Cyberpunk 2077: 5 Unique Weapons Worth Upgrading (& 5 To Skip)
It might not be registered as a looter-shooter but Cyberpunk 2077 will get to feeling like Borderlands quickly without the proper inventory management. Characters in the game will give V a weapon to help complete a mission, then V will do the mission and get a whole bunch more weapons off of the enemies, and then the reward for the mission will be another weapon. In Night City, a seemingly endless metropolis of weapons, players are going to have to make thousands of choices about which ones deserve a spot in their equipment slot and which ones to sell or break into parts.
Iconic weapons can be upgraded to keep them up relevant. Some will be found as a blue rare or even a green uncommon but they are worth every bit of effort to make them legendary guns that will never leave a player's holster again. Others might say "iconic" or "legendary" but they are complete trash — in fact, some are worse than the standard guns they are based on. By doing research and making wise choices, V can save some eddies and have maximum firepower at all times. It's a cutthroat world, but those with the right firepower will be just fine. Those without it better have a save file handy.
10 Upgrade: Overwatch
- Sniper Rifle.
- Power Weapon.
- Built-in silencer.
- Faster reload speed.
The Overwatch is the best sniper rifle in the game without debate. As a sniper rifle, reload speed is always useful when the window of opportunity for multiple targets is only so long. The built-in silencer is incredible to help with those shots so enemies don't scatter. If V puts a silencer on a gun, the damage gets reduced, but this built-in variety keeps the damage full.
It might be the best sniper rifle for that alone, but what makes it absolutely overpowered is the raw damage. V can go through the entire game without seeing a four-digit damage number. This gun regularly hits for five-digits with headshots. Perhaps somebody misplaced a decimal because even 10% of the damage would have been more than enough to one-shot most enemies.
9 Skip: Plan B
- Pistol.
- Power Weapon.
- Chance to apply bleed effects.
- Each shot costs eddies.
Players that complete every single side quest, gig, quest chain, and NCPD mission in the game will be surprised to learn they still don't have enough money to buy a high-end car. Even the most frugal of players will have to tighten their belts to stay afloat in Night City.
This means that a gun with average DPS that costs eddies every time it is fired must be ruled out. This gun is the first iconic weapon some gamers get ahold of since it comes from early fixer Dexter DeShawn, but it's a poor representation of the power of iconic weapons. Under no circumstances should it be fired unless the goal is to play through the game with no spending money.
8 Upgrade: Skippy
- Pistol.
- Smart Weapon.
- Deals electrical damage and has a chance to shock.
- Scales to player level.
- Option to target lethal and non-lethal areas.
- Speaks when equipped.
Skippy is widely regarded as the best gun in the game and there are plenty of reasons to back that up. As a smart weapon, bullets don't miss already, and Skippy has a setting that makes it so all shots hit in the head, effectively doubling or tripling the listed damage (which is already absurd). It automatically scales to player level, too, so it's a cinch to upgrade.
There are two major amateur mistakes to make with Skippy. The first is to program it for headshots right away. For whatever reason, after fifty kills, it will automatically change back to the opposite. So start with non-lethal shots, then, when it switches back, have V respond with "I don't know," and this will enable permanent headshots. The next trap is that a quest exists to give Skippy back to its original owner. The eddies aren't even good, but no amount of eddies would be enough to replace Skippy anyway.
7 Skip: Divided We Stand
- Assault Rifle.
- Smart Weapon.
- Deals chemical damage.
- Chance to apply poison effects.
- Targets up to five opponents at once.
The theory of an assault rifle that fires shots without ever missing is one that looks great on paper. Adding chemical rounds to each bullet is even better, the rapid-fire essentially assures that targets will be taking poison damage after a clip or two.
But the biggest drawback is supposed to be a feature. By targeting five at the same time, bullets are spread out too thinly among groups of enemies, especially robotic ones where the poison is rendered useless. Stacked on top of that is the gun's low DPS and it's pretty common to empty five clips or more on a mob before it finally goes down.
6 Upgrade: Apparition
- Pistol.
- Tech Weapon.
- Charged shots deal double damage.
