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Author: elwoz

Dec 29th 2012 at 11:06:10 PM

It's not ''that'' hard to defeat the safety on a RealLife nail gun if you know what you're doing, and then it ''will'' send the nails flying across the room, but not on full auto, and not with enough force or accuracy to be a practical weapon.  (I suppose it could be used for area denial -- the nails do go fast enough to be dangerous.  Just not as dangerous as a real gun.)  OrSoIHeard.

VideoGames: the original ''{{Quake}}'' replaced ''{{Doom}}'''s chain gun with a gameplay-identical "nail gun," possibly to show off the fact that it no longer had to be a HitScan weapon.

Literature: in ''[[Literature/VorkosiganSaga Diplomatic Immunity]]'', a construction worker uses an "automated hot riveter" as an ImprovisedWeapon, having systematically defeated all the safety features.  Realistically, it is inaccurate to the point of being more dangerous to bystanders than the target.  Also realistically, it doesn't ''look'' like a weapon at all, which is part of the point: the construction worker can carry it around the space habitat where the book takes place and nobody thinks anything of it.