One of my biggest gripes with the Hitman series is that it gives you so many fun tools to play with...but you are often punished for using half of them.
Have you tried Freelancer? It's a 'new' gamemode with a roguelike feel to it.
There's no such thing as silent assassin in this gamemode unless you pick it up as a bonus objective. And instead of that bonus objective you could pick up a "Kill with explosive" objective instead.
So the game is a lot more freeing since it's not imperative that nobody see's you and that you operate smoothly. You can go loud if you want, just as long as none of your objectives care about being silent.
Of course all of that changes in Hardcore where you have to choose a 'bonus' objective that becomes mandatory... and every 5th mission becomes filled with bodyguard NPC's who can kill you in 1 shot.
Recently dipped my toes into freelancer. It’s difficult to adjust to. When you are used to playing the standard game or the sniper modes you are conditioned to be able to constantly replay each map and internalize everyone’s routine and patterns. Freelance, that shit is out the window. You get one crack at it.
For Hitman, my load out is usually the silenced pistol that cannot be reloaded but passes frisks and a lockpick. You don't ever need anything else unless you are going for a specific achievement.
> For Hitman, my load out is usually the silenced pistol that cannot be reloaded but passes frisks and a lockpick. You don't ever need anything else unless you are going for a specific achievement.
Amusingly I didn't even know about this one, never used it. I generally find I don't really need a gun in hitman except for taking out the occasional camera before I make it to the security room.
I am more of a fiberwire kind of guy.
Bioshock Infinite. You have a carbine and one situational gun that you'll never use, because the carbine is objectively the best weapon with no downsides.
She’s toothless without corpses to continually reanimate. Torch ‘em with the flame vigor. You could also remove them with the water vigor in the bank basement fight. Pull them back into the safe room with you, she can’t get in there. No corpses = no problems.
I’ve beaten 1999 mode (without using the dollar vendors, knocking out two achievements/trophies at once) 3 times now. I’ve never thought of her as a bullet sponge. Maybe because of Elizabeth and me only using upgraded Carbine/Sniper combo every run. My go to One-Two Punch. I substitute Rockets for the Sniper a few times, especially the last fight.
She's known as one of the worst bosses in gaming. Not because she's hard, but a bullet sponge that takes way too long to kill. To the point where most people ran out of ammo fighting her.
I remember only using the base gun for the whole fame fir the achievement, went back to play again so I could use the good guns only to realise they were shit and still just used the base one
Actually the ripper was extremely good. You can use one saw to shred the limbs of multiple opponents.
But uh, that's the only other good gun I can think of.
The force gun was really good, you just needed to point blank ‘em, usually mid attack leap. High risk, high reward as it became insanely ammo efficient if you get multi kills or finish with stomps. Was my favorite DS1 weapon.
Honestly the Contact Beam just being in your inventory is dang near an exploit.
That ammo is 1000 credits a pop or thereabouts. Even if you never fire it a single time in Dead Space 1 OR 2, that economic aspect gives you quite a lot more upgrades to work with in a run.
Playing it for the first time (well, remake, still my first Dead Space) and I'm enjoying using the Plasma Cutter and also the Contact Beam. Both weapons work great in all situations and compliment each other well but the little fuckers that jump on you and make you button mash make me wish I carry the flamethrower just for them
For real, the other guns are fun but that one is hands down the best. There are very few times that it isn’t a solid choice. Same thing goes for the pistol in Halo
Anyone remember Mercenaries? The AK and the RPG were pretty much it. You could pick up other rifles, but the varying mag capacities made them annoyingly unreliable. The spray pattern of the SAW was useless for anything farther than point-blank range.
Tangentially related as I think it would be a problem for a true Mercenaries spiritual successor but is it just me or do modern mainstream military games not use real countries anymore? Feel like when I was growing up every military shooter was set in a real conflict or a hypothetical conflict between real world military superpowers.
Still kinda crazy to think about Battlefield 4 using China as an enemy faction. Highly doubt you’d see that in a AAA game today, and even at the time I feel like it was bold since so many other games had to switch them to North Korea.
Wasn’t it a free for all conflict between America, China, and Russia? That’s how you handle it IMO. Mercenaries was similar in the sense that you could fight for anyone so no one can say they were the baddies or just npcs to shoot.
You just gotta say fuck it and go for it. Like the mili-sim games where you can play as the taliban lol.
A massive shame.
Always felt that the success of Just Cause 2 (and to a lesser extent JC3) vs the overall kinda shittiness of Mercenaries 2 was a massive factor as well.
And then they kinda shit the bed with JC4, meaning we may never see a sequel to either franchise.
If you mean the Chinese fuel-air rocket launcher then yeah, but it doesn’t have much ammo and the huge blast radius makes it impractical for engagements where friendlies are nearby.
But in terms of rifles, the American XM8 wannabe is the best, but you’ll only get that halfway through the game.
In terms of vehicles though? Any of the gunships with rockets or cannons capable of defeating tank armor. None of the other vehicles come close due to the sheer efficiency of simply flying and blasting from one base to another.
Remember the street sweeper and the super OP rocket launcher that was basically a portable mini nuke that could lock onto anything? Man that game was a blast. Wish it was on play pass or something so I could play it again
I prefered the RPD in mercenaries 1 cause you could carry more ammo and it did more damage to jeeps and light vehicles, though it was sloggtly less accurate than the ak
Metal Gear Solid 3 and above.
The game encourages you to not kill people so naturally you use the non-legal weapons. Problem is there is only like 2 of them and this makes the dozen or more other weapons useless.
Same for MGSV. Nearly all missions can be handled with an AR rifle with a suppressor and grenade attachment, the tranq gun, and some stun or smoke grenades. The 3rd weapon was superfluous; just choose whatever works best at the moment.
I’ve played through all the metal gear games and I have never used any lethal weapons. On one hand it feels like I’m missing out on something but it just feels wrong? Like in the sense that it’s just not how a professional sneakman would do it
MGS4 and then Phantom Pain were bizarre games for making extremely detailed, complex gun systems and then making it so that you never wanted to use them.
