Despite my overall disappointment in Fallout 3, I’ve been playing a whole lot of it recently. But trying to figure out which weapons I liked best took a while. I’ve done a bunch of hunting around in an attempt to find the “best weapon” in Fallout 3, and while some are better than others, I’ve come to the conclusion that a lot of it is personal preference. I’m going to present my own take on my favorite ten weapons in the game.

• Fragmentation Grenade: While not the most powerful weapon, they’re very common, and they’re useful as hell. Any time I see a group of enemies or I need to attack around corners, I’d better have a frag grenade or ten on me. Throw enough grenades and you’ll be taking down sentry bots like they’re radroaches.
• Chinese Assault Rifle: The best of the small guns, this will be a mainstay weapon throughout the game. The ammo is common enough that you don’t have to be overly conservative.
• Gatling Laser: The best of the big guns, I’m still not quite sure why the Gatling laser wasn’t categorized as an energy weapon, but unlike the minigun this one is actually useful and marginally accurate. Too bad ammo is so hard to come by.
• Bottlecap Mine: Who knew that if you put a cherry bomb in a lunchbox with a bunch of bottlecaps it would explode so violently as to create a small mushroom cloud? Anyway, the bottlecap mine is the biggest baddest landmine in the game, and I love to lay them out and lead enemies along a trail of them. Somehow, they never realize what I’m doing.
• The Alien Blaster: It almost feels like cheating to use the alien blaster. I suppose it’s good that ammo is so limited, because the weapon is way too ovepowered. But it is fun to use.
• The Terrible Shotgun: Not a big fan of the name, but it’s the game’s best shotgun. And it does lots and lots of damage. So I ended up using it quite a bit. I’ve always liked shotguns in games, and this one will take the head off a supermutant in one hit at close range, especially if you take it by surprise.
• Deathclaw Gauntlet: The deathclaw gauntlet isn’t much better than a regular power fist until you fight heavily armored opponents. I’m currently playing an unarmed character, and taking down Mirelurks and Super Mutants in melee is fun. I’ve been partial to the “Fisto!” and “Shocker” power fists, but I think the Deathclaw Gauntlet wins, since it ignores damage resistance. Watch out, Enclave.
• Shishkebab: My plan for my third character is to max out his strength and melee skills, give him the pyromaniac perk, and have him use the shishkebab exclusively. It’s a frelling flaming sword. What’s not to love?
• Plasma Rifle: The plasma rifle is the best energy weapon, and I’m currently playing an energy weapon focused character. But what makes it really cool is how the enemies melt into green puddles when you get a really good hit. It’s also got a phenomenal rate of fire. Zapzapzap.
• Dart Gun: What? Are you nuts, Greg? Your favorite weapon in the game is the dart gun? Yes. It is. And I’ll tell you why. Against some of the tougher melee-only enemies like mirelurks, deathclaws, and giant radscorpions, the dart gun makes fights cake. Just shoot them in the legs, and there’s no way they can catch you. Then you simply stay out of their reach and blast them with a shotgun. Easy. And the ammo is very easy to come by.