Remembering Fallout’s 15 Wildest Weapons

Fallout 76 is just beyond the crater, and with the latest round of updates showcasing a plethora of new weapons including a crossbow and a guitar sword, it seems like a good time to look back on some of the outrageous armaments that have defined this darkly humorous series. From pop-culture references to just plain strange, here’s a list of the 15 wildest weapons in Fallout.

2076 World Series baseball bat – Fallout 4

This seems like your typical oakwood baseball bat, until you send a deathclaw soaring into the stratosphere. As the name suggests, this unique melee weapon is a souvenir baseball bat from the 2076 World Series and is a pre-war artifact untouched by the nuclear war. The bat features a “small chance to send targets flying,” and a unique sound effect that includes the crack of the bat and the raucous cheers of an excited crowd. Vault-dwellers can truly relive that great American pastime, as they send their enemies soaring into the distance.

Abilene Kid LE BB Gun – Fallout: New Vegas

If you selected the wild wasteland trait, this weapon is only discoverable through a unique interaction with your cyber-dog, Rex. Walking around the wasteland, Rex will engage you in dialogue with “aroo!” Then, if you ask him if someone fell down a well, Rex will bark in agreement, and the location of the weapon will be marked on your map. Apart from the hilarious interaction with your canine companion, this weapon is a typical BB gun – that is, unless you land a critical hit, then it becomes a devastating weapon capable of taking down even the most formidable wastelander.

Alien blaster – Fallout, Fallout 2, Fallout 3, Fallout: New Vegas, Fallout 4

This little ray gun looks like a prop out of a cheesy, ‘50s-era sci-fi flick, so you wouldn’t expect it to be quite so lethal. A staple appearing in every Fallout game to date, players can generally find the alien blaster near the corpse of a crash-landed extraterrestrial. If the aliens are still alive, however, your only hope in acquiring this pistol is to welcome them to Earth Will Smith-style, which is to say, you’ll have to blast them in the face.  

Broadsider – Fallout 4

As silly as it is intimidating, the broadsider is nothing to shake a hook at. A portable 18th-century naval cannon that players wield like a minigun, it shoots cannonballs made from solid, black iron and turns raiders into chum in a flash. A reward for aiding pirate robots who speak with serious salty dog accents, vault-dwellers can finally feel like Captain Ahab as they take down their white whale of a super mutant.

Cryolator – Fallout 4

Okay, bad ice-themed Mr. Freeze puns aside (see Batman & Robin), the cryolator is like a flamethrower in the sense that this prototype weapon freezes enemies solid with a cryogenic spray. With the bloody mess perk, players can watch their foes explode into a thousand bloody ice cubes. That’s one red slushy you might want to avoid.

Fat Man – Fallout 3, Fallout: New Vegas, Fallout 4

Ten years ago, Todd Howard introduced this weapon for the first time at E3, quipping that, “Every kid wants one of these under the Christmas tree.” Since then, this “mini-nuclear bomb catapult” has become one of the most iconic weapons in the series. As OP as Fallout weapons get, the fat man matches the game’s dark humor perfectly by dropping nuclear bombs on an already bombed-out world. If you ever hear a whistling sound like that of an anvil falling out of the sky, run for cover, because a megaton’s worth of hell is about to rain down on your head… followed by instant death and a big mushroom cloud.

Holy Hand Grenade/Holy Frag Grenade – Fallout 2/Fallout: New Vegas

While the names and art styles slightly differ, both of these hand grenades derive from the quotable scene in Monty Python and the Holy Grail where the Knights of the Round Table encounter a man-eating rabbit. Like the alien blaster, players in Fallout: New Vegas need to select the wild wasteland trait to discover this unique explosive. In Fallout 2, players discover the holy hand grenade through a random encounter that involves a bunch of Brotherhood of Steel knights dubbed “King Arthur’s knights” who get slaughtered by a small rat. If the player walks up and shoots the rat between the eyes, the holy hand grenade can be found in a dank cave, complete with a cross for a firing pin.

Rock-It Launcher/Junk Jet – Fallout 3/Fallout 4

When you can kill a raider with a high-velocity teddy bear, or any piece of junk for that matter, you know you’ve stumbled onto something special. A vacuum-powered, detritus spewing rubbish cannon, the junk jet (or rock-it launcher, depending on your preference) can take any piece of junk you find and lob it at an enemy’s head with satisfyingly violent results. Made of jury-rigged scrap and oddments, this gun is the perfect weapon in a world littered with debris and populated by scavengers.

K9000 cyberdog gun – Fallout: New Vegas

With “floppy metal ears” and a “nose sensor” this heavy machine gun houses a living dog's brain because …. SCIENCE! It whines when you holster it and growls when it detects enemies, so the fact that it’s a weird, half-sentient, half-robotic abomination does make sense ... plus you can pet it, and it won’t pee on the carpet, and it spits hot lead. So, good boy.

Lincoln’s repeater – Fallout 3

A lever-action rifle that belonged to Honest Abe himself, the Lincoln’s repeater is not only one of the most accurate and powerful rifles in Fallout 3, but it’s also based on a real-life firearm currently housed in the Smithsonian. As a big bonus, the pip-boy icon for this weapon shows a vault boy decked out in an Abe Lincoln top hat and beard. Clearly, vault boy is a student of history.

Mesmetron – Fallout 3

Brainwash your foes into giving you all their clothes. Or throw a bomb collar around their neck and sell them for caps. Either way this non-lethal brain scrambler hypnotizes nearly every person you meet, turning them into hyper-suggestible zombies. Go nuts.

Nuka-grenade – Fallout 3, Fallout: New Vegas

The most powerful explosive in Fallout 3, and the second-most powerful in Fallout: New Vegas, the nuka-grenade harnesses a cocktail of chemicals with its most prominent ingredient being a glowing pre-war cola. In fact, the necessity of this ingredient really makes you wonder about the integrity of pre-war corporations in the Fallout universe. But then again, when have reputable companies like Vault-Tec or Robco ever done anything shady?

Railway rifle – Fallout 3, Fallout 4

This high-powered rifle shoots railroad spike projectiles, lets off jets of steam, and emits a high-pitched train whistle, but that’s only part of the charm of this custom-made weapon. With elongated metal spikes for ammunition, the railway rifle severs enemy limbs and pins them to nearby walls. Sometimes it’s good to let off some steam. 

Repellent stick – Fallout 3

A stick laced with mole rat repellent, this weapon comes from Moira Brown and is supposed to offer a non-violent solution to handling the critters. However, it doesn’t work as advertised, which becomes apparent after you test it out.

If you whack a mole rat with the stick once, nothing happens. If you whack it a second time, the creature’s head begins to smoke. And if you whack it a third time, the mole rat’s head explodes in a shower of bloody pulp. Whack-a-mole has never been so violent.  

The Striker – Fallout 4

The modified version of a fat man, this unique heavy weapon fires bowling balls instead of mini-nukes and can leave more than a few raiders dead in the gutter. Whenever you reload, a strike sound effect plays like you knocked down a row of pins. And though it’s not quite as powerful as a normal fat man, the striker is still lethal enough to crush a mutant’s head like a grapefruit. After all, it is a bowling ball moving at the speed of a bullet.

Well, that concludes the list. Did we leave anything out? Be sure to sound off in the comments section below. Also, for the latest post-apocalyptic news, be sure to check out our Fallout 76 news hub, or this article where we sat down with the developers to discuss all the new things to expect in the irradiated hills of West Virginia.