this is Jonathan Ferguson the keeper of
firearms and artillery at the Royal
armories Museum in the UK which houses a
collection of thousands of iconic
weapons from throughout history and on
today's episode Jonathan is taking a
look at Riot games hero shooter valeran
I do I enjoy reviewing science fiction
games it sort of frees you up to look at
the design aspects somewhat the downside
is it's very hard to find real guns from
the Royal armories collection to show
you I'm just gonna show you this briefly
this is the ACR we actually recorded so
much with Jonathan about valorent that
will be publishing two episodes for the
game so make sure to subscribe if you
want to check out the second episode
later on and if there are any other
games guns and mechanics that you guys
want to see Jonathan breakdown let us
know in the comment section below right
let's take a look at the guns of valorin
foreign
not a real gun but it does sort of look
and feel quite like a real gun looks
like it might be made or the receiver
might be substantially polymer which is
I think never going away we're probably
stuck with plastic guns because it just
offers so many advantages in terms of
weight cost oh and maintenance certainly
over the old wooden stocks and things
much much better it has a bipod and a
big old c-mag on it so sort of a
lmg-esque thing and it's absolutely
spewing what looks to be 5.56 millimeter
casings out of the side of it with very
little recoil interestingly so I don't
know if there's supposed to be some
science fiction recall damping thing
going on there's no massive muzzle
device on this that would allow that
kind of control equally I don't know if
the player is supposed to be amped up in
some way on this but the thing that
strikes me the most about this are the
sights because I'm always going on in
Sci-Fi games about well would we have
iron sights well this still has iron
sights has some very H and K style
diopter-esque sites with a drum at the
rear and a round protected post to the
front albeit the post is sort of picked
out in in bright yellowish but what's
interesting is there's a device on the
top that opens up and projects a
holographic site now I don't know about
it being mechanical and opening up but
uh I am very much of the mind that we
will have maybe not built in forever but
hopefully your gun would come with a
stock site that can be swapped out in
future via some Universal mounting
system so opening up like a flower not
sure about that but it kind of looks
cool but definitely projected
holographic Optics fit my preconceptions
of what a science fiction gun should be
foreign
on this one because I want to see the
the gun in profile maybe it's cheating I
don't care so you've got a lever action
rifle but a very science fiction looking
leader action rifle now I have seen a
few we haven't really got any here at
the armories yet but I'd like to get a
modern take on a lever action maybe a
modern Marlin ideally the one from
Jurassic World
this is more science fiction looking
than that though but it's not about
science fiction but the the basic
barreled action and the lever and all of
that underneath the stock absolutely
standard is now this isn't any one type
of modern lever action it's it's sort of
an idealized version but with the pivot
Points of the lever where it is it's
more like a Marlin than a Winchester say
and then a tiny little scope on top
which does not look very futuristic at
all it looks like quite a first half of
the 20th century low power optic so
we'll see how that functions this the
iron sights are very reminiscent of
modern sporting rifles again kind of
racking my brains that this might
actually be based on something if it is
the stock isn't part of it and that's
kind of the overwhelming aesthetic that
we see
foreign
defeated okay I really like the feel of
this sounds might sound weird but I
think for those of you who play games
all of you well understand what I mean
it has sort of weight and the sound
effects help with that the loading it
all feels very plausible I say feels
very plausible because these are firstly
pointed bullets which are not a good
plan in what is presumably has to be a
tube-fed gun problem being the point of
one bullet goes up the back end of the
one in front and detonates the thing in
the tube and there's enough pressure
containing ability within that tube for
it to hold the pressure and then let it
go and so the tube explodes in a shower
of metal and plastic and pain not good
uh if you look at full-on rifle rounds
for lever actions you'll see that they
have a flat tip for this reason so
that's one problem the other is that
whatever these are they look like 762 or
something similar maybe a sporting round
equivalent in power to that they are too
long I think to fit five in a tube mag
could be wrong but certainly from this
perspective