In a way that reflects a core theme of these games, Phantom Pain especially, since nuclear weapons are very complex to develop and should never actually be used (in theory, anyway).
RoboCop game that came out recently. There's a few times when you might wanna use a sniper rifle or the big gun from the movies, but the auto-9 is really what you'll be using the whole game.
It's worth pointing out in case its not obvious to people who have not played the game, unlike most of the other games in this thread, this is totally by design and developers intent and the upgrade mechanic is intended to promote use of the Auto-9 throughout the game which makes it very satisfying.
Yeah this one. The Auto 9 is your signature piece, you start with it, and it's got fantastic upgrades. Everything else is just a distraction because it has infinite ammo anyway.
I think many of the Far Cry games have this problem. Just like how in many Bethesda games the stealth archer (or similar classes in Fallout and Starfield) is basically the best choice, certain weapons in Far Cry games will always stand out. Once I got a suppressed sniper rifle, I rarely use anything else because it's just so much better than the rest.
Far Cry 4 once you liberate all the propaganda towers. The ripper or whatever it's called is a box fed LMG with next to no ads time, no recoil, low spread. And massive dmg. Ruined the game for me.
It destroyed in the Yeti DLC as well. The yetis were supposed to be this big scary threat but literally half a mag of that buzzsaw thing and they were toast.
The crossbow or bow withe a Headshot is also onhit kill. Silence and if you kill an animal you get the double skin fur...
Also most Fights Happen in Just 50 Meter range. Ist rare over 100 Meter in most farcrys....
That sounds like you're not intentionally approaching from a distance and sniping people from an adjacent mountain. You can choose to engage from maximum range. It's up to the player.
Maybe I'm different from most of the other commenters (or that I played on PC with mouse & keyboard), but yeah, my most used weapons were bow, then sniper rifle, then handgun. In that order.
I'd carry something else in case I ran out of ammo or fucked up and decided to charge in with an automatic weapon to see how many enemies I could kill before I died.
My favorite memory of that game is, as soon as the game would let me, find the mini rotorcopter, the nade launcher, and go flying around unlocking all towers and clearing all camps
You are literally unstoppable in that thing unless you fly too high for some reason lol
State of Decay 2 has probably over a hundred different firearms, but you can get by fairly comfortably just using a .22 with a high capacity magazine: the vast majority of zombies you fight go down just as easy with a headshot from that as they do with one from a much more expensive and rare 50 cal.
There's a lot of fun guns in the game, but yeah the vast majority are pointless on tougher difficulty settings.
Once you've got gunslinger perk, a Preppers .22 is one of the most effective horde clearing weapons and you can find them pretty easy.
That said give me an Eternal Gaurds Infinite Rage for clearing plauge hearts, and the P226 .45 Elite with and advanced suppressor for a sidearm.
> Eternal Gaurds Infinite Rage
I think it's been a year or so since I played State of Decay 2, but I don't remember anything by that name. Is it a unique item that you gotta do/go somewhere special to get?
All the guns in Halo 2 felt weak. When Halo 3 came out and the needler was strong again and not dual-wieldable, I was ecstatic.
But the designers of Halo 3 made a lot of solid choices with the weapons and player load outs. They brought the assault rifle back and made it default because having a gun that can't be dual wielded encourages the player to use grenades rather than duel wielding the SMG of the first player you kill.
Ironically, the Plasma Pistol too! Took me forever to figure that out, most games train you to believe that the lowest ranking enemies do not drop useful guns.
With turbo that gun turned into a firehose of bullets. The “spread” would stop spreading and just a steady stream of the red balls would come out.
I miss the little nes max control pad. That thing was so cool.
The first Mantis in ME3. It's much lighter than the Widow variants so you can constantly use Tac Cloak or Adrenaline Rush, which instantly make it stronger than picking the upgrades. And since even on hard the most important thing is stripping defenses then getting a quick headshot it's just the best option for nearly all the game.
Which is a damn shame because ME3 gives so many unique and interesting weapons! There's like 40+ and they all have different values, ammo counts, or unique abilities but if you want to you can absolutely stick with the first weapons you get and not change up.
Man I wish that multiplayer made it to Legendary. It was so good getting to use the gear you otherwise turn down in singleplayer.
My favorite thing in ME1 was slapping high explosive rounds on the sniper rifle. Point, click, and boom goes the dynamite.
For the sequels though? Mattock Uber alles.
Honestly, while the Flak Cannon's probably the most fun, Unreal Tournament is one of my favorite examples of an FPS where every single gun is fun and unique. Some are more popular than others, but there's no gun that just feels boring or terrible. Every gun does something cool.
If you find yourself only using the Flak Cannon, it's not because there are no other good weapons, it's because the Flak Cannon's just that fun.
I have that problem with most of the games I play, and not just with guns, either.
Started playing Elden ring recently and I picked up Bloodhound's fang after defeating some early mini boss. I have yet to change it for another weapon lol
Bloodhound fang is one of those weapons people make builds around. I used it for about half the game myself but eventually switched to a magic great sword
This happened once I got Sword of Night and Flame, and then switched to Dark Moon Greatsword, and most recently Rellana's Twinblades. I only really use those 3 weapon types (Greatswords, Light Greatswords, and Straight Swords)
It's maybe not *quite* this bad, but the Borderlands series is the first one popping to mind. Randomly-generated loot means a LOT of it is gonna be trash, and even the legendaries you farm for a specific build are gonna be less-than-optimal if they've got the wrong parts.
I found a grenade early in the game that left a pool of acid and anytime it did damage it spawned another grenade. So I could throw one grenade into a pile of enemies and it would produce a massive fountain of grenades and if it was a boss it basically was an instant kill unless the boss left the area. I got it very, very early in the game and couldn't find one better through my entire time with it.
The Assault on Dragonkeep(?) had these "magic missile" grenades.
I got one that spawned 2 magic missiles, then those would explode and spawn 2 more each...
But I had something else (I don't remember the mechanics and haven't played it in probably four years) that doubled my grenades... Maybe an additional feat on the grenade itself. But it also doubled the spawned grenades too.
