Why is the 9mm so under powered?

[The Bum]

So that we can have starter weapons that don't break the game's balance.

Then why are they the same way in "realistic" games?

operation flashpoint, a double two the torso will kill, one to the head will kill or two two the legs will cripple


you will never have a truely realistic game


also..shotguns NEVER are shown even half way real..eg nearly all games have them useless over 15 feet

You know i was considering adding shotguns but then i thought of the half-life series now THATS a realistic game.

 

[bassdrum]

Well, there's the fact that games aren't actually realistic, but there's also the fact that 9mm pistols are sometimes too powerful for their own good: many real world police forces have abandoned the use of some guns because they quite simply had too much penetrative power, and weren't effectively stopping the enraged maniac charging at an officer. Perhaps the lack of force represented in games is a translation of this strong penetrative force.

 

[The Bum]

first off, I assume that by realistic you mean the marketing term that publishers use to refer to games like call of duty. rather than to actually realistic games like ArmA 2 or operation flashpoint. but I would also consider possible armour piercing capability. I mean, a coyote is nice, but how would a 9mm round go against kevlar and ceramic plates?

Yea hence the hefty amount of """s since when whas COD realistic?

 

[The Bum]

There are way too many factors here in your complaint. First of all which round is it? How many grains? Jacket/no jacket?

But most importantly, its just a video game. Dont worry too much about it.

Thats true but i just was pondering it after a long day of 13-yr olds taking me down with their fancy-scmancy AA12s (actually an astonishing gun!) and then yelling YOU GOT PWNED LOLZ!!! after i put 4 9mms in their chest

 

[Plurralbles]

resident evil 4 disagrees.

Wolfenstein 3D agrees though if your pistol could do everything, why use the otehr weapons?

Tombraider DEFNITELY agrees and so does devil may cry. Holy crap, but they do have infinite ammo and rapid fire so that might be the balancer.

Yep. IT's just for balance.

 

[The Bum]

So that we can have starter weapons that don't break the game's balance.

Then why are they the same way in "realistic" games?

operation flashpoint, a double two the torso will kill, one to the head will kill or two two the legs will cripple


you will never have a truely realistic game


also..shotguns NEVER are shown even half way real..eg nearly all games have them useless over 15 feet

You know i was considering adding shotguns but then i thought of the half-life series now THATS a realistic game.

Half-Life? Realistic? Please, don't make me laugh so hard.

I meant APART from the 1-handed crowbar murder the back-fliping magnum the ever stoic gordan freeman the inxplicabley foolish combine Ect..... i meant JUST the shotgun

 

[Xeros]

It's for balance, although I really don't see why it matters. One in the face, and it doesn't matter what you're using. Or really one in any major organ for that matter.

 

[The Bum]

So that we can have starter weapons that don't break the game's balance.

Then why are they the same way in "realistic" games?

Note the quotes. A lot of realistic games, like Call of Duty or Ghost Recon are actually not that close to reality at all. The problem is, they need to keep the balance, so they need a weak gun. Now, in a combat situation, you wouldn't see anyone wielding a .22 or anything, so they need to downpower the 9mm.

You'll find that in proper realistic games, like Red Orchestra and ArmA II, the 9mm packs just as much of a punch as it should.

You know i was just gonna mention red orchestra

 

[era81]

Same reason why a 50bmg is so underpowered.

 

[Icecoldcynic]

Well, in real life, a 9mm has pretty decent stopping power, and will stop a man dead in his tracks when it hits him most of the time.

A 5.56 doesn't even have that kind of stopping power. That entire statement is pure fiction.

 

[Icecoldcynic]

EDIT: Whoops, pressed quote instead of edit.

 

[Jfswift]

It's just the way the games are designed. As was stated earlier, a 9mm is typically a starter weapon so it wont be as strong. A real one can kill someone with relative ease yes, I agree.

 

[Johnnyallstar]

The reason a 9mm is considered underpowered is because of two major reasons. Mass and Size.

The 9mm Parabellum round is an incredibly fast moving round which can cause hydrostatic shock if placed well, but unless you shock vital organs enough, the person you shot isn't going to go down easy. Hydrostatic shock being based on transfer of energy, in which E=mc^2, showing that the transfer of velocity, or c=acceleration, is more important than actual mass.

When people say it's underpowered, they're usually comparing it to the legendary .45 ACP. The .45 ACP is a slow moving, heavy, hard hitting round in comparison. The .45 ACP is barely able to produce the hydrostatic shock, because of the much slower velocity, though the mass is greatly higher. Because of this, the .45 ACP +P, .45 ACP Super, and the .450 Rowland were developed to reach higher velocities with identical dimensions.

The other issue is sheer size. The parabellum is much smaller, so it will penetrate longer before coming to a stop compared to the .45 because of surface area friction. There's much less surface area, which means that it will mathematically have a smaller ratio of real impact vs total force, because impact is the ratio of force over time (F/t).

The .45, being much fatter, and slower will stop quicker, which means a greater ratio of impact to force. Smaller time, greater impact. This is the reason why the .45 is called a "1 shot stop." No matter where you hit the person, they are going down, unlike a 9mm parabellum which may require several shots before they go down.

 

[Typecast]

Because .45's are cooler

 

[Dr. wonderful]

Well, in real life, a 9mm has pretty decent stopping power, and will stop a man dead in his tracks when it hits him most of the time.

In videogames though, it's done for balance. 9mm rounds are some of the most common. Because they're so common in the real world, they're common in videogame land, but since the devs don't want you to have a powerful weapon that also has easily replenishable ammo, they make the 9mm weaker.

Balance is the reason that videogames are not like real life, remember that.

I agree.

Of course, some of it can be subverted.

In the first Halo game and ODST, the 9MM is an above average weapon that would be a newbie best friend.

GTA4: You can use a shotgun or an assualt rife, but the 9MM will be most players choices (Hell, it made me an badass)

There is no 9mm in Halo.

>.>
<.<
...Let's pretend there was...It would be epic.

 

[Icecoldcynic]

Well, in real life, a 9mm has pretty decent stopping power, and will stop a man dead in his tracks when it hits him most of the time.

Even a 5.56 doesn't have that kind of stopping power. That entire statement is pure fiction.

A 5.56 is a NATO round, and all current NATO ammunition is jacketed, because it's less lethal and has less tumbling in the body. As such, a jacketed round has less stopping power than an unjacketed round.

A 9mm round actually had a pretty good amount of stopping power.

Regardless, I assume we are talking about standard 9 x 19 mm parabellum rounds rather than hollow points. Yes, a hollow-point 9 mm round will incapacitate a man in one shot, but generally a 9 mm won't, unless it hits a vital organ.