9mm Pistol

Lore & Background

In the world of Serious Sam, the 9mm Pistol is the kind of weapon you find in every military armory, every police cruiser, and every government safe. It is unremarkable by design—compact, reliable, and mass-produced. Sam Stone, a self-described 'serious' individual who happens to be the only one standing between humanity and an alien invasion, treats it with the same casual competence he brings to everything else: a quick draw, a few controlled shots, and a move to the next objective.

The pistol's presence in every entry of the series is a deliberate design choice. Croteam wanted the player to always have a weapon in hand, even in the most chaotic moments when a rocket launcher or minigun is out of reach or out of ammo. The 9mm is the safety net, the 'you will never be empty-handed' guarantee baked into the game's structure. It is the weapon that reminds the player that, beneath the spectacle of exploding tanks and hordes of aliens, the core loop is still about aiming and pressing a trigger.

Over the course of the franchise, the pistol has evolved visually and mechanically in small increments—slightly different models in each title, minor tweaks to fire rate or spread—but its identity has remained constant. It is the quiet, dependable tool in a toolbox full of increasingly absurd hardware, and its very ordinariness is part of its charm in a series that otherwise revels in over-the-top firepower.

In Their Own Story

The dust had just settled on the last wave of alien drones when Sam checked his mag. Empty. The minigun was still cycling, but the ammo counter was blinking red. He reached back, fingers closing on the familiar grip of the 9mm tucked into his waistband. The slide was warm from the sun-baked concrete beneath him. He thumbed the safety, felt the round chamber with a sharp click, and turned to face the next corridor. One round. Two. Three. Each one a small, clean report that cut through the distant roar of the invasion like a pinprick in a storm. It wasn't much. It was enough. He walked forward, pistol low, ready for whatever came next.

Reader's Guide

The 9mm Pistol presents a compact, single-stack silhouette with a short barrel and a rounded slide—immediately readable as a sidearm even in the chaos of a Serious Sam level. Pulling the trigger feels snappy and light: a crisp, single-shot report with a brief recoil kick that nudges the crosshair upward. There is no burst mode, no full-auto option; every round is a deliberate choice.

In terms of damage profile, the 9mm sits at the bottom of the weapon list. Each round deals modest damage, meaning it takes several hits to take down even a basic alien grunt, and it is entirely outmatched against armored vehicles or large bosses. Its value lies in its speed of access and the fact that it is always in your inventory. The ammo type is standard 9mm, and in several entries the pistol carries a generous or effectively unlimited reserve, ensuring it is never a true dead end.

The pistol first appears as the starting weapon on the very first level of each game—you do not need to search for it; it is in your hands from the opening seconds. It is the weapon you will still be using in the middle of a level when your shotgun or SMG runs dry.

Fan verdict: the 9mm is a niche utility pick. It will not win you any 'best weapon' votes, but players who respect a clean, fast sidearm in a pinch rate it highly for its reliability.

Between versions, the pistol has seen minor visual model updates and small adjustments to fire rate and spread, but its role as the lowest-tier, always-available weapon has remained consistent across the series.

Did You Know?

• The 9mm Pistol is the first weapon in the player's hands from the opening moment of every major Serious Sam title, meaning no player in the franchise's history has ever started a level without a gun.
• Despite the series being famous for miniguns, rocket launchers, and other oversized hardware, the 9mm is the only weapon that is strictly semi-automatic with no full-auto option.
• In several entries in the series, the pistol's ammunition pool is so large it functions as effectively unlimited, making it the one weapon you can never truly run out of.
• The pistol's visual model changes slightly from one game to the next, but its in-game role and tier position have remained the same since the 2001 original.