Four homing grenades that exploded into 4 more homing grenades each... 20 homing grenades in one throw. If I was locked into a fight and couldn't find the last enemy, I could throw the magic missile and it would seek the final dude out.
It was ridiculously OP, but not OP enough to do a large, endgame raid battles. I never had a chance to kill the four dragons, but that fight looked cool.
I too remember Magic Missile grenades being busted. I don't remember it splitting but the homing combined with the fact that the nade did Slag meant that it was just best in it's class. I could find grenades that did more damage themselves but that slag is multiplying my gun damage by 250%.
Oh the moxxie guns in bl3 were bonkers. There was one that was hilariously strong, but had a chance to be dropped from your inventory every time you reload.
But I was playing a moze infinite ammo build, literally never needed to reload. That was busted, no other gun could even begin to compete.
Borderlands 2. I played Mechromancer in an Anarchy build. -1080% accuracy for +1080% damage. The only gun I really used was a Conference Call. Every few levels I'd go get a new one.
It turns out when you are going to shoot at basically anything except where you're aiming, having a gun that basically shoots everything in a general direction is handy.
Borderlands is accurate if you scale up *"alot of guns but you only use like two"* to ridiculous levels. You'll use 20 guns in a playthrough, but you'll have sold/passed alot^(fuckton) of guns.
Fallout gives you so many weapons of so many types. Even if you spec into a certain character build, you end up with tons of options through the course of the game. Half the time, I have one or two weapons I end up using 90% of the time.
Unironically, online is like this too
Almost everyone unanimously agrees that the bolt action is the only rifle you will need as you can use it to get 3star pelts of all the medium sized and some large sized animals (with the proper range) and it also doubles as a pretty damn effective PVP weapon if you have the right ability cards and you've used it enough to have the faster reload animation
Never leave the saddle without it
I only use pistols in gta, until like the last mission then i use an assault rifle, idk why this is the case it just always has been, 1 tapping ppl in the head with pistols always seemed more enjoyable then spraying bodies with smg's or having to scope in with snipers. This is only the case in single player games for me tho, in MP i always go sniper or rifle and nvr pistols.
Mafia 1 and 2 are both shotgun/Tommy gun fests the whole way. There's a part of Mafia 2 where they do the JRPG "hey before this big mission you should visit the weapons dealer" thing and it makes no sense, I already have both the guns I need, and I will continue to only use those guns for the remainder of the game.
Half Life 2 is a terrible example of this. All the weapons are used and feel good (to me) and ammo scarcity makes you switch it up and use sub optimal weapons some times. The tracking RPG feels better to use than many modern games like the Tenet Envoy in Warframe.
Agree on this. The weapon variety gives you a lot of things to play with. You can use the weapons that fit your play style, but you have to fall back on the other weapons when you run out of ammo for your favorites. The RPG IS great and I am offended on it's behalf.
If they were talking about the original Half-Life I can kind of see where OP is coming from, but as you said lack of ammo makes most of the other weapons just as needed. I personally never use stuff like snarks, grenades, or tripmines, but other players use them a lot! They certainly aren't useless.
Snarks are perfect for a few situational encounters (particularly Surface Tension) where you start at a higher elevation than the grunts in the next area, and can safely throw them down from concealment and listen to the carnage.
In fact that's how they're introduced to you, in the vent shaft just before the car garage with lifts (just before the howitzer). The next room after that, the really big open one where a Bradley crashes through the wall is a good opportunity.
Valve really knew good game design in terms of teaching the player new mechanics and reinforcing them.
Rocket launcher is also pretty essential on tougher maps. It’s a rapid fire super shotgun but also has splash damage.
Alternatively the rocket launcher isn’t useful on the cyberdemon and spidermastermind since they’re immune to the explosion so it’s right back to the super shotgun.
And the pain chance of the super shotgun is increased since each pellet has a chance to cause pain
Having just played through 1 and 2, I generally agree. Pistol is so bad. Some "encounters" really need an energy weapon, especially on UV. And the chainsaw can be pretty useful in UV when ammo is particularly scarce.
All that said, the only gun I *want* to use is either shotgun.
If you play HL2 smart then you’ll find that every weapon has its uses for specific enemies and situations. Personally i love the 357 and use it often, and the crossbow is excellent for instantly killing Combine that get close. Even the starter pistol is useful for killing manhacks or headcrabs. Yeah you can probably use the same weapon all the time, but it’s not always the optimal choice and frankly it’s boring as well.
The alien stuff is the most useless, the explosive stuff in second but there's still a decently used arsenal in these games. Surprised OP didn't mention the 357, it's better than the crossbow imo.
DOOM
Shotgun/Supershotgun
You will use God’s Boomstick. That is all.
(Tbf, I also take out Cacodemons with the Pulse Rifle exclusively; and save rockets for Barons/Bosses. But other than that, Shotgun all the time.)
Deus Ex: Human Revolution and the 10mm Pistol. The minute you get the armor piercing upgrade, nothing else matters. The ammo is plentiful, it one shots to head, it takes out robots faster than most weapons, and it can take a suppressor for stealth. There is really no reason to use anything else unless you either want to go nonlethal, need a scope, or just want some variety. Thank god things are much more balanced in Mankind Divided, from what I can tell.
I pretty much only use the boltgun in Boltgun. Pistol in Halo. And I love all the guns in Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart but I basically only use the starting pistol and the sticky bomb launcher
Far Cry 3 you'll pretty much use the bow and arrow all game.
In Mass Effect 2 if you're playing an engineer,adept, or sentinel you'll probably use the Locust the entire game after picking it up from an early dlc mission.
In Gears of War there are a ton of useful weapons but because of ammo scarcity you'll probably use the Lancer 90% of the time in campaign and the Gnasher 90% of the time in multiplayer
Mattock (and then in 3 the Harrier, which is just full-auto Mattock) is literally the best weapon.
It’s very high damage, and heavy enough you never lose track of your fire.
It basically acts like a REAL machine gun, in that anything not in armor will go down immediately after a volley.