- Increased damage, fire rate, and reload speed at low health.
V will probably never need to use the feature of this gun, as amazing as the feature is. The gun syncs up with the user's vitals and does better output at lower health. In order to see this effect, the player will have to get into a very bad situation first, because the odds of enemies living long enough to surround V is minimal.
Charged tech weapons deal around double damage to begin with, so the feature on this weapon that does double damage means V will regularly be hitting enemies for quadruple damage or more. Factor in the ridiculously high base damage numbers on the gun and it's basically one-hit kills for anything less than a boss fight or cyberpsycho, meaning V will likely be at close to full health by the time the fight ends.
5 Skip: Chaos
- Pistol.
- Tech Weapon.
- Each clip randomizes crit chance, damage type, and chance of effect.
The Chaos sounds like fun to use, and in many ways it is. After emptying a clip, when the player decides to reload, the gun will change crit chance, damage type, and effect chance. In one clip, bullets can be thermal and in the next, the bullets can be electrical. The name "Chaos" is very appropriate.
However, as a tech weapon, the way to maximize the damage is to charge up each shot and shoot slowly. This means clips are few and far between and it's easy to get stuck on an ineffective effect for the given enemy. The DPS is poor, even worse than other common pistols at the same level, making the gun nothing more than a burden to carry around.
4 Upgrade: The Headsman
- Shotgun.
- Power Weapon.
- Chance to apply bleed effects.
- Increased bleed effect chance.
- Increased dismemberment chance.
- Double the number of pellets.
- Reduced reload time.
- Increased spread.
- Reduced rate of fire.
- Reduced clip capacity.
There are three penalties tied to this shotgun and it's fair to be completely turned away by those warnings before ever giving it a chance. Players that overcome their fears about it will find that the reason these penalties are applied is to try and balance The Headsman out, but it's still overpowered.
By doubling the number of pellets, the damage is doubled right away. Then factor in that this is a power weapon and any missed projectiles will ricochet back. Top this off with bleed and dismemberment effects. This all adds up to shredding anything within a few meters. In close-quarter rooms, there isn't a better choice in the game.
3 Skip: Problem Solver
- Submachine Gun.
- Power Weapon.
- Chance to apply bleed effects.
The Problem Solver doesn't have any drawback to scare away any onlookers. It does have a nice bleed effect, but many standard submachine guns have bleed effects tied to them. To realize why this weapon is so bad, take a look at the iconic description and it's plain to see why this gun has much to be desired.
It's blank. That's right, for some reason, an iconic effect was never given to this gun, making it just a normal submachine gun. It could be an oversight, but regardless, it's got nothing going for it over anything else. It's just fine as a plain gun, but when upgrade resources are limited enough already, pouring them into a gun with nothing special about it is ill-advised.
2 Upgrade: Stinger
- Knife.
- Deals chemical damage.
- Chance to apply poison effects.
Katana users spend so much time figuring out which sword is the best that they overlook that it's actually a knife that holds the title of the best blade in the game. As a blade, it gets every single advantage that a katana gets from the skill tree.
With full upgrades, it actually swings faster than a katana (6.67 swings per second to the katana's 5). The base damage is better than even the best katana as it is, so the cherry on top is the poison effect chance. When swinging that quickly, the poison is nearly guaranteed to go off within the opening combo. Mixed with some cybernetics geared toward melee combat, this is the king of all melee weapon selections.
1 Skip: Cocktail Stick
- Katana.
Unlike the Problem Solver, this katana actually has an iconic description. But that's where the differences end. Like that weapon, nobody thought to give this katana an actual effect. The description states that the Cocktail Stick "looks like a toy, cuts like a laser," but if that's true, it's being compared to a very weak laser.
Iconic weapons are derived from base weapons and the stats are modified from there. The game does not explicitly say it, but there are actually two kinds of katanas. One has the second-highest melee DPS in the game. The other has the lowest. Sadly, this one is based on the lowest. This means that upgrading this blade is the equivalent of upgrading the worst melee weapon in the game. It has a mod slot, but that's not good enough to turn this into anything decent.
Post a Comment