The 50 Most Unique Firearms in Video Games

You've probably already read more than one list of "The Best Weapons in Games," so we wanted to take a fresh approach. After all, every game with a pistol's also got a shotgun, assault rifle and sniper. But you see, most lack ice beams, shoulder-mounted nukes, and electric shuriken launchers.

That's why we decided to focus on gaming's most unique weapons. Not all of these are the most powerful. Hell, not all of them are even technically guns. But whether you prefer Metroid to Quake or Final Fantasy to Halo, we've absolutely got you covered. And if you can think of a one-of-a-kind firearm that we forgot, well, you don't get a prize, but we're sure you'll berate us in the comments or on Twitter anyway. Now read on!

Singularity's main star is the TMD, a wrist-mounted swiss army knife of video game tropes that apes everything from Dead Space's stasis to Half-Life 2's gravity gun. But Singularity's weapons are no slouch, either, and the Seeker is the best of them. Hold down the trigger and you can guide each shot on its slow-mo trajectory toward enemies' unsuspecting heads or riot shield-exposed-ankles—even if you miss, the splash damage will probably blow their legs off.

Just look at that thing. It may be the most powerful revolver in the Resident Evil series, but it's the size of a shotgun. That's probably why its .50 caliber bullets can take out most enemies in a single shot.

Serious Sam isn't known for being realistic, so its full-sized, portable cannon doesn't come as a surprise. The cannonballs it fires are huge, and they'll even roll around and bounce off the walls for a while, taking down any enemies (or you) that get in their way.

We can't think of another series that lets you use futuristic mining tools instead of actual weapons, but luckily for Isaac Clark, the tools in Dead Space's arsenal are just as effective as real guns. The Plasma Cutter is the most iconic of the bunch, and one of the most useful, as well; its blades of energy can be shot vertically or horizontally for maximum necromorph dismemberment.

A game doesn't have to be a shooter to have an awesome gun in it. The star-possessed marionette Geno makes his one and only appearance in Squaresoft-developed Super Mario RPG, but he definitely makes an impression. He had guns instead of hands before it was cool, and his ultimate weapon—the Star Gun—shoots actual shooting starts instead of bullets. Make a wish, kids.

If juvenile references to erect genetalia are what get you excited about a game, Shadows of the Damned is definitely for you. It doesn't hurt that it's also a great game. The boner is a revolver named for the demon bones it uses as ammo. Also, for dicks. Go figure.

Of Borderlands' purported 17,000,000-plus possible firearms, we can't think of any that gave us more joy the first time we picked one up than a Carnage-class shotgun. They come in many, many flavors, but one thing they all had in common was that they actually shot rockets. There's no way Gearbox was ignorant of how awesome this is when they designed it; the in-game description even reads, "Holy crap! It Shoots rockets!"

Call of Duty games are known primarily for their realistic-ish take on warfare and weaponry (well, they used to be, at least). That makes the Model 1887 something of an enigma; Modern Warfare 2 multiplayer was positively plagued by run-and-gunners defying the laws of physics by sprinting around at full tilt with one of these suckers in each hand. And considering it's a lever-action shotgun from 1887, it was way too effective.

Speaking of dual-wielding shotguns, Infinity Ward might have actually taken some inspiration from Bungie's old series, Marathon, when they designed the Model 1887. They even borrowed the WSTE-M5's fancy (especially for the mid '90s) gun-twirling reload animation. You really have to see it.

The chemical thrower may seem, to the uninitiated, like your average flamethrower, but once you pick up some alternate ammo you'll be singing a different tune—as you electrify and freeze your enemies to a fine carbon powder. It does all three.

There was nothing quite like laying waste to an entire level of Unreal Tournament with the Redeemer, undoubtedly the series' most powerful weapon. That's saying something, especially when you look at the Flak Cannon, Pulse Rifle, and the rest. If you were ever lucky enough to actually find one, you were pretty much guaranteed to net a few kills with the Redeemer's enormous blast radius—usually including yourself.

In a game that focused largely on America's great and storied history, there were few thrills quite like picking up the repeating rifle of Honest Abe himself. The man freed the slaves, after all, likely with his trusty Repeater at his side. It wasn't easy to find in Fallout 3, but its combination of huge damage, retro charm and an inexplicable loogie-in-a-spittoon noise every time you fired it made it worth it.

While a crossbow isn't technically a firearm, it's definitely the most interesting weapon in Rage, and it's the only one we've ever used that fires mind control bolts that let you take control of enemies. Its repertoire of alternate ammo types also includes electric bolts (super effective against anything standing in a puddle) and dynamite bolts, which are pretty self-explanatory.