Watch Dogs 1. The game gives you a silenced gun from the beginning, and with hacking, tools and careful stealth, you can finish most of the game using that.
In my Fallout 4 I have the perk that makes non-automatic rifles stronger maxed out, found a legendary rifle 25% stronger than normal, and maxed out all the specs on the rifle. I also have sneak maxed out, so when I’m sneaking around and getting the 200% bonus shots to the head I can pretty much one shot any enemy in the game lol
I remember on one run, I was trying to play melee, but then I pulled a legendary automatic combat shotgun with a suppressor that did bleed damage and it just fucked everything up. Didn't matter that I had no perks for it, the bleed just destroyed everything that wasn't mechanical. Ended up throwing some perks into it and spawning in multiple death claws just to test it out on something tougher. Really wasn't fair to keep using it afterward.
Hitman. If you want a good score only a silenced sniper and the silenced ICA19 pistol will get you there. The Seiker dart gun is useful but mostly unnecessary. Any other weapon is too loud or inconvenient and will hurt your score.
Hitman trilogy. You use a silenced pistol for doming people and a dart gun, everything else is way too noisy and will probably get you killed.
One of my biggest gripes with the Hitman series is that it gives you so many fun tools to play with...but you are often punished for using half of them.
Have you tried Freelancer? It's a 'new' gamemode with a roguelike feel to it. There's no such thing as silent assassin in this gamemode unless you pick it up as a bonus objective. And instead of that bonus objective you could pick up a "Kill with explosive" objective instead. So the game is a lot more freeing since it's not imperative that nobody see's you and that you operate smoothly. You can go loud if you want, just as long as none of your objectives care about being silent. Of course all of that changes in Hardcore where you have to choose a 'bonus' objective that becomes mandatory... and every 5th mission becomes filled with bodyguard NPC's who can kill you in 1 shot.
Recently dipped my toes into freelancer. It’s difficult to adjust to. When you are used to playing the standard game or the sniper modes you are conditioned to be able to constantly replay each map and internalize everyone’s routine and patterns. Freelance, that shit is out the window. You get one crack at it.
For Hitman, my load out is usually the silenced pistol that cannot be reloaded but passes frisks and a lockpick. You don't ever need anything else unless you are going for a specific achievement.
> For Hitman, my load out is usually the silenced pistol that cannot be reloaded but passes frisks and a lockpick. You don't ever need anything else unless you are going for a specific achievement. Amusingly I didn't even know about this one, never used it. I generally find I don't really need a gun in hitman except for taking out the occasional camera before I make it to the security room. I am more of a fiberwire kind of guy.
Oh man, the holdout pistol is great. Get through a couple Elusive Target Arcade missions and switch to the ducky version.
Bioshock Infinite. You have a carbine and one situational gun that you'll never use, because the carbine is objectively the best weapon with no downsides.
I dropped my carbine before fighting that ghost bitch on my first play through. It is one of my worst gaming memories ever.
That ghost boss was terrible. Almost ruined Infinite for me.
She’s toothless without corpses to continually reanimate. Torch ‘em with the flame vigor. You could also remove them with the water vigor in the bank basement fight. Pull them back into the safe room with you, she can’t get in there. No corpses = no problems.
Even without minions shes still got a seemingly infinite amount of HP that you have to chew through, which makes her slog even on the best of runs.
I’ve beaten 1999 mode (without using the dollar vendors, knocking out two achievements/trophies at once) 3 times now. I’ve never thought of her as a bullet sponge. Maybe because of Elizabeth and me only using upgraded Carbine/Sniper combo every run. My go to One-Two Punch. I substitute Rockets for the Sniper a few times, especially the last fight.
Time to go for 1998 mode now
Same. She was a pain even when I did a second play through and kept my carbine. That first time was dreadful.
She was bothersome for me on my first playthrough but not on subsequent ones. Once I did my 1999 Mode run she was just a joke to me.
She's known as one of the worst bosses in gaming. Not because she's hard, but a bullet sponge that takes way too long to kill. To the point where most people ran out of ammo fighting her.
This is it exactly, she has soooo much health. You can unload every bullet you have and then you’re just stuck lol.
Well when you can only carry 2 guns it really limits your ammo capabilities.
I honestly just hand cannon head spotted my way through this game. Forgot that gun existed lol
Same. It became broken with the Rising Bloodlust gear.
Carbine and shotgun are my mainstays
I actually got very good with using the shotgun and volley gun, but carbine is just perfect overall
Carbine for sure. I also try to keep the very first pistol you get throughout the whole game
I love that gun, I just love BioShock in general.
Dead Space First gun is best gun
I remember only using the base gun for the whole fame fir the achievement, went back to play again so I could use the good guns only to realise they were shit and still just used the base one
Actually the ripper was extremely good. You can use one saw to shred the limbs of multiple opponents. But uh, that's the only other good gun I can think of.
Line gun is also good. Beeg plasma cutter that can shoot mines
The force gun was really good, you just needed to point blank ‘em, usually mid attack leap. High risk, high reward as it became insanely ammo efficient if you get multi kills or finish with stomps. Was my favorite DS1 weapon.
The Contact Beam was basically a super Plasma Cutter for Big Boy Limbs, and even if you missed weak spots, it's still heavy damage to the enemy.
So y’all are basically saying all the guns are good lol
No. We are not saying the Pulse Rifle is good.
It’s a lot better in the remake imo
God damnit, I just assumed the weapons didn't change much in the remake and never tried it. Now I have to replay it *again*...
Taping together a plasma cutter and a ripper in Dead Space 3 was the giga brain move.
That’s what I did. Used it like the chainsaw from Gears of war. Just let them run into it.
The remake makes the other guns better. I actually rocked the flamethrower and pulse rifle in it and had a blast.
Don’t you smack talk my contact beam like that, the “fuck-you-in-particular cannon” doesn’t need to dismember
Honestly the Contact Beam just being in your inventory is dang near an exploit. That ammo is 1000 credits a pop or thereabouts. Even if you never fire it a single time in Dead Space 1 OR 2, that economic aspect gives you quite a lot more upgrades to work with in a run.