um looks like that's maybe a three round
mag at best I would suggest now I'm
always looking at how things might
operate in real life if these things are
real you know that and this looks like
it might it's got um a reciprocating
bolt like a Browning or various other
lever actions that use a um straight
four and aft bolts rather than the
toggle of the original Winchester's and
a dropping locking block at the rear the
only thing that gives me pause for
thought is that we seem to have a big
old firing pin sticking through that
block and I'm not sure how that would
work in reality but it may just be that
I haven't had enough caffeine today yet
foreign
straightforward pump action shotgun is
really quite interesting
um I had to watch that a couple of times
but um we have in our little shooting
range demonstration this is the only way
that clicked for me we've got a firing
mode an ALT fire where it shoots almost
like a rifle but then only after a
certain distance does it burst into a
pattern of shots effectively so it's
almost like a way of carrying your
Buckshot to a further distance but still
having that spread effect I don't think
I've seen that before that seems new to
me and the ability to do one or the
other it's not like you're locked into a
shotgun that only works that way such
that at close range if we wouldn't get
the spread but a longer range you would
so you'd have to use it like a long
range gun this means you can use it
either way now for some reason it's
reminding me of the old Flintlock knock
volley gun which I always think of as a
way to do the same thing to carry a
pattern of shot much further out because
we didn't have our modern ammunition
technology so they instead braised seven
barrels together to create a pattern at
maybe 100 yards something like that and
this seems to be a way of achieving the
same thing albeit this is made up but
something new and different which for a
pump action shotgun in a game is pretty
hard to pull off otherwise it seems
pretty standard but let's have a look at
what the effect is
gotcha
Spike down a
we've got some some rounds in the Shell
carrier that I don't think this has a
practical effect in the game but some
are facing one way up some are facing
the other now I've seen people use that
as a way to not only visually but
um in a tactile way work out which
rounds are which in their shell holder
so if they're trying to use slugs or
Buckshot they know that their slugs are
one way up and they're buckshots the
other way up this is probably just a
visual reference taken from a real gun
and that may or may not have been what
they were doing doesn't seem to be what
we're doing in the game Rail and of
course we have a highly cosmetic safety
on the top of the action
um why would we use that in a shooter
foreign
this is a bit of a trend with with your
science fiction video game shooter is
you can see or you can you think you can
see influences humans love pattern
recognition me included and we will try
and say that's that's based on this
that's based on that sometimes you don't
know unless you ask the developers
because as in this case I think I'm safe
to say that the barrel assembly and the
slide of this must surely have been
borrowed from the Desert Eagle but
they've changed enough about it that
this no longer actually really resembles
a desert eagle they have scaled down
that massive Barrel so a distant cousin
of the deagle I would say but it almost
makes it look more like an automag or a
wildly Magnum and it has a suppressor
relatively futuristic looking and that
we already have big blocky suppressors
like that uh so the controls yeah the
controls again look like they've been
translated over from the Desert Eagle
the mag release is again different so
it's sort of the mullet of of video game
pistols it's gone Desert Eagle on top
and something else down below that's not
a very good analogy let's see it shoot
yeah it's an intriguing Weapon It's got
all those Desert Eagle design cues but
the scale of it the fact that it has a
suppressor and the way it's being used
it comes across more like a futuristic
high standard more sort of sneaky beaky
and slim line the other little detail I
noticed is that the rear sight stays put
now there are on um custom 1911 2011
pistols designed called the site Tracker
Where the front sight is part of the
barrel assembly and the whole rest of
the slide reciprocates this has a rear
sight tracker so instead of the rear
sight being part of the side assembly
and it moving back and forth not really
a problem at pistol engagement distances
for accuracy this must be reaching for
that extra accuracy by keeping both the
front side and the rear sight in place
in space if that makes sense obviously
recoil will make them both move but
relative to each other they're not
moving like a real Desert Eagle for
example