The Flailgun is like a grenade launcher, if those generally fired two grenades tethered to one another that would then wrap tightly around enemies before turning them into hot, pink mist. It can trip enemies, tie them up tight, and even cut through them like a hot boomerang through butter with its flame-powered secondary fire. Sauteed space mutant, anyone?

The Shrink Ray isn't exactly an original idea, but Duke Nukem 3D was almost definitely the first game to include one. It was perfectly in keeping with Duke's lack-of-fuck-giving to shrink down his foes to a stompable level, and he even continued the habit in Duke Nukem Forever, though we try not to mention that one if we can help it.

What's more badass than using simple bullets or fire or nukes to defeat your enemies? If you answered "tornadoes," you've probably played a Ratchet and Clank game, because seriously, who the hell would think of that? It's even better when you upgrade it to the Tempest Launcher and throw some lightning into the mix. Obviously.

You know a weapon's good when you can only pick it up one time throughout the entire game. You can't even use Killzone 2's Arc Rifle in multiplayer, or in Killzone 3 at all, despite it being wielded by specialized Helghast troops. Ammo is scarce, but when you can chain one electrically-charged shot between every enemy in spitting distance, it doesn't really matter, does it?

If Guerilla had really wanted their electri-frying Arc Rifle to stand out, they should have taken a page out of Painkiller's manual and had it shoot ninja shuriken as well. As Zero Punctuation's Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw put it, "All you really need to know is there is a gun that shoots shurikens and lightning."

It's a shame all of New Vegas's most interesting weapons, the K9000 Cyberdog included, were packed into pricey DLC nuggets. We can't help mentioning it anyway, since it's quite literally a machine gun with a dog's brain stuck in a little glass vial. It wags its "ears," barks, and sniffs out enemies before you can see or Perceive them. And it packs quite a punch, as well, firing magnum ammo and boasting a scope. Good boy.

South Park wasn't a great game by any stretch of your filthy mind, but it wasn't impossible to have some fun with it. Especially when you unlocked every weapon with a code ("FATKNACKER") (remember codes?) and went to fucking town on some mutant turkeys. The most ironic way to do so was by violently assaulting a chicken until it spewed eggs from its nethers like protein-packed grenades.

Devil May Cry's been host to some over-the-top weapons, but our favorite has got to be DMC 3's Artemis. It fires demonic pink arrows that can hit multiple targets at once or—if you're feeling extra special—you can shoot a whole bunch of 'em straight up and watch as neon fuschia death rains all around you. Ebony and Ivory ain't got shit on you, Artemis.

For a weapon with a guaranteed one-hit-kill in almost any situation, the Rail Gun can complete crap in the hands of inexperienced players. On the other hand, it let experts completely dominate. Introduced in Quake 3, it wasn't long before it completely took over competitive play, and nevermind its significant cooldown time between shots or lack of a scope. When you're good enough, all you need is one shot.

In most situations, the Hammer of Dawn is totally useless. Get it outside with clear skies and a satellite overhead, though, and it'll cause molten death to pour down from the heavens like a god's toxic cleaning solution dripping down from his giant sky-toilet. Briefly targeting an enemy is one thing, but when they start to run away and you realize you can drag the satellite beam across the ground, you'll never want to use another weapon again.

Even better than the Super Sniper Chicken is, of course, South Park's Alien Dancing Gizmo. As self-explanatory as that title is, we'll give you the rundown anyway. It's alien technology that makes your enemies dance. And dance. And dance. Then you can either run right past or throw a Canadian fart grenade at them to finish them off. That's what kind of game that was.

Unlike Goldeneye's "License to Kill" mode, which gave every weapon the ability to kill with a single bullet, getting the golden gun in normal multiplayer was actually exciting. It wasn't the easiest to use, as there was significant time between shots, but it had this sound effect that just drove us nuts. And you got ultimate bragging rights when you did actually hit someone with it.

Though Metro 2033 was a tragically underrated game, it certainly wasn't because it lacked a variety of weapons. Hands down, our favorite was the Tihar Pneumatic, one of the game's two pump-action, pressurized-air powered guns. You literally had to take a few seconds to pump it before you could bring it up to full power, but it was totally silent, and the ball bearings it fired were often lethal at close- to mid-range. It made Metro's unique stealth portions that much more tense and fun.

The whole Resistance series is loaded with unique alien weaponry, and the Mutator is one of the weirdest. It fires infectious biological goo and mist that cause poor Chimera to erupt in toxic cysts and begin fighting viciously amongst themselves before exploding. That's the gist of it, anyway.