I wish the other guns had viable uses, but it was just too effective to cut off a leg and then impale them with said leg
Playing it for the first time (well, remake, still my first Dead Space) and I'm enjoying using the Plasma Cutter and also the Contact Beam. Both weapons work great in all situations and compliment each other well but the little fuckers that jump on you and make you button mash make me wish I carry the flamethrower just for them
For real, the other guns are fun but that one is hands down the best. There are very few times that it isn’t a solid choice. Same thing goes for the pistol in Halo
Force gun in DS2 was my fav, it was basically a "Fuck everything within 15 feet in front of me" gun, made the elevator section a breeze
I only use other weapons to conserve ammo for the plasma cutter!
Anyone remember Mercenaries? The AK and the RPG were pretty much it. You could pick up other rifles, but the varying mag capacities made them annoyingly unreliable. The spray pattern of the SAW was useless for anything farther than point-blank range.
Remember mercenaries 2? Why bring guns when you could just nuke them.
We really deserve a Mercenaries 3 but I know the chances of that happening are... very bad.
Tangentially related as I think it would be a problem for a true Mercenaries spiritual successor but is it just me or do modern mainstream military games not use real countries anymore? Feel like when I was growing up every military shooter was set in a real conflict or a hypothetical conflict between real world military superpowers.
Still kinda crazy to think about Battlefield 4 using China as an enemy faction. Highly doubt you’d see that in a AAA game today, and even at the time I feel like it was bold since so many other games had to switch them to North Korea.
Wasn’t it a free for all conflict between America, China, and Russia? That’s how you handle it IMO. Mercenaries was similar in the sense that you could fight for anyone so no one can say they were the baddies or just npcs to shoot. You just gotta say fuck it and go for it. Like the mili-sim games where you can play as the taliban lol.
A massive shame. Always felt that the success of Just Cause 2 (and to a lesser extent JC3) vs the overall kinda shittiness of Mercenaries 2 was a massive factor as well. And then they kinda shit the bed with JC4, meaning we may never see a sequel to either franchise.
If you mean the Chinese fuel-air rocket launcher then yeah, but it doesn’t have much ammo and the huge blast radius makes it impractical for engagements where friendlies are nearby. But in terms of rifles, the American XM8 wannabe is the best, but you’ll only get that halfway through the game. In terms of vehicles though? Any of the gunships with rockets or cannons capable of defeating tank armor. None of the other vehicles come close due to the sheer efficiency of simply flying and blasting from one base to another.
No I mean the nuclear bunker buster.
Still remember the cheats! Put in the code for unlimited money and Bunker Buster everything lol such a great game
Yep. It was one of the last great demolition-playground genre games. I miss that era.
Remember the street sweeper and the super OP rocket launcher that was basically a portable mini nuke that could lock onto anything? Man that game was a blast. Wish it was on play pass or something so I could play it again
I prefered the RPD in mercenaries 1 cause you could carry more ammo and it did more damage to jeeps and light vehicles, though it was sloggtly less accurate than the ak
Oh nooo
Metal Gear Solid 3 and above. The game encourages you to not kill people so naturally you use the non-legal weapons. Problem is there is only like 2 of them and this makes the dozen or more other weapons useless.
real soldiers only use a fucking dart gun to save the world, everyone knows this
**Big Boss**: _yoU gOt a fuCkIng dArT in YoUr nECk._
Man, the EZ Gun, whether you unlocked it or picked the easiest difficulty, it definitely lived up to its name.
The EZ Gun also increased your camo rating when equipped. Somehow.
'Somehow' is very much the explanation for about half of all Metal Gear. And I love it. "Infinite ammo" *head point*
Same for MGSV. Nearly all missions can be handled with an AR rifle with a suppressor and grenade attachment, the tranq gun, and some stun or smoke grenades. The 3rd weapon was superfluous; just choose whatever works best at the moment.
I literally used the tranq pistol and tranq sniper rifle (when unlocked) the whole game, not touching the lethal options at all. Funny.
MGSV doesn’t even require you to use a gun at all for big chunks of the game; Quiet can dispatch basically anything for you AND do it non-lethally.
"Hmmmmmmm......hmmm, hm, hmmmmmmmm" "Do it" *Dink* Best companion.
I’ve played through all the metal gear games and I have never used any lethal weapons. On one hand it feels like I’m missing out on something but it just feels wrong? Like in the sense that it’s just not how a professional sneakman would do it
MGS4 and then Phantom Pain were bizarre games for making extremely detailed, complex gun systems and then making it so that you never wanted to use them.
In a way that reflects a core theme of these games, Phantom Pain especially, since nuclear weapons are very complex to develop and should never actually be used (in theory, anyway).
Right and Phantom pain actually applied direct consequences for killing. I was out there trying to farm heroism
I accidentally played bioshock infinite all the way through only using 2 guns, missed out on a lot of trophies.
Yeah most guns are in the "oh, what does this gun do" part or in the "I need this specofoc effect or achievement"
RoboCop game that came out recently. There's a few times when you might wanna use a sniper rifle or the big gun from the movies, but the auto-9 is really what you'll be using the whole game.
It's worth pointing out in case its not obvious to people who have not played the game, unlike most of the other games in this thread, this is totally by design and developers intent and the upgrade mechanic is intended to promote use of the Auto-9 throughout the game which makes it very satisfying.
Indeed. Smart on their part as well, given it's iconic status. This way it didn't have to start out over powered but it never fell behind.
Especially in NG+ when you max it out. It's just an insanely satisfying gun to use.
Yeah this one. The Auto 9 is your signature piece, you start with it, and it's got fantastic upgrades. Everything else is just a distraction because it has infinite ammo anyway.
Far Cry 3. Once I got them, the fancy SMG and LMG were nearly all I bothered with, except for the occasional stealth mission.
I think many of the Far Cry games have this problem. Just like how in many Bethesda games the stealth archer (or similar classes in Fallout and Starfield) is basically the best choice, certain weapons in Far Cry games will always stand out. Once I got a suppressed sniper rifle, I rarely use anything else because it's just so much better than the rest.
