comes out to set the arena up is one of ours. They have passed the RPII operator and supervisor exams, are first-aid trained and hold enhanced DBS certificates, which matters if you are booking for a school, a youth group or a council. The inflatable is PIPA-tagged and inspected once a year by our in-house RPII inspector, and it is built to BS EN 14960:2019. We carry £10 million public liability insurance, with the certificate and the risk assessment on request, and we hold the extra licensed-premises cover, so there is no problem running it at a pub, a club or a bar.
We cover Hampshire, Surrey, Sussex and London, including Havant, Portsmouth, Southampton, Winchester and across Surrey and West Sussex. Tell us the date, the venue and roughly how many you are expecting, and we will put a quote together.
Or call us, we're open
Sun: 10am-4pm
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We have worked with Monster for five years now, from the very first year of our event. Our festival has grown considerably since it’s first year and Monster have supported us along the way with their involvement also growing each year with the festival.
Monster have a great relationship with the young attendees of our event and it’s fair to say that the activities that they provide are an absolute key element to our success and the reason that some kids keep coming back!
I’m sure ours is not the easiest event for Monster as we’re continually changing our requirements right up until the day (and on the day!) but it is never a problem for Joanne and the team who are always able to deliver.
I can’t recommend Monster highly enough – their flexibility, positive attitude and willingness to go over and above is why we continue to use them year on year.
Many thanks
Frequently asked questions
Is the wrecking ball hard, and will it hurt to get hit?
The ball is padded, not solid. It is heavy enough to knock you off balance and tip you off your pedestal, which is the whole game, but it is soft on contact rather than hard. The base, the pedestals and the area around them are all inflatable as well, so there is nothing hard to land on when you do come off.
Can younger children play, or is it really for older kids and adults?
It works best for teenagers and adults. Younger children tend to struggle to stay upright on the pedestal and reach the ball at the same time, so they get knocked off almost straight away. If your event is mostly younger ones, tell us and we will point you at something that suits them better.
Do players have to wear the morphsuits from the photos?
No. Some of the groups in our photos took it on in matching morphsuits, a colour each, but you do not need them to play. It works just as well in whatever you turn up in, and plenty of people play it in their ordinary clothes.
