It's one of every developers' worst nightmares: pre-alpha screenshots of your game leak on an internet message board and folks respond by saying it "looks like dogshit."

But over a year later, Red Faction: Guerrilla developer Volition has found a way to turn those frowns upside-down, in the form of the "Ostrich Hammer" seen above.

Inspired by this NeoGAF post, the weapon was originally unveiled as an April Fools' gag. The overwhelmingly positive response was all the encouragement Volition needed to reveal that it's actually in the game, as an unlockable multiplayer item.

"I guess there was a plus side to having pre-alpha screenshots leaked out to the internet by mistake," Volition wrote on the game's community site.

In other words, after the game hits on June 9, players--be they on PC, PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360--can expect plenty of fowl business and ostracism when they hop online.

Please install Flash to view this Shackvideo

Shackvideo users can use the HD Stream.