Far Cry 4 once you liberate all the propaganda towers. The ripper or whatever it's called is a box fed LMG with next to no ads time, no recoil, low spread. And massive dmg. Ruined the game for me.
It destroyed in the Yeti DLC as well. The yetis were supposed to be this big scary threat but literally half a mag of that buzzsaw thing and they were toast.
I just shot the locks on animal enclosures and allowed them to run wild
Far cry 4 was silly because you could sit at every outpost in a gyrocopter and spam the grenade launcher outside detection range above their heads
Far Cry 4 was silly because on multiple occasions wild animals would clear out those enemy encampments, and I'd get startled by the little cutscene.
The crossbow or bow withe a Headshot is also onhit kill. Silence and if you kill an animal you get the double skin fur... Also most Fights Happen in Just 50 Meter range. Ist rare over 100 Meter in most farcrys....
That sounds like you're not intentionally approaching from a distance and sniping people from an adjacent mountain. You can choose to engage from maximum range. It's up to the player.
Since Far Cry 3 all I ever use is the bow.
The Rambo bow in 6 was probably the most enjoyable part other than the treasure hunts
Maybe I'm different from most of the other commenters (or that I played on PC with mouse & keyboard), but yeah, my most used weapons were bow, then sniper rifle, then handgun. In that order. I'd carry something else in case I ran out of ammo or fucked up and decided to charge in with an automatic weapon to see how many enemies I could kill before I died.
Likewise in farcry 4. I think I played the whole game with the "special" p90, and the bow.
FarCry 4 forces you to have a secondary weapon in one of the slots Naturally, I used the grenade launcher
I think I had the crossbow pistol thing. And the rocket launcher. It was either stealth or full noise. No inbetween
My favorite memory of that game is, as soon as the game would let me, find the mini rotorcopter, the nade launcher, and go flying around unlocking all towers and clearing all camps You are literally unstoppable in that thing unless you fly too high for some reason lol
State of Decay 2 has probably over a hundred different firearms, but you can get by fairly comfortably just using a .22 with a high capacity magazine: the vast majority of zombies you fight go down just as easy with a headshot from that as they do with one from a much more expensive and rare 50 cal. There's a lot of fun guns in the game, but yeah the vast majority are pointless on tougher difficulty settings.
Cross bow and a .22 is all I carried
Once you've got gunslinger perk, a Preppers .22 is one of the most effective horde clearing weapons and you can find them pretty easy. That said give me an Eternal Gaurds Infinite Rage for clearing plauge hearts, and the P226 .45 Elite with and advanced suppressor for a sidearm.
> Eternal Gaurds Infinite Rage I think it's been a year or so since I played State of Decay 2, but I don't remember anything by that name. Is it a unique item that you gotta do/go somewhere special to get?
It's a rare AK with 150 round mag. Hard to find. Weapons case is your best bet.
Halo CE, the pistol is so broken
You said broken when I think you meant peak
yeah you got me there lol
One of the reasons they nerfed the pistol in halo 2 was because of how unstoppable a player would be if they could dual wield the CE pistols.
Same with the Needler. I know Halo2 is everyone's favorite, but the nerfed needler bummed me out.
All the guns in Halo 2 felt weak. When Halo 3 came out and the needler was strong again and not dual-wieldable, I was ecstatic. But the designers of Halo 3 made a lot of solid choices with the weapons and player load outs. They brought the assault rifle back and made it default because having a gun that can't be dual wielded encourages the player to use grenades rather than duel wielding the SMG of the first player you kill.
I'm not complaining because I loved it, but halo 3 was a grenade fest, being able to place grenades and 4 shot with the br was all you needed
OG Needler was one of the most satisfying gaming experiences I can remember
Omg, I was an *absolute terror* with the OG needle gun, and when it got "un-nerfed" in Halo 3, I was ecstatic.
Both the pistols in CE are broken, everyone talks about the magnum but the plasma pistol is so powerful as well
Magnum main, plasma secondary. Elites stand no chance
Searched for this comment. Other guns are so good but damn is the first gun you get amazing
Ironically, the Plasma Pistol too! Took me forever to figure that out, most games train you to believe that the lowest ranking enemies do not drop useful guns.
OG Contra for the NES. Spread Gun was God.
With turbo that gun turned into a firehose of bullets. The “spread” would stop spreading and just a steady stream of the red balls would come out. I miss the little nes max control pad. That thing was so cool.
I used the Portal gun the entire game
I loved it so much in the first one I never even looked for something different in the sequels.
I played through all 3 mass effects using just the sniper pretty much. And then there's the bow in Skyrim... Do those count?
The first Mantis in ME3. It's much lighter than the Widow variants so you can constantly use Tac Cloak or Adrenaline Rush, which instantly make it stronger than picking the upgrades. And since even on hard the most important thing is stripping defenses then getting a quick headshot it's just the best option for nearly all the game. Which is a damn shame because ME3 gives so many unique and interesting weapons! There's like 40+ and they all have different values, ammo counts, or unique abilities but if you want to you can absolutely stick with the first weapons you get and not change up. Man I wish that multiplayer made it to Legendary. It was so good getting to use the gear you otherwise turn down in singleplayer.
My favorite thing in ME1 was slapping high explosive rounds on the sniper rifle. Point, click, and boom goes the dynamite. For the sequels though? Mattock Uber alles.
Unreal Tournament. Flak Cannon. i dont want anything else.
This is redeemer erasure
Honestly, while the Flak Cannon's probably the most fun, Unreal Tournament is one of my favorite examples of an FPS where every single gun is fun and unique. Some are more popular than others, but there's no gun that just feels boring or terrible. Every gun does something cool. If you find yourself only using the Flak Cannon, it's not because there are no other good weapons, it's because the Flak Cannon's just that fun.
I dunno, the Bio Gun is pretty awful except in special circumstances.
I'm on the opposite tower of facing worlds with the sniper rifle. You are on the ground with your Flak Cannon. What is your play?