If Super Mario RPG's Geno had guns for arms before it was cool, then FF7's Barret Wallace made it cool. When the dude lost his right forearm trying to save his home, he didn't get all whiny and depressed. He just melded a gatling gun to the flesh of his elbow. That's totally what we would do, too. Upgrades for Barret's gun-arm include a spiked cannon ball, a drill, a rocket-powered boxing glove, and "atomic scissors," whatever the hell those are.

Dead Space is another franchise known for its distinctive arsenal, largely because most of the weapons in the games are actually re-purposed mining tools. We're not sure what a deadly, spinning circular saw blade connected by gravity tether to the launcher in your hands has to do with mining, but we're not complaining, either.

Like Killzone 2's Arc Rifle, the Wunderwaffe (German for Wonder-Weapon) shoots a bolt of electricity that hops between proximal enemies and fries their brains to the consistency of runny eggs, which happens to be exactly how zombies like them. Of course, that's the difference; while Killzone's Helghast are fiendish enough, the Wunderwaffe is only available in Call of Duty's Nazi Zombies mode, in which you fight god damned Nazi Zombies. Could anything on Earth or the moon be more hated, or more fun to kill?

Another of the Ratchet and Clank series' devastatingly awesome weapons is the Rift Inducer, a gun that actually creates small-ish black holes that suck down enemies and, somehow, nothing else. We realize this makes zero sense, but it's a game about a talking Lombax and his pet robot, so shut up.

The needler may not be Halo's most powerful weapon, but if you catch an opponent running head-on toward you like an idiot, they're pretty much going to die. Plus, they'll die filled with pointy pink crystals that explode as their unique toxins combine in their bloodstream. Yeah, that's how that works (we're pretty sure).

Some will argue that Metroid Prime's Phazon Beam is actually the same as Super Metroid's Hyper Beam, when in reality the Phazon Beam is way cooler. They're both hyper-powerful endgame weapons, but where Super's Hyper beam shoots rainbows up Mother Brain's pee-hole, the Phazon fires totally nuts, radioactive-ish energy in an immensely powerful stream. The most powerful version is in the first Metroid Prime, where you actually have to be standing in a puddle of the last boss's gooey secretions to even use it.

The Fat Man, Fallout 3's shoulder-mounted nuke launcher, blew our minds pretty much to smithereens when we first picked it up, so you can imagine how we felt when we first picked up the Experimental MIRV. It's a one-of-a-kind Fat Man that fires eight miniature nuclear warheads at a time. Do the math, Einstein. Shit's crazy.

Crysis may be known primarily as the game with graphics so good your PC can't even run the title screen, but it's the weapons that kept us coming back. Primarily, the Molecular Accelerator, or MOAC, which quickly froze moisture in the air around it to shoot deadly icicles like gatling fire.

Even better was the upgraded version, the Molecular Arrestor (MOAR), which fired a continuous stream that flash-froze enemies, vehicles and pretty much everything else. You could freeze a helicopter in mid-air and watch it tumble to the ground, exploding into a million icy shards on impact.

Ever since we first saw The Fifth Element, we wanted one of those guns that Gary Oldman's character sold to those stupid Alf-looking things. Among its many features, the coolest was easily its homing bullets, which hit a tagged target no matter where Oldman aimed it.

And it was a pipe dream for us—until Resistance: Fall of Man launched alongside the PS3 and we got our hands on the Bullseye. It does exactly that—tag an enemy with the secondary fire, and every shot will go straight to it no matter where you're pointing the muzzle. 'Cause aiming is for chumps.

Do we need to tell you what it stands for? Because that should be all you need to know. The thing would obliterate anything that was on the screen when you fired it, ensuring it lived up to its name. Seriously, look it up.

The Gunblade combines two of our favorite things, so it's only natural it's so high up on the list. Nevermind that it doesn't actually shoot anything, as later versions, like one that appeared in FFXIII, actually did fire projectiles. But FFXIII kind of blew, so we're sticking with Leon's from FFVIII as the seminal example.

Ho boy did we have some fun with the laptop gun. Perfect Dark improved on Goldeneye in every way, especially the arsenal of weapons. The laptop gun was the ultimate spy tool; disguised as a computer (they were a lot bigger back then), it unfolded into a powerful machine gun. To top it off (and this is really the clincher), you could stick it on any surface and have yourself an automated turret. We knew exactly where to place it on every map for maximum carnage.