foreign
science fiction games well this is what
I've got I focused quite a bit on uh how
things actually work but in general it
sort of frees you up to to look at the
design aspects somewhat the downside is
it's very hard to find real guns from
the Royal armories collection to show
you I'm just gonna show you this briefly
so this is the I'm sure some of you
already recognized this is the ACR this
um and I mean this in a I don't mean
this in a critical way generic
futuristic looking assault rifle now it
actually has design elements of the scar
a bit the only thing I can really put my
finger on actually would be the magazine
the bumper floor plate on that magazine
and the design of that magazine looks uh
very scar we can we can point to at
least one design feature this fence
around the magazine catch is very
reminiscent of the Phantom here and the
general lines of it but then to be fair
the hk433 uh the scar has already
mentioned brand two we are sort of
converging on a fairly standard AR-15
ergonomics ar-18 gas system polymer low
receiver aluminum upper I mean I don't
know what the what valorance guns are
made out of exactly I think there's a
lot of polymer but it's a little hard to
tell it's a reasonable take on a near
future ish infantry rifle because hey
they already look like this why wouldn't
they look like that in however many
years
foreign
now a couple years ago something popped
up called the AK Alpha with an F to
modernize the AK with a more modern
architecture and there are a couple of
other attempts that are probably going
to become more significant so rather
than a U-shaped metal receiver and then
a sheet metal top cover with all sorts
of problems for making that robust
enough to mount a an optic on you go for
a two-part upper and lower receiver like
a lot of other designs and this has done
that however it hasn't taken full
advantage of that Advantage it still has
very AKs lines on the top and it has
just a cut out for a rather limited site
option it's our generic holographic site
that we see throughout the game that
would limit what you could mount on the
gun that's why you normally see long
strips of rails on the top of the rifle
so that you can put more than one site
on there if you need to Thermal infrared
or you can mount one on site further to
the front or the rear depending on your
eye relief your body shape or with that
now we also have what at first glance
looks like quite a modern butt stock but
doesn't really look to have any
adjustable features and that's that's a
big No-No right now it's a very AK
magazine almost identical to an AK
magazine I would say and the curvature
looks like 7.60 by 39 and now to be fair
that AK caliber has never gone and it
has a very AKs actually it looks a bit
gillily at the front with that gas block
with the sight mounted on top of it and
a take on the AK-74 muzzle brake with a
few Liberties taken overall very
recognizably in AK but it has that sort
of AK Alpha Gilly or Ace
modernized look
10 seconds left
right we've got some sort of a variant
design of this thing that looks
radically more futuristic more science
fiction even this though still has a
hint of the top cover release button
that's on the back of the AK to remove
the top cover now neither of these
designs need that so it's this is a
Trope of video game gun design and
probably other thing designed too where
design cues get abstracted from
reference images and placed somewhere on
a weapon and then melded into the design
so you can go oh that looks like that
but it doesn't have a functional purpose
now they're the base design looks like
that button might do something we don't
know what but it is a riff on the on the
release capture of the AK top cover and
then this more advanced looking version
it really is just a sort of design
feature
aesthetic design feature like like the
lines of a car body it doesn't do
anything for the gun itself as far as I
can see still uh even even Firearms
today their receivers can and are can be
and are designed for aesthetic reasons
the the ability to put a barreled action
in a shell effectively means that your
outer body can be whatever it needs to
be we're seeing that from everything
from the table onward the F2 F2000 uh
the HK 433 is is essentially a part of
the reason for that redesign is so that
it looks cool and futuristic so it isn't
just games that that do require
Aesthetics
Spike down B all right those were the
guns of valorent a totally new
look on me always fun to go through
um I hope you enjoyed it if you'd like
to support the work that we do at the
armories we'd love you to come and visit
one of our three sites if you can you
win we're in the UK so that's a problem
for some of you otherwise check out our
website our various social media outlets
and of course I will see you again next
time
[Music]
thank you
foreign