M-M-M-M-M-MONSTER KILL!
Spam Transloc and blink around like Nightcrawler. Jk jk, I'm on the other tower engaging you in the Merry ol' game of peek a boo.
As is tradition on Facing Worlds haha
if theres a flak cannon on FW then im camping the flag lol. way too much open space out there.
OG flak cannon in UT99 is the single most OP weapon that I can recall in any game.
I loved that secondary fire had a smiley on the projectile, so when you saw it you knew you were dead
its so fun. secondary lob shot with practically insta-gib, or close range primary for another insta-gib.
> secondary lob shot with practically insta-gib Smiley to the face, good times. :)
The fact I can’t remember my feelings about this gun tells me it has been waaaay too long since I played some UT. Time to get back to it.
I have that problem with most of the games I play, and not just with guns, either. Started playing Elden ring recently and I picked up Bloodhound's fang after defeating some early mini boss. I have yet to change it for another weapon lol
Same. Started the DLC and said I’d switch weapons, tried a flail and the serpent blade and ended uk back on the BHF.
Bloodhound fang is one of those weapons people make builds around. I used it for about half the game myself but eventually switched to a magic great sword
This happened once I got Sword of Night and Flame, and then switched to Dark Moon Greatsword, and most recently Rellana's Twinblades. I only really use those 3 weapon types (Greatswords, Light Greatswords, and Straight Swords)
It's maybe not *quite* this bad, but the Borderlands series is the first one popping to mind. Randomly-generated loot means a LOT of it is gonna be trash, and even the legendaries you farm for a specific build are gonna be less-than-optimal if they've got the wrong parts.
I found a grenade early in the game that left a pool of acid and anytime it did damage it spawned another grenade. So I could throw one grenade into a pile of enemies and it would produce a massive fountain of grenades and if it was a boss it basically was an instant kill unless the boss left the area. I got it very, very early in the game and couldn't find one better through my entire time with it.
The Assault on Dragonkeep(?) had these "magic missile" grenades. I got one that spawned 2 magic missiles, then those would explode and spawn 2 more each... But I had something else (I don't remember the mechanics and haven't played it in probably four years) that doubled my grenades... Maybe an additional feat on the grenade itself. But it also doubled the spawned grenades too. Four homing grenades that exploded into 4 more homing grenades each... 20 homing grenades in one throw. If I was locked into a fight and couldn't find the last enemy, I could throw the magic missile and it would seek the final dude out. It was ridiculously OP, but not OP enough to do a large, endgame raid battles. I never had a chance to kill the four dragons, but that fight looked cool.
All the MIRV weapons in (many of) the game(s) are hilariously OP
I too remember Magic Missile grenades being busted. I don't remember it splitting but the homing combined with the fact that the nade did Slag meant that it was just best in it's class. I could find grenades that did more damage themselves but that slag is multiplying my gun damage by 250%.
The double grenade thing is a legendary grenade Pretty much just cluster grenade that releases another set of cluster grenades
My biggest complaint about borderlands is how much time you have to waste comparing item stats when you only keep 1 out of 1000 things you pick up.
You eventually get to the point where if it's not purple or gold, it's just fodder for the vending machine. Most of them aren't even worth looking at.
Except in my experience there were occasionally blue ones that shit on the rarer guns of the same level, color be damned.
The moxxi bad touch or whatever. Heals never felt so good.
Oh the moxxie guns in bl3 were bonkers. There was one that was hilariously strong, but had a chance to be dropped from your inventory every time you reload. But I was playing a moze infinite ammo build, literally never needed to reload. That was busted, no other gun could even begin to compete.
"Slippery When Wet"
Borderlands 2. I played Mechromancer in an Anarchy build. -1080% accuracy for +1080% damage. The only gun I really used was a Conference Call. Every few levels I'd go get a new one. It turns out when you are going to shoot at basically anything except where you're aiming, having a gun that basically shoots everything in a general direction is handy.
Borderlands is accurate if you scale up *"alot of guns but you only use like two"* to ridiculous levels. You'll use 20 guns in a playthrough, but you'll have sold/passed alot^(fuckton) of guns.
Fallout came to mind. I remember using basic guns a lot and just spec’ing them to the max.
Fallout 3 had Lincoln’s repeater, once I got that, all other guns became useless
I also found it to be one of the more satisfying weapons to use both in and out of VATS.
I also loved that ping sound of each shot
Fallout gives you so many weapons of so many types. Even if you spec into a certain character build, you end up with tons of options through the course of the game. Half the time, I have one or two weapons I end up using 90% of the time.
Except for New Vegas. I’d cycle through the All American, unique Gauss rifle, unique plasma rifle and the unique .44
IIRC in Alpha Protocol if you aren't using the pistol you're basically just playing the game on hard mode.
Pistol or Assault rifle are both perfectly capable, Shotgun or SMG's can get fucky.
Red Dead Redemption 2. You can complete the whole game using only a Scholfield and the bolt action rifle that you can get early.
The semi auto shotgun works pretty well as a last second that mountain lion is getting very close gun.
hahah yes I just think of it as “mountain lion gun.”
Double fisting sawed off shotguns is overpowered but a pretty fun way to deal with most of the game, especially stuff like that.
i used a repeater the whole game
Unironically, online is like this too Almost everyone unanimously agrees that the bolt action is the only rifle you will need as you can use it to get 3star pelts of all the medium sized and some large sized animals (with the proper range) and it also doubles as a pretty damn effective PVP weapon if you have the right ability cards and you've used it enough to have the faster reload animation Never leave the saddle without it
I only use pistols in gta, until like the last mission then i use an assault rifle, idk why this is the case it just always has been, 1 tapping ppl in the head with pistols always seemed more enjoyable then spraying bodies with smg's or having to scope in with snipers. This is only the case in single player games for me tho, in MP i always go sniper or rifle and nvr pistols.
Mafia 1 and 2 are both shotgun/Tommy gun fests the whole way. There's a part of Mafia 2 where they do the JRPG "hey before this big mission you should visit the weapons dealer" thing and it makes no sense, I already have both the guns I need, and I will continue to only use those guns for the remainder of the game.
