From Gears of War

"Uh... Razorhail?! Not so good for my life expectancy."

— Damon Baird

Razorhail is a deadly weather phenomenon unique to Sera. As its name implies, it is sharp, blade-like hail. Fragments range from tiny chips barely an inch across to shards half a foot or more in length. Razorhail chunks are often sharp large, heavy chunks of ice that pummel, lacerate, and can cause death to those caught out in the storm. While short exposure is survivable, inflicting damage at an ever-increasing rate, rushing out into a Razorhail storm is fatal. Appearances of Razorhail are usually brief - occurring only during violent storms. Razorhail cannot be defeated, so a player's only options are to either take shelter from it, although a Boom Shield can be used as an umbrella against the deadly shards.

[edit] Behind the Scenes

Razorhail serves a similar function in Gears of War 2 to the one performed by the Kryll from Gears of War: it creates a gameplay mechanic limiting the player's movement and enemy movement to specific areas and forces the player to find ways to create or find safe pathways through a completely inhospitable environment.

Razorhail makes a prominent appearance in Gears of War 2 in Act 3: Gathering Storm. Damon Baird and Augustus Cole are forced from their original position (guarding the Centaur Tank) by an oncoming Razorhail storm, which proceeds to make for a difficult challenge for Marcus Fenix and Dominic Santiago as they move to regroup with the rest of the squad and causes minor damage to the Centaur, which Damon has to fix.

There is also a Multiplayer map known as Hail, which features periodic Razorhail storms, unless playing on Horde Mode (which has no hail).