Owning a gun or a weapon has become more and more normal in the future, and Night City is no exception. Dangerous times, call for equipping oneself to react to whatever the streets might throw at you, and more and more people of different vocations are now carrying. Not only do law enforcement, corporate security, mercenaries and gangsters carry, but so do those merely trying to protect their livelihood like cab drivers, vendors and owners of businesses. Gun laws are pretty lax in night city, unless you step into a high profile location like a courthouse or police station. These buildings are guarded by heavy security and are extremely strict about carrying weapons and any implants with offensive potential.

In Night City, you can legally purchase most weapons, from the highly disposable Budget arms, or their do it yourself 3D printing kits, to more specialized weapons from more exclusive vendors.

Heavy weapons or weapons of war as they are called, undergo far more scrutiny and the sales of these weapons are prohibited within the boundaries of Night City. The exception to this rule is the corporations and their security forces to use at their discretion and for “public safety” as well as the elite tier of the NCPD, the Max Tac in combating the rampant threat of murderous Cyberpsychos.

Illegally, heavier firepower can be provided through a fixer with the right connections, at a considerable fee.

The weapon hierarchy in Night City is dominated by Asian Corporations. Arasaka, Tsunami and Kang Tao are considered to be the best in weapon manufacturing. Arasaka is one of the most intimidating Japanese corporations covering all elements of security including high grade weaponry, and Tsunami is also a highly distinguished Japanese corporation mostly focused on experimental and out of the box thinking and designs. Kang Tao is a newer company founded around 2050, who are known for their sophisticated “smart technology.”

The midtier largely belongs to the American corporations. Militech currently focuses heavily on the mid range of weapons due to their ability for mass production, and Midnight Arms focuses on Borg weapons which are a subcategory of weapons that can only be wielded by heavily augmented users.

Malorian arms have fallen from grace, as they were a bespoke and highly renowned company in the 20s. THey have yet to release a new model since 2043, but they still have a reputation for making handguns that pack a punch. Constitutional Arms makes standard mid tier machine guns and shotguns, and Techtronica have earned the name the “Russian Militech” due to their similarity in what they offer the market. They have recently included military robots in their offerings.

For those of you who are short on eddies and influence, look no further than the bottom tier brands. Nokota offers reliable, powerful, but inexpensive arms, where India-based Darra Polytechnic is more about style than functionality. Serbian Rostovic are again cheap, but can be customized to the nines. BudgetArms is a standout name in the space, and is the epitome of base functionality.

Modern weapons are classified into 3 main types. Power weapons are conventional guns in the sense that they use traditional ammo, calibres and cartridges. This category includes a wide variety of weapons including polymer one shots, which are disposable, revolvers, smgs, machine guns, shotguns and pistols. High rate of fire accompanied by high recoil is a feature of most power weapons.

Tech weapons are weapons that use rail gun technology, firing projectiles that are propelled with an electromagnetic charge. What they give up in terms of rate of fire, they make up for in penetration effects depending on how long the charge is held for. These weapons use caseless ammunition, typically jacketed steel flechette.

Smart weapons use gyrojet technology to fire caseless guided ammo at enemies. This technology was first developed in the 1960s, but was unreliable during combat. In 2077, they are efficienct and pin point accurate. Smart weapons are tied to weapon grips and optics to accurately scan and track the movement of targets.

Melee weapons exist, but they typically aren’t favored in the dystopian future. With so much bombastic weapon technology, blades, knives, hammers are a more crude form of destruction only used by few. WIth that being said, blades don’t jam or run out of ammo, so keeping both a firearm and some kind of melee weapon may be a good idea.

Modifying your weapon to your liking is also key. Optics, sights, suppressors and launchers are available and most weapons have modular slots to install whatever you like onto them.
Customization extends to different types of ammunition, like thermal ammo to inflict damage over time or EMP rounds to make a quickly approaching highly augmented enemy collapse into a short circuiting hunk of junk.