Magic Weapons.... Do you have something slightly more magical?

A month ago, whilst sequestered in the Edward’s Think tank, we stumbled upon the topic of Magic and how it is depicted in Novels and games. Since one was spawned by the other it was strange to note how different the two are.

In Novels and even movies, magic weapons are things of legend. In the Lord of the rings trilogy you have Glamdring, Orcist, Sting and Narsil, weapons who’s names are known throughout the land ( Though how three of them ended up in the same troll lair is beyond me) they are feared and respected... In Games... not so much. A magic weapon is merely one of a zillion that seem to lay under every nock and cranny through out the world, collecting dust on shelves in weapons shops.

A Magic weapon in literature is like the signature of the hero, when he draws it, the reader says to himself “Okay... The can has been opened mr Bad Guy”. How would it have been if Drizzt had tossed Icingdeath and the twinkle sword to the curb because Schmuckbanger offered +1 more endurance?

In games (specially the electronic medium), the fact that a weapon is “magical” means nothing... Its how magical or worse yet... how rare it is. Its like saying “Yes I have Magical swords holding up my book shelves... but that one over there, they only made 5 or 6 of those”. In most games you discard your sword nearly every other quest or mission as you are handed a slightly better one as a reward. Magic is so prevalent that the guy standing along the road is going to give you a magic sword just for killing a few pigs.

I understand why the magic factories of the great MMORPG worlds worked overtime to produce a glut of Magical Armor’s, Weapons, Staves, Robes, Totems, Necklaces, Ring’s and such... But I would prefer magic items to be “rare” or wondrous. When you pull that sword that you recovered from the tomb of _______ , your foes take a step back and say “Holy Crap!! That is the sword of _______” as fear grips their very guts.I know that people generally love their games the way they are and that a game that makes Magic Weapons rare is probably not going to have a issue with having enough servers...but in my imaginary world... things will be different.