5 Videogame Weapons You Wouldn't Want In Real Life

Games have given us some truly awe-inspiring weapons over the years. From the BFG to the Buster Sword, right down to 47's gorgeous pair of Silverballers, we are definitely in no short supply of an awesome arsenal. However, not all video game weapons are created equal; while some bleed cool, others just bleed out and die. These are the weapons that make you say, “What on earth were the developers thinking?” – the 5 video game weapons you wouldn't want in real life.

Blitzball – Final Fantasy X

Final Fantasy X has its detractors – most of all for its overly linear story, bad voice over work, and annoying characters; however, I myself really like it and think it's aged tremendously well 13 years on. However, there's one thing I find myself in complete agreement with critics on, and that's how overwhelmingly stupid the sport of blitzball is. Picture, if you would, a gigantic sphere of water where, inside, two teams battle it out to send a ball through the opposing team's goal. It's essentially a mutant cross-breed of water polo and soccer that's absolutely turgid to play; it sucked then and it sucks now. Story-wise, the game is central to life on Spira as the people have nothing else to do due to Sin, an omnipowerful destructive force. As such, two of our heroes play the game themselves, and one of them uses the ball as a weapon. It's just as insipid as it sounds. To attack, this character (Wakka, voiced ably by Futurama's John DiMaggio) will kick or hurl the ball into enemies, which does incredible massive damage. Square wanted to re-invent the archer archetype here, but in no universe is a ball a good trade-off for a bow and arrow. Even worse, the ball can be enchanted with status ailments like Silence and Stone – even in the blitzball-crazed state of Spira, I don't see how anyone can take a blitzball seriously as a weapon. Put it this way: in real life, if your mates were apprehended by burly men wielding baseball bats, and you rocked up holding a ball, saying “It's alright lads, I've got this”; would the chances of you being laughed out of there be any less than 100%?

Cole MacGrath's Electric Powers – inFamous

Granted, this one may look like an odd choice – who hasn't fantasised about having superpowers, even just for a day? However, inFamous' more gritty and realistic interpretation of what it means for one man to have all that power shows implicitly that it's not all saving kittens from trees and helping old ladies cross the road. Mr MacGrath can summon electric power, and it can take shape in any form he wants it to – as a projectile attack, as 'blades' mounted on his arms, even as a long distance “boom drop” assault. However, cool as this all sounds, there's a price to pay. Cole has to take in energy by absorbing it from electrical sources, Crank-style; be it through streetlights, generators, or cars, and doing so is no picnic. MacGrath must let it flow through his body so he can 'charge up', and from the anguished moans that he makes, one can safely surmise that a charge cycle is quite painful for him. Also, I have to believe that possessing such a power would be difficult to control – try going about your day, attempting not to fry your loved ones, or worse, avoiding painful static shocks.

Altair's Hidden Blade – Assassin's Creed

This may seem like another odd choice, but bear with me here. In the majority of Assassin's Creed games from about II onwards, the Hidden Blade is revered as an awe-inspiring murder tool that can be sheathed and unsheathed quickly, tipped with poison, and used to kill stealthily. However, many players might be more familiar with the Ezio/Connor variants, which were risk-free. There's a very clear, horrifying reason why the Altair version charts here – to use it, one of your fingers must be cut off in order to make space for the retractable blade when your hand is balled into a fist. If that wasn't painful enough, it also causes blinding pain every time the blade comes out – not dissimilar to Wolverine's adamantium claws. While I do like the idea of quiet murder, I think I'll be better off keeping my finger and using a dagger instead.

Keyblade – Kingdom Hearts

Alright, settle down – I know that the mere mention of the Kingdom Hearts series is enough to set players off either in laughter or rage. The Disney/Square crossbreed is disparaged by many as it's saccharine enough to cause diabetes, what with constant mention of heart, light, soul – all those sort of nauseating words. Yet, it boasts an incredibly tight Action RPG experience, and an enjoyable, if wacky story. The aforementioned weapon, the Keyblade, is the centrepiece of this story, which our pre-adolescent protagonist must use – and keep in the forefront of your mind that this is a sword shaped like a key – to lock all the evil forces out of each Disney world that he, Donald, and Goofy happen upon. No, this game wasn't made on drugs, but ideas like the Keyblade really do make you wonder. By nature, as a sword, it's a failure, as the base Kingdom Key model is totally blunt. This doesn't slice through the air, which means swinging it would be a real pain in the neck. Also, its design is absolutely the least intimidating thing I've ever seen. Sometimes Kingdom Hearts has a tongue-in-cheek element to it, but let's be honest: this weapon looks like something Mattel would sell to five-year-olds.

Penetrator – Saints Row series

Maybe it's just me coming over all No Sex Please, We're British, but I find something very cringeworthy about this weapon. Not that I didn't like it; after all, there's something that just makes me chuckle gleefully after whacking off mooks with an oversized rubber phallus, but in real life? Owning one of these bad boys just seems to be more trouble than it’s worth. I mean, for starters, it's massive, so where the hell does one hide it? If someone finds it, how do you explain it away? “Oh, no, it's a weapon, really, I promise!”. Also, not only does this weapon pale in comparison to something as time-tested as a cricket bat, I'm fairly certain that owning one would put you on some kind of register. This one just presents too much of a social risk to own for real.