Minigun has other meanings. See Minigun (disambiguation) for other uses.

This page is about the weapon in Wolfenstein 3D. For the weapon in Return to Castle Wolfenstein, see Venom Gun.

The Chaingun^[1] (sometimes referred to as Gatling gun^[2]) is an automatic weapon used in Wolfenstein 3D. It has the highest rate of fire in the game, which makes it the most powerful weapon. It is useful against large crowds and bosses. The Chaingun can first be found in E1M2.

The Chaingun is also the weapon used by most of bosses, and incidentally is the most useful against them, although they will never drop one when defeated.

Strategies

As stated earlier, the Chaingun excels at destroying large groups of guards. Try to be around medium distance from the crowd before firing. This will make it harder for the enemies to hit you and the sheer amount of bullets the Chaingun can fire will easily compensate for the damage and accuracy drop-off.

Don't use the Chaingun against mid groups of enemies (2-4 if there are no mutants) or large groups (5+) of guards; doing so is a waste of ammo. In higher difficulty levels, you'll need all the ammo you can get.

Note that if B.J. already has a chaingun, he receives only bullets (up to 6) if he picks up another. Since it doesn't count toward any treasure percentage and has no other benefits, the player should avoid picking up the Chaingun if he already has one and his Ammo is full, as it is a valuable source of ammunition that is easily wasted. On the other hand, if BJ does not have a machine gun and happens to pick up a chaingun, he will also get a machine gun.

Trivia

• The Jaguar Chaingun uses Doom's Chaingun graphic as a base.
• In real life, chainguns have bullet belts instead of magazines. Also, real life chainguns do not have a pistol grip.
• Besides the player's Chaingun, all bosses' chainguns' barrels do not spin.
• The term "Chaingun" is actually improperly applied, as it only properly refers to weapons that use a moving-chain mechanism that externally feeds new rounds into the firearm's chamber, rather than the discharge of preceding rounds. The multiple-barrel equivalent which would be correct is "gatling gun".
• It is thought that the Venom is based on the Chaingun, or even the Chaingun itself (only slightly different, maybe an modern representation of the Chaingun).

The SNES, Mac, and 3DO Chaingun's view graphics.

The Jaguar Chaingun's view graphics.

The Chaingun's world graphic in post-Jaguar ports.

Mission Packs Chaingun pickup sprite, floor 18.

The face B.J. makes briefly after picking up the chaingun.

References