Ray Gun

"I don't know who Ray is, but his gun is rip!"

- Tank Dempsey

The Ray Gun is a Wonder Weapon which appears in Call of Duty: World at War and Call of Duty: Black Ops. It is one of the most iconic Zombies features in the gamemode, due to the fact that it appears in every Zombies map.

Call of Duty: World at War
The Ray Gun appears in the campaign mission Little Resistance as an easter egg and in every Nazi Zombies map. The Ray Gun is one of the most powerful weapons in the game, but is not available outside of these minimal appearances without the use of cheats or mods. The Ray Gun's appearance is of a generic 1950's science-fiction film ray gun.

The Ray Gun is often the most favored weapon in Nazi Zombies due to its one-hit kill strength up to about round 18-22 (when Pack-A-Punched it loses its one-hit kill status at rounds 22-25) and its large magazine capacity for such a high-damage weapon. It is pinpoint accurate, meaning that the player should aim their shots carefully. The Ray Gun can hold 20 shots inside its magazine, which is, strangely, stuck into the barrel (the magazine seems to be two batteries stuck into the barrel). The Ray Gun shoots a series of green circles. Since most people tend to fire one shot at a time while using the Ray Gun, reloading won't be too frequent, and plus, reloading only takes about one second when Speed Cola has been purchased and three seconds without it. However, one downside is that it cannot be reload canceled, as the magazine becomes full at the instant the weapon is ready to fire, sometimes making the reload accidentally unsuccessful, forcing the player to reload again. An often unnoticed feature of the Ray Gun is that it is fully automatic, though it has a very low rate of fire.

A document from Vbush reveals more about the Ray Gun. The document reveals that the Ray Gun is powered by Element 115, which must be contained in the battery inserted into the gun. The Ray Gun was created by aliens, as confirmed by activision and the fact that aliens talk to you in Little Resistance, against the idea that it was made by Dr. Maxis. This is also proven by the fact that when Tank Dempsey gets the ray gun in Shi No Numa, he will sometimes yell, "I've got the spaceman's gun!"

Call of Duty: Black Ops
The Ray Gun is available in Call of Duty: Black Ops, only in the Nazi Zombies game mode. While still being very powerful, the gun has a tendency to start making crawlers on rounds 18 more often if shot in the legs. Although this can be very useful, the player may be caught unaware by them. At round 20 the original ray gun is generally useless. At about round 30, the Porter's X2 Ray Gun (the upgraded version of the Ray Gun) will start to make crawlers. One problem is that it makes a mere 50 points per kill, making it one of the worst weapons to make points with. The Ray Gun, along with the other Wonder Weapons, is very useful on Kino der Toten and "Five", as crawler zombies won't release their toxic gas if killed with it. It becomes useless at later rounds since it takes a lot of ammo to kill a zombie and since ammo is low it is not recommended for use past round 35+.

Call of Duty: ZOMBIES


The Ray Gun also makes an appearance in the Call of Duty: ZOMBIES application for the iPhone, with a few differences from its counterpart on the console. It causes no splash damage to the user and loses its one shot kill abilities much later, at about round 20 - 22. Along with these differences, it is not fully automatic on the iPhone. Obtaining it on the iPhone gives the player the "Space Man" achievement, and using it to kill 100 zombies gives the player the "Laser Face" achievement.

Porter's X2 Ray Gun
When upgraded, the Ray Gun becomes the "Porter's X2 Ray Gun." With the upgraded version, the magazine capacity is twice as big, the spare ammo is increased from 160 to 200, it gets extra damage through damage multipliers, it shoots red rays instead of green, and the splash damage is reduced (even though the player can still receive damage from it). Also, should a player get downed with a Porter's X2 Ray Gun, he/she will have a larger amount of ammo to cover teammates. The Porter's X2 Ray Gun gets its name from H. Porter, the scientist that was working on the next Ray Gun model. He was trying to reduce its peripheral damage and apparently succeeded if the Porter's X2 Ray Gun is really the second generation model he created. H. Porter is a reference to Max Porter, the programmer that created the Ray Gun.