Without the Spread Shot powerup, we doubt anyone would have been able to beat the notoriously hard 2D shooter Contra. It was the only way to get shots off diagonally so you wouldn't have to enter every enemy's line of fire to take them out. Even with it, we never even came close to completing the game, but it was still the only thing that let us progress at all.

No Ratchet and Clank game would be complete without the series' obligatory change-your-enemies-into-funny-animals gun. Over the years, these have included chickens, sheep, ducks, pigs, cows, and monkeys. We're still hoping for a game that lets you use them all and enact your own twisted version of Animal Farm.

Few weapons seem so inane at first, yet turn out to be absolutely pivotal in both single player and multiplayer, as Halo's Plasma Pistol. Its single-shot plasma dots hardly register, but when you charge it up, the giant blob of hot green envy it emits will do everything from instantly fry opponents' shields to stop any vehicle in its tracks. It makes playing on Legendary a joke, and its ability to enable headshots in multiplayer has earned it a spot as one half of the dreaded "Noob Combo". Good thing not a single Grunt in the entire series knows how to use it right.

Crysis may have done it better, but Metroid gets more points for being the first. From the original NES game, the Ice Beam would stop enemies in their tracks, netting Samus some much needed breathing room and even allowing her to hop on them and access tough-to-reach areas. Almost every Metroid since, including Prime (but not its two sequels), has featured a version of the iconic weapon.

The Cerebral Bore is easily the most memorable part of the Turok series, which turned out to be quite forgettable despite combining first-person shooting with dinosaurs. Fucking that up was quite a feat, but at least we'll always remember this weapon.

It launched a tiny parasite that burrowed into enemies' heads and caused their grey matter to splatter all over the walls. It was an unprecedented level of gore for a shooter at the time, and it made us positively wet in the pants. We're sure we developed no small number of psychological issues due to this, but we've no doubt it was worth it.

Despite being one of the most recent entries on the list, the Shark-O-Matic is also one of the most deserving. How to explain—okay, remember Street Sharks? They were a quartet of totally badass sharks that lived on the streets instead of the ocean.

Although we never actually watched that piece of shit show, this is what we imagine it was like: when you shoot someone full of chum with the Shark-O-Matic, a (you guessed it) giant shark will erupt from the pavement under their feet and noisily devour them. If every game had a pre-order bonus this unquestionably awesome, those poor Gamestop employees would probably have a lot more luck.

You'd be forgiven for thinking the Scarab Gun—the giant turquoise plasma beam mounted on the front of the Covenant's quadripedal Scarab tanks—wasn't actually a usable weapon in Halo 2. It can destroy the biggest vehicles in the game in literally less than a second, so it would be much too powerful.

That's probably why Bungie put it so far out of reach and didn't even bother to dress it up with anything other than a boring-looking plasma rifle skin. Rest assured, though, that once you find it, you won't have any more trouble with those pesky aliens. If you can avoid killing yourself by accidentally shooting anything within 100 feet of yourself, that is.

The FarSight defined hacks-to-the-max back in the Perfect Dark days, when online multiplayer (and the real hacks that came along with it) were only sparkles in young console gamers' eyes.

It was the ultimate tool in multiplayer. Not only did it use magic alien thermal sensors to pinpoint opponents' locations, but it also let you simply shoot through any walls in between and take them out in one hit. We'd have entire games of hide-and-seek where one player would have the FarSight and the other four would simply run around in circles and see how long they could last.

The Gravity Gun has an obligatory spot near the top of almost any gamer's list of favorite weapons, despite the fact that it was little more than a way for Valve to show off Half-Life 2's sexy physics engine. Somehow it came to embody the iconic series just as much as Gordon's crowbar ever did, and we still can't pick something up in games like Singularity or Skyrim without thinking of that pseudo-zombie level with all the saw blades in Half-Life 2.

It's hardly even a gun at all, considering it serves no actual offensive purpose, but it's still our second favorite. Both Portal games come as close to perfect as we believe video games can, and they each only have one weapon, with one function. Somehow that translates into one and a half full-length games with millions of dedicated fans, and it's all because of the Portal Gun.

The Lancer almost lost the top spot to the Portal gun, until we remembered that it's a combination of a chainsaw and an assault rifle. Epic really struck gold with this one, and the Gears series has become one of the biggest franchises in the industry. That satisfying squelch as the saw blade rips into Locust and human alike is one of the coolest sound effects ever. And real life Lancers like the one above make us salivate, even though we'd probably only cut trees with them, too, just like Cliffy (we're pacifists at heart).

Did we miss any? Do you disagree or just think we are so stupid? Go ahead and let us know in the comments or on Twitter.