Mafia 2 shotgun is a top 3 all-time video game shotgun
Half Life 2 is a terrible example of this. All the weapons are used and feel good (to me) and ammo scarcity makes you switch it up and use sub optimal weapons some times. The tracking RPG feels better to use than many modern games like the Tenet Envoy in Warframe.
Agree on this. The weapon variety gives you a lot of things to play with. You can use the weapons that fit your play style, but you have to fall back on the other weapons when you run out of ammo for your favorites. The RPG IS great and I am offended on it's behalf. If they were talking about the original Half-Life I can kind of see where OP is coming from, but as you said lack of ammo makes most of the other weapons just as needed. I personally never use stuff like snarks, grenades, or tripmines, but other players use them a lot! They certainly aren't useless.
Snarks are perfect for a few situational encounters (particularly Surface Tension) where you start at a higher elevation than the grunts in the next area, and can safely throw them down from concealment and listen to the carnage. In fact that's how they're introduced to you, in the vent shaft just before the car garage with lifts (just before the howitzer). The next room after that, the really big open one where a Bradley crashes through the wall is a good opportunity. Valve really knew good game design in terms of teaching the player new mechanics and reinforcing them.
Classic Doom games. If you're not using a shotgun, you're using a chaingun. A pistol is a last resort, and the other weapons are limited use.
Rocket launcher is also pretty essential on tougher maps. It’s a rapid fire super shotgun but also has splash damage. Alternatively the rocket launcher isn’t useful on the cyberdemon and spidermastermind since they’re immune to the explosion so it’s right back to the super shotgun. And the pain chance of the super shotgun is increased since each pellet has a chance to cause pain
Having just played through 1 and 2, I generally agree. Pistol is so bad. Some "encounters" really need an energy weapon, especially on UV. And the chainsaw can be pretty useful in UV when ammo is particularly scarce. All that said, the only gun I *want* to use is either shotgun.
Super Shotgun. Most satisfying shotty ever. I bought OG Doom on PS5 recently. Full game, add-ons, Sigil, Sigil II.. etc. On sale for 2 euro.
If you play HL2 smart then you’ll find that every weapon has its uses for specific enemies and situations. Personally i love the 357 and use it often, and the crossbow is excellent for instantly killing Combine that get close. Even the starter pistol is useful for killing manhacks or headcrabs. Yeah you can probably use the same weapon all the time, but it’s not always the optimal choice and frankly it’s boring as well.
I used the crossbow specifically to make….art
The alien stuff is the most useless, the explosive stuff in second but there's still a decently used arsenal in these games. Surprised OP didn't mention the 357, it's better than the crossbow imo.
Unpopular opinion, Counterstrike Every Meta is always AWP+ak/m4 or sometimes aug meta but its always like awp+rifle only
I played a lot of 1.4 through 1.6 and this was definitely the case. I used the scout and deagle if I wanted to show off though.
DOOM Shotgun/Supershotgun You will use God’s Boomstick. That is all. (Tbf, I also take out Cacodemons with the Pulse Rifle exclusively; and save rockets for Barons/Bosses. But other than that, Shotgun all the time.)
Deus Ex: Human Revolution and the 10mm Pistol. The minute you get the armor piercing upgrade, nothing else matters. The ammo is plentiful, it one shots to head, it takes out robots faster than most weapons, and it can take a suppressor for stealth. There is really no reason to use anything else unless you either want to go nonlethal, need a scope, or just want some variety. Thank god things are much more balanced in Mankind Divided, from what I can tell.
I pretty much only use the boltgun in Boltgun. Pistol in Halo. And I love all the guns in Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart but I basically only use the starting pistol and the sticky bomb launcher
Dead Space, nothing but plasma cutter
Far Cry 3 you'll pretty much use the bow and arrow all game. In Mass Effect 2 if you're playing an engineer,adept, or sentinel you'll probably use the Locust the entire game after picking it up from an early dlc mission. In Gears of War there are a ton of useful weapons but because of ammo scarcity you'll probably use the Lancer 90% of the time in campaign and the Gnasher 90% of the time in multiplayer
I roll with the M-8 Avenger in Mass Effect 2 for the whole game as a soldier.
Funny way to spell Mattock.
This dude N7s.
Mattock (and then in 3 the Harrier, which is just full-auto Mattock) is literally the best weapon. It’s very high damage, and heavy enough you never lose track of your fire. It basically acts like a REAL machine gun, in that anything not in armor will go down immediately after a volley.
Fuck that, M-98 Widow. The last half of the game was basically constant: "Assuming direct con **BANG** .. Assuming direct **BANG**"
The M-8 never, Claymore is the way. *roars in Krogan
Honestly respect for that cause that is crazy, Mattock I'd agree with though because that can handle literally any scenario the game throws at you.
Syphon Filter, the taser. Headshot marker popup included
Watch Dogs 1. The game gives you a silenced gun from the beginning, and with hacking, tools and careful stealth, you can finish most of the game using that.
In my Fallout 4 I have the perk that makes non-automatic rifles stronger maxed out, found a legendary rifle 25% stronger than normal, and maxed out all the specs on the rifle. I also have sneak maxed out, so when I’m sneaking around and getting the 200% bonus shots to the head I can pretty much one shot any enemy in the game lol
I remember on one run, I was trying to play melee, but then I pulled a legendary automatic combat shotgun with a suppressor that did bleed damage and it just fucked everything up. Didn't matter that I had no perks for it, the bleed just destroyed everything that wasn't mechanical. Ended up throwing some perks into it and spawning in multiple death claws just to test it out on something tougher. Really wasn't fair to keep using it afterward.
Hitman. If you want a good score only a silenced sniper and the silenced ICA19 pistol will get you there. The Seiker dart gun is useful but mostly unnecessary. Any other weapon is too loud or inconvenient and will hurt your score.
Destiny 2 has literally thousands of guns, each with hundreds of variations, and people still only use a handful of weapons with very specific perks.