Finding the Ray Gun
The Ray Gun can only be found in the Mystery Box. Using the box costs 950 points, though it likely takes several tries to obtain the Ray Gun. In Shi No Numa and Der Riese, it is more common at later levels (15+). However on Nacht der Untoten, it is more common on lower levels.

The singleplayer mission Little Resistance also features the Ray Gun as an easter egg. After using the first artillery strike, head onto the beach. Starting from the far right side, there are three puddles. Jump into (and then out of) these in order (right, middle, left), until the player reaches the last puddle. Stay in this puddle for a while. After a while, the ground will shake and a deep, garbled, voice speaks. Four Shisa statues will arise from the ground holding a Ray Gun. To get it, walk up to the statue (it doesn't matter which one) and then press the action button. The Ray Gun has a laser-cross-hair sight, comparable to a Red Dot Sight. The gun the player is given has maximum ammo, and the player can come back to the statues and get a new gun an unlimited amount of times. It can be used to destroy the tanks with two shots at the end of Little Resistance instead of calling an artillery.

Appearance
The Ray Gun is crimson in color. It has some meters on it, and contains something that appears to be some sort of Red Dot sight system, however, the red dot is actually a red crosshair. In World at War, the cross-hairs appear to rotate alternatively on a vertical and horizontal axis, as if they are on a holographic screen. However, in Black Ops, the cross-hair instead appears to fluctuate up and down. On the back of the gun, the Ray Gun appears to feature a cog-shaped object with three rectangular-shaped bars atop it. There is a large handguard in front of the grip, and some sort of gauge on the sides of the gun, directly below the bar that acts as the rear sight (somewhat), which has a disputed purpose. There is also a toggle switch on the ray gun, next to the gauge, which has an unknown purpose. It could be speculated that it is a firing mode selector, and is set to fully automatic. This could be a reference to the fact that the Ray Gun is a "futuristic" gun, as modern firearms may have a fire mode switch. On the side, the title "Blast-O-Matic" can clearly be seen on the back under the voltage gauge. In Call of Duty: Black Ops, the laser cross-hair can appear in many colors, like blue, green, or red. Everytime the secondary weapon (with the Ray Gun as primary) or the Ray Gun itself is Pack-a-Punched, the cross-hair will change color.

Videos
Video:CoD WaW: 4 Ray Guns on Little Resistance Tutorial (High Quality)|Ray Gun Acquisition on Little Resistance

Tips

 * By using the perk PhD Flopper (only available on Ascension and Call of the Dead), the player is immune to its splash damage, making it completely safe for a player to fire directly at their own feet when firing the Ray Gun, allowing an easy escape if players get caught on a zombie they failed to dodge, firing at the player's own feet would normally down the player in two shot without Juggernog and three shots with it.
 * If in Last Stand during a zombie round, the Ray Gun is put to good use in defending the remaining team, who may revive the user easier since the downed player can aid them by shooting the ground repetitively when surrounded, rather than using the ammo to kill random zombies. The splash damage will kill any zombies attacking the player's savior, and not affect the downed player, allowing him/her to be revived at less risk, although the player has limited ammo in last stand.
 * The combination of Thundergun and Ray Gun (or Wunderwaffe DG-2 and Ray Gun in World at War) is the most known and most wanted combination in the Zombies mode. However, some people find it preferable to have an light machine gun (such as HK21 or Browning M1919) with one of the two Wonder Weapons because the Ray Gun runs out of ammo fast quickly above round 30 (due to the large amount of shots needed to kill zombies) and because the Thundergun/Zeus Cannon has a very small ammo capacity. Also the light machine guns will give tons of points for just "spraying" into the horde of zombies, while the Ray Gun will only give 50-60 points per kill, and the Thundergun give only 50 points per kill, as well as no power-ups will be given on a kill made with the Thundergun.
 * Oddly enough, the splash damage is higher than the direct hit damage, which also saves ammo as the splash damage can kill other nearby zombies. However, this will make a bit fewer points than from direct hits though the difference is not very noticable, and overall saving ammo is likely more important, especially at higher rounds.
 * It is advised not to upgrade it before round 15, as it will have no extra benefits besides larger magazine, due to damage stats being already high enough to kill with one shot. Upgrading it afterwards can be wiser, as the player can save points needed for other things, and optionally use all of its ammo before upgrade.

