Video games are home to many fantastical beasts, people, creatures, and objects imbued with great power. These can come in the guise of miscellaneous relics, armor, weapons, and more, offering a refreshing change of boons to those that seize them and the power within.
Some artifacts hold more power than others, which can also come with dangers to those who possess them, as their power is not meant to be wielded by mortal hands, or comes with a price that demands to be paid.
8 El Dorado - Uncharted: Drake's Fortune
The first installment of the Uncharted game saw the franchise's main character Nathan Drake on the road to discovering El Dorado, a place from myths and legends in the writings of his ancestor's journals. Embarking on a dangerous adventure full of peril following in his ancestor's footsteps, Drake soon uncovers the truth: El Dorado is not a place, but an object.
The object in question is a regal golden sarcophagus that would certainly fetch a pretty penny, but it has a price of its own on any who would open it--unleashing a curse upon humans to transform them into crazed zombies with a mind only for violence and bloodshed. All that glitters is not gold.
7 Auriel's Bow - The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim
One of Skyrim's most powerful artifacts is also one of its most powerful weapons: Auriel's Bow. This beautiful bow can be found in the Inner Sanctum within the Forgotten Vale, completing the quest "Touching the Sky."
Dappled in golden light, the bow comes equipped with magical properties. Boasting a faster firing rate than ordinary bows, it also deals 20 points of sun damage in addition to the 13 base damage output. What's more, this bow is the bane of the undead, as the sun damage triples when an undead is shot by an arrow fired from this bow. Just one single shot can deal an impressive total of 73 points of damage, which would prove fatal to most enemies.
6 Majora's Mask - The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask
Perhaps the darkest entry in The Legend of Zelda franchise, Majora's Mask involves cursed masks, horrifying transformations, and the ever-looming threat of the impending apocalypse as the smiling moon bears down on the land.
Set in a place called Termina instead of Hyrule, Link is cursed by Skull Kid to exist as a deku scrub and sets about to try and destroy the region with little regard for the inhabitants that have chosen not to evacuate. Though Skull Kid was not the sole architect of the apocalypse plan, as he was influenced by the Majora's Mask, which is said to be a sentient mask that bestows wickedness and power on its wearer and has no qualms with bloodshed and havoc.
5 Dark Crystal - Final Fantasy
Possessed by the evil villain Garland in the original Final Fantasy, the Dark Crystal is a powerful item, and extremely dangerous when in the wrong hands. Though its first appearance never explicitly states the powers held within the shadowy facets of this crystal, it holds the power to traverse through time, a fact revealed in a game released twenty years down the line.
This power allows Garland to travel backwards in time and become Chaos, the final boss of the game. As the name suggests, Chaos is a demonic creature ready to wreak havoc upon the world, with the ability to create time loops at his gnarled fingertips. But Garland/Chaos isn't the sole holder of the Dark Crystal, as it appears in multiple entries in the Final Fantasy series, and becomes an object sought out by both heroes and villains alike, though their motives greatly differ.
4 The Master Sword - The Legend Of Zelda
The Master Sword is the most famous magical sword in the history of gaming, coming to mind when confronted with the question about the most famous weapons in gaming. But the Master Sword is not just another blade--it holds great power within. Across every entry in the franchise, the Master Sword maintains its iconic appearance with the blue hilt and is often drawn from a stone in the middle of a forest, not too dissimilar to the Sword in the Stone from Arthurian legends.
The Master Sword is the ultimate weapon Link needs in order to defeat Ganon and save Hyrule, bringing damage and even magical properties to the fight. For example, Link can hold his sword aloft in Skyward Sword to emit magical energy beams at enemies, or it can be used to traverse between the two different timelines in Ocarina of Time.
3 Pandora's Box - God Of War
Based on the box of Greek mythology by the same name, Pandora's Box is a reoccurring artifact in the God of War series, rumored to hold the power to slay the almighty Gods within it.
After the end of the Great War against the Titans, Zeus had Hephaestus create the box to hold all great evils within. And when the box is inevitably opened in God of War, the evil that was held within is unleashed and corrupts the Gods of Mount Olympus, silently setting the stage for Kratos's brutally bloody campaign throughout the games.
2 The Triforce - The Legend Of Zelda
The Triforce is a relic of sacred origin comprised of three triangles that connect together to make one larger triangle gifted to the land of Hyrule by the three Goddesses, Din, Nayru, and Farore who were also responsible for the creation of Hyrule. Each piece represents a different quality: courage, wisdom, and power, with each separate triforce, often held by one of the three major characters in the franchise: Link, Zelda, and Ganon.
The Triforce holds great power and is what maintains the balance of the world. If anyone obtains the Triforce, it is said that they will have their wish granted regardless if their intentions are good or evil, which makes it extremely dangerous if it falls into the wrong hands, or a force for the betterment of all if placed in the right hands.
1 Frostmourne - World Of Warcraft
Perhaps the most infamous sword of all time, Frostmourne is the weapon that brought about the legendary Lich King, one of the most revered WoW expansions of all time. But Frostmourne is not just another plain sword with intricate design details. Frostmourne has a curse attached to it that affects any who dare wield it.
Frostmourne becomes equipped with the ability to drain away the life of anyone who wields the sword, or has the sword wielded against them, and slowly corrupts the one who holds it, turning even the purest hearts a deep, rotten black.