10 Awesome Weapons That Actually Made Video Games Worse

There's no denying the cathartic appeal of suffering through a tricky, intense section of gameplay only to be gifted with a game-changing, God-killing piece of weaponry which significantly levels the playing field from that point onward.

The giddy thrill of unleashing Doom's BFG or firing Mario Kart's Blue Shell speaks for itself, but there are also many times where an otherwise creative or deliciously powerful weapon actually undermines a game's fundamentals.

Though these 10 weapons are all beautifully destructive and quite stunning to behold in their own rights, each nevertheless actively worked against their respective game's narrative and gameplay goals.

From comically overpowered weaponry which drained games of all their suspense, to stupid-strong weapons which totally undermined the thrill of experimentation and exploration, these weapons were, despite their badassery, ultimately more of a net negative than a positive.

That's not to say they weren't enjoyable to use in small bursts, but factoring in the entirety of what each game was supposed to be, these weapons were clearly a mistake of balance and design...

The Last of Us is an undeniable masterclass of anxiety-soaked tension and agonising suspense, but it's also fair to say that the game mitigates much of the intended stress by gifting players a massively useful weapon in its final third.

Upon reaching the game's University level, Joel comes across a homemade flamethrower, which is extremely useful at dealing with the array of infected enemies you'll encounter for the next few hours of the game.

More than anything, it makes crowd control a cakewalk: hordes of the infected can now be reduced to piles of smouldering ash with a few pumps of the flamethrower, in turn severely dialling down the game's white-knuckle terror factor.

This is especially true in the case of the gigantic boss enemies the Bloaters, which while initially intensely fierce and challenging obstacles, are rendered relatively minor inconveniences by the flamethrower.

Granted, the weapon is admittedly taken away from players for most of the game's final section, but you still have access to it for a good while before that, and it completely trivialises what should be some of The Last of Us' most gut-wrenching encounters.

For his part, the game's creative director Neil Druckmann eventually admitted that the flamethrower was actually a late addition to the game, and the team spent a lot of time debating how powerful it should be.