The 10 Best Weapons to Craft in 'Dead Space 3'

Dead Space 3 is hardly a perfect game, but it definitely took the series in some unexpected directions, not all of which are bad. Co-op is the most obvious—and also the best—addition by far, but another one also springs to mind: the weapon crafting.

It came as a huge surprise when EA and Visceral announced that Dead Space 3 would have an advanced weapon crafting system, and many fans—ourselves included—assumed it wouldn't add much to the experience. Most crafting systems are extremely shallow, after all, offering only peripheral weapon augmentations like scopes, larger magazines, and the other standard Call of Duty attachments.

But Dead Space 3's system goes much deeper than that. It allows you to craft yourself the perfect weapon from the ground up. You start with a frame, add top and bottom racks for different types of projectile, then add the tips, which determine how those projectiles are fired. Finally, attachments add extra effects, and upgrade circuits up the gun's stats.

If that sounds a little daunting, don't worry—we thought so at first as well. But once we got the hang of it we quickly discovered a deep and rewarding system.

We don't believe we've mastered it yet, but we feel pretty confident that these ten weapons are some of the best and most fun that it's possible to make in Dead Space 3.

Blueprint or Made Up: Blueprint

Components: Survey charge with compressor, electrocution module

Attachments: Flame glaze, safety guard

The timed mines go off after five seconds, but tapping the secondary fire button triggers a bonus, and it's electric. Literally, a field of deadly electricity expands around the projectile before it even detonates. You'll want to use this as a backup for large groups of enemies, as it has no real secondary fire, and the mines are highly situational. But the safety guard protects you from splash damage, so when you do use it, you can really go to town.

Blueprint or Made Up: Made up

Components: Plasma core with compact cone dispersal, pneumatic torch with default tip

Attachments: Acid bath, damage support

Two classics combine for accurate dismemberment and crowd control all in one. The flamethrower replaces the rotator cuff on a traditional plasma cutter, but the close-range prowess it makes it worth the loss of the normal 90 degree rotation. And the compact cone makes the plasma cutter extra wide. Cut off limbs from a distance, then roast 'em at point-blank. The attachments add acid damage and increased damage overall—what's not to love?

Blueprint or Made Up: Blueprint

Components: Telemetry spike with conic dispersal, hydraulic engine with default tip

Attachments: Ammo support, flame glaze

Loving the reference. This weapon just doesn't give a shit. Also, it's a shotgun that fires "tempered alloy bolts" (i.e. rivets) plus a "hydraulic eviscerator" that grants you powerful melee attacks, all coated in flame damage. It's the ultimate in up-close badassery.

Blueprint or Made Up: Blueprint

Components: Rip core with directed ejection field, Plasma core with diffraction torus

Attachments: Acid bath, ammo support

Again, for the reference. You're gonna be making great plasma all day! The saw blades shoot out at lightning speed (though without lightning damage, unless you want to swap out the default acid bath for an electric charge). And the diffracted plasma core brings back Isaac's old ability to point the weapon at the ground and let loose a shockwave that sends enemies flying. It doesn't do a ton of damage, but it's great for crowd control. Besides, those saw blades take care of the damage.

Blueprint or Made Up: Blueprint

Components: Tesla core with compressor, tesla core with directed suspension field

Attachments: Ammo box

The Bolas Gun fires spinning projectiles—like two balls with a rope between them, only made of electricity—for both its primary and secondary fire. The primary projectile ricochets off the nearest surfaces and bounces away to explode somewhere else, while the secondary stays on the ground and twirls around like a super-fast, electrified Skip-It of death. Anyone else remember Skip-Its? We're guessing necromorphs don't, because they suck at it.

Blueprint or Made Up: Blueprint

Components: Military engine with repeater, survey charge with default tip

Attachments: Explosion amplifier

This one's a real classic: a rapid-fire assault rifle on top with a bottom-mounted grenade launcher. Make sure to include the explosion amplifier to maximize the radius of those grenades. We recommend upgrading the grenade launcher's clip, as well, unless you want to have to reload after every two shots. And you can swap the default tip on the survey charge for a diffraction torus to get incendiary grenades instead. Woohoo!

Blueprint or Made Up: Made up

Components: Rip core with default tip, rotator cuff module

Attachments: Acid bath, damage support

The classic ripper is back, producing saw blades that hover a few feet in front of you as you wade waist-deep through freshly bisected necromorphs. The beauty of the rotator cuff is that it allows you to flip the blades 90 degrees, just like the classic plasma cutter. So no matter what type of beast is coming at you, you'll be properly equipped to chop it up into little bits. And don't forget the enhanced acid damage from the attachments! Just make sure you've got a long range weapon as backup.

Blueprint or Made Up: Made up

Components: Tesla core with default tip, survey charge with directed suspension field

Attachments: Safety guard, damage support

Dismember or detonate—it's your call. The tesla core and default tip produce a line gun that fires a wide horizontal beam, making it easy to separate necromorphs from their limbs. If you start to get overwhelmed, fire the rocket launcher, and don't worry about splash damage—the safety guard nullifies it completely. With damage and clip upgrades you'll be dismantling those monsters with precision. Okay, maybe not precision. But they'll be in pieces, at least.

Blueprint or Made Up: Made up

Components: Plasma core with default tip, survey charge with compressor

Attachments: Flame glaze, stasis amplifier

This baby, designed by yours truly, delivers the ultimate one-two punch: you fire the timed mine first, and while you wait for the five-second fuse to tick down, you send anything dumb enough to approach you flying backward into the explosive's radius. With a little luck and some crowd control skill you'll be taking out four or five enemies with every explosion. Upgrade the clip size so you can keep this cycle going without having to reload.

Blueprint or Made Up: Blueprint (special edition only)

Components: Military engine with Evangelizer directed ejection field, military engine with evangelizer conic dispersal.

Attachments: Acid bath, stasis amplifier

This one's a little different—you get it automatically with Dead Space 3's special edition, along with two extra suits and another, much shittier gun. But the Evangelizer is so awesome that we used it for literally the entire game. The shotgun is incredibly powerful and helps with anything up close, while far-off and slow-moving enemies fall victim to the precision shots from the directed ejection field. Without the special edition, you can make your own with normal DEF and conic dispersal tips, though it won't be as powerful. Oh, and be sure to upgrade the firing rate to help out with the shotgun's poor speed.