The default weapons are great in Atomic Heart but if you want to shoot EMP pulses from your weapon, you’ll need to do some crafting. The Atomic Heart crafting guide aims to make crafting your dream fire axe easy.
Stuff Needed for Atomic Heart Crafting
To craft new weapons or upgrade them to be more deadly, you need a couple of things:
- Recipes
- Crafting Components
- NORA the crafting station
Combine all of these to take your arsenal of robot-killing to the next level. Adding a new grip to your shotgun will make it behave better, it just handles smoother.
Recipes
The recipes are scattered around the game, they are usually found inside chests and various complexes. Some of them are part of the main story so you’ll get them right on the main path. Some of them require some clever puzzle-solving. While some are simply given to you as you enter a Safe Room making Atomic Heart crafting a little easier.
As long as you love to traverse the off-beaten path and explore, you’ll constantly be getting new recipes for both weapons as well as their upgrades. If you require a specific upgrade, the crafting menu lets you see its general location so tracking it down becomes easier.
Crafting Components
You can’t do much with just the recipes either. You cannot make banana bread without bananas even if you have the recipe. It’s the same when it comes to crafting in Atomic Heart.
The components come in eight different varieties and can be collected from various sources. Looting the floor, drawers, desks, cases, and chests will give you components.
Killing off robots and collecting components from their dead mechanical bodies is also a great way to obtain materials. Don’t forget to loot them after dispatching though. To make things easier, using the scanner in Atomic Heart highlights lootable containers in blue.
Press and hold the interact button to siphon crafting components from the area. Think of it as a vacuum just for crafting materials. This makes the process of clearing out a room of any potential lot a breeze.
You can also break down ammo and healing items to get more crafting components. The Disassembly menu in the crafting station interface lets you break down components. It’s a great way to clear out your inventory and gain valuable and rare materials.
NORA
Head over to any Safe Room in the game and you’ll find a NORA crafting station. The first time you encounter it, a small cutscene will play. After that, you unlock the ability to craft in the game. You can use a NORA station to craft new weapons, make weapon upgrades/mods, and even upgrade your Glove to unlock additional powers.
Atomic Heart Crafting
Inside a safe room approach the big red old-school fridge. That’s the NORA crafting station.
Press the interact button, usually RB on Xbox and R1 on PS.
Now Select the first option, usually, it’s about upgrading weapons. The option text changes depending on where in the story you are.
Once activated you’ll be in the crafting menu. The first screen is about weapons. If you have the recipe/blueprint and the necessary crafting components, you can easily make new weapons. Press and hold X on Xbox and Square on PS to make your new weapon.
Press the RT on Xbox or R2 on the PS to hop over to the next crafting category; Consumables. Here you can make neuromed capsules to heal yourself or dynamo to recharge your energy.
The next section is about ammo, here you can make ammo for your weapons. This is a great way to always have enough ammo for the next fight. It does take up some valuable resources but it’s better than having no ammo in combat.
The last section is about cartridge guns. You can load these in your weapons to apply different elemental effects on enemies.
Crafting Upgrades
Press the RB on Xbox or R1 on PS5 to hop over to the Upgrade section. Here you’ll see the weapons you currently have in your inventory. If you’ve stored a weapon, you’ll have to retrieve it from the storage to upgrade.
Select a weapon to go deeper into crafting. On the left corner, you’ll see different upgrade slots. The number of slots depends on the weapon. For example, the simple MP or Marakov Pistol has 5 slots for upgrades; barrel case, barrel module, cartridge gun, magazine, and aiming devices.
Select the type of upgrade and you’ll see available options. You’ll need recipes/blueprints for the upgrades as well. You can craft the upgrade if you have both the recipe and the required components.
If you don’t have the recipe, the game gives you its general location. You can also press the View Button on Xbox and Track Pad on PS5 to view the location on the map.
Similarly, if don’t have a specific upgrade component, select it from the upper right corner to see where you can obtain it.
Storage/Disassembly
The storage allows you to store weapons, ammo, and neuromeds. This frees up your inventory for more important things.
Press RT on Xbox or R2 on PS5 to move to the disassembly section. Here you can break down items to get crafting materials. The game shows you what you’ll get when you disassemble a weapon, ammo pile, or health item.
Having trouble saving the game? Check out how to Save in Atomic Heart. Playing the game on a Steam Deck? Here are the best settings to use!
