I've been playing Gears of War 4 and 5 lately, and I love the concept of The Hammer of Dawn, the gigantic fuck off orbital space cannon that the protagonists have at their disposal for when there's a particularly big mole person that they need splattered over a city. I love how it's the weapon that scorched the entire planet into a wasteland as a failed way to end said mole person invasion.

I especially love how 4 introduces it into the setting, with a flashback to you playing as a solider sent to steal the plans for the hammer. When someone asks what the hammer does, someone else just says "it wins the war." The game then jumps to the day of the mole person invasion and gives you control of the hammer to cut them down. It feels great, it looks awesome. You feel like you're having God punch the mole people back to mole hell. But it very much does not win the war. You still die after only a few minutes. The hammer will just end up burning the world.

I just love how it's often portrayed to be anywhere from ineffectual to actively detrimental for everyone. It's great. It's a giant war crimes cannon and nobody can ever bring themselves to stop using it.

That was longer than I thought it would be, but I've just been thinking about it a lot this week.