10 Weird Origins Behind Iconic Video Game Weapons

10. Gordon Freeman's Crowbar (Half-Life)

It's hard to picture the legendary Gordon Freeman without his trusty crate-smashing crowbar. That said, why did the devs decide to give their protagonist such a plain, simple melee weapon?  

Well, Gabe Newell opened up about that very choice during an hour-long documentary exploring the first game's development (documented here by PC Gamer), and it's quite something.  

According to Newell, one of the earliest priorities during Half-Life's production was ensuring that the environments reacted to your choices. In essence, he felt many game walls didn't respond to the player's actions, claiming that if he attacks a wall and it leaves no mark, "it feels like the wall is ignoring me."  

With that in mind, the devs introduced walls that showed damage when struck. They then spent a lot of time "running around like idiots smacking the wall." In Newell's own words, "When you're going around whacking a wall, a crowbar is an obvious thing to whack the wall with." And that is where the soon-to-be beloved crowbar made its debut.