Trivia

 * The batteries read "Atomic Cold Cells".
 * On the PC version of the game, if the user lowers gravity, when they shoot the Ray Gun at the ground, the user will then be pushed up into the air.
 * The Ray Gun is extremely ineffective at reload canceling, as the clip inserts to the weapon at the instant the weapon is ready to fire, which can be crucial in an emergency, if the player sprints, knifes or switches weapon at the wrong time.
 * The pick-up symbol is the same as the Colt M1911 since it is classified as a pistol using M1911 animations in 3rd person view.
 * The Ray Gun's third-person appearance is the same before and after it is upgraded in the Pack-a-Punch Machine.
 * When used on Little Resistance the player can shoot a dead Imperial Japanese Army soldier and after a few seconds their skin starts to decay, hinting that it fires highly radioactive beams.
 * In Little Resistance, the Ray Gun's accuracy is bad making it harder to use on higher difficult levels.
 * In Little Resistance, the Ray Gun can destroy a tank with one or two blasts.
 * The Ray Gun is the first of the six fictional guns to appear in the Call of Duty series, the others being Wunderwaffe DG-2, Thundergun, Winter's Howl, Scavenger and V-R11 in order. Note that all of these are only included in Zombies (with the exception of the Ray Gun and Thundergun easter eggs).
 * It is possible to carry two Ray Guns in Little Resistance.
 * Coincidentally, the name of this weapon is pronounced the same way as Reagan, which is the last name of Ronald Reagan, the United States' 40th president.
 * In Call of Duty: Black Ops, the first shot after equipping the Ray Gun will make the screen vibrate.
 * In Call of Duty: World at War, the aiming reticule is always red, whereas in Call of Duty: Black Ops, it can be green, red, blue, yellow, white, or purple. It may change when teleporting or upgrading.
 * This is the only gun that appears in all the zombie maps, as M1911 is not featured in Dead Ops Arcade, where Ray Gun appears as a power-up.
 * It was built and invented, like the Wunderwaffe DG-2, by the Germans at Der Riese.
 * In Call of Duty: Black Ops, when a player receives a Ray Gun or Porters X2 Ray Gun, they will twist a knob on the side of the Ray Gun to turn it on.
 * There is an unusable Ray Gun on a table in "Five". It can only be seen with noclipping.
 * The first person model for the Ray Gun holds it with one hand while the third person model shows the character holds it with both hands.
 * The Ray Gun's hipfire cross-hairs expand when the player turns their view, unlike any other weapons.
 * In third person, the reload looks and sounds like an M1911 reloading.
 * The Ray Gun in the Wii version of Call of Duty: Black Ops has a different firing sound.
 * In Call of Duty: Black Ops, when the Ray Gun is fired, the needle on the left side gauge will jump forward into the green section of the meter then bounce back. This is only seen when hip-firing.
 * On the Pack-A-Punch machine, there is a picture of two Ray Guns, one with a limp barrel and one with a normal, straight barrel.
 * The Ray Gun makes a brief appearance in the opening cutscene of "Five".
 * In Black Ops, in the classic maps, Ascension and Call of the Dead, if someone gets the Ray Gun from the Mystery Box, a faint guitar riff can be heard by the players.
 * If the player is reloading the Ray Gun and sprints before it makes a sound, the reload action will stop, the same goes for the Thundergun.
 * If used on Japanese Infantry in Little Resistance, when hit they do not bleed or produce any blood and it is impossible to gib them with it.