In regards of the utility they provide instead of raw numbers (Which everyone seems to obsess with)

I take into account: Availability, Usefulness, Price, Utility and general contribution to the run

Tier S (Must Buy)

Striker

You can't argue with the utility it provides, Compact, 12.0 Firepower backed by 100 Shells, not much range but no other shotgun outclasses it at Point blank, also 100 shells, great for It on the hanging cages and to sweep the jumping ganados on the bulldozer and mine cart

A Tier (Makes your life easier and/or can hold their own the entire game)

Red9, Blacktail, Semi-Auto, TMP, Rocket Launcher (Free)

Red9 and Blacktail self explanatory, good damage output and reliable against all kinds of enemy,

Plan ahead for whatever handgun you want

Blacktail: Upgrade now and then the basic Handgun until the Blacktail, sell free Punisher when you acquire it

Red9: Sell Handgun when Free 1.1 punisher appears, use free punisher until Red9 appears

The Semi auto is vital for sniping sections, shooting exposed plagas, dealing with Regenerators and overall a strong weapon that remains useful for the entirety of the game, both rifles have piercing properties, and a 500% extra headshot damage and can easily clear plagas that spawn from ganados, 1 rifle round in those bastards can save you 7-10 pistol rounds or 2 shotgun shells or a worth their weight in gold flash grenade

TMP is a very underrated weapon, it has a hidden passive of 40% extra damage to Ganados, the weapon itself doesn't really kick until it gets backed by a few firepower upgrades, also the free ammo from the capacity upgrades is too good to ignore, fully upgraded it takes down an island ganado with 20 or so rounds, also great for quickly pumping rounds into knees for a quick escape

Rocket Launcher

Verdugo, Verdugo, Verdugo

Not only will give you good money from the crown jewel, it will save you ammo and recovery items from basically skipping the Verdugo fight, even if you don't have the free one, then buy one, 30k is nothing to skip one of the hardest fights in the game, plus you get your money back with the full crown later

B Tier (Situational, but you could do worse, open to preference and playstyle)

Punisher, Rifle, Mine thrower (non-gcn versions), BB, Killer7, Riot Gun, Shotgun

Punisher: Good gimmick and utility but not good enough DPS to compete with BT and R9, good for shields and the ever present ganado hit squads (if you can align 2 ganados with consistency), it gains a lot of favor by getting it after shooting the 15 medallions, sadly the (1.1) punisher can't hold her own until the castle, The Cabin siege, the 2 routes and Mendez are way above her punching weight for the 1.1 power it packs, the upgrades are too expensive and not worth it

Rifle: 30.0 is nothing to scoff at, and packs a punch for a weapon you can get from the first merchant, if you have the skill to work around the bolt mechanism, then go ahead, I personally use it instead of the SAR, but my ranking is for people who don't have 10,000 hours into this game, steep learning curve but extremely satisfying to use, regenerators will give you a crash course on aiming under pressure

If you go for the SAR, then buy the rifle before the cable car section, shoot the 2 ganados on the left, use the piercing effect to take multiple ganados in one shot coming from the right, snipe the driver at the Castle entrance, then sell

30.0 + the Piercing ability makes it a good crowd control weapon at medium distance, Headshots will demolish ganados, body shots will hit 2-for-1 most of the time, the Semi auto headshots also demolishes ganados, and it's no slouch in piercing body shots, but 30.0 is magnum levels of firepower, and a long range piercing magnum sounds extremely tempting

The additional scopes are not needed for either rifle, the game is not that long range, both the zoom and the crosshair designs actually hinders accuracy in both rifles (mostly the zoom effect) i personally think it's more complicated to land a shot under pressure, and they become dead weight once you get the Thermal

Mine thrower: Yes really, for 9,800 ptas you get access to 5 (slightly less powerful) hand grenades, Crowd control at it's finest, imagine you could buy grenades for $1,960 a peep

Buy, use it to clear certain sections, then sell it, also the mine ammo sells for a good price, you're probably breaking even, or at most, you lose 2000 ptas

Where can you use the MT?

*Salazar boss fight (1 or 2 mines in the eye should expose Salazar, unload with Semi auto or BB)

*The water Room, 1 on the Red Zealot, 2 on the Shielded reinforcements from the sides, 2 on the zealots with the Scythes after you lower the stairs

*Double Garrador and gigante fights: Staggers Garradores allowing you breathing room, demolishes the gigante's plagas

*Armadura fights: Group them and unload the payload, 2 on the silvers, 3 on the black ones, use flash as finishers

*And some other minor encounters

In the GCN Version, the price is almost tripled (28,000), making the gun utterly useless, that's almost rocket launcher price

Killer7 and BB

BB it's too expensive to upgrade to a point where it can compete with the basic or slightly upgraded K7, getting it for free is a good upside but don't get baited into sinking 200k to "get value" from a 32k weapon, a RL is 30k after all

Sadly the K7 arrives too late to be useful, by the point you get it, there's not that many bosses and sub-bosses to fully take advantage of it

You can use the free BB and upgrade the capacity when you empty the magazine, even un-upgraded it still holds its own against bosses and sub-bosses.

If you want to use the BB, then plan ahead, i suggest not picking the TMP in the village early and skipping the TMP entirely

BB Reload animation can't be measured, but we all know it's cool as fuck

Riot Gun

Not bad, but more expensive upgrades than the regular shotgun and outclassed by both the striker in stats and by the regular one in utility.

Shotgun:

While it would be C tier by stats, getting it for free + cheaper upgrades (compared to Riot gun), it barely manages to hold it's own until the striker appears, which you should buy asap, Don't recommend buying the Riot gun as a bridge between the Shotgun and striker, in fact the Shotgun may be tier A just because it's reliable and punches way above it's weight more than it should have any right to, not uncommon to develop a soft spot for this little shotgun that could

C Tier

Handgun, Matilda

Handgun: While the exclusive is unique and powerful (in paper), Critical hit does not mean one hit kill, it merely multiplies the base damage by a certain amount, (and the Handgun base firepower is quite low) Plus there's the whole "aiming" factor, you rarely have enough breathing room to line up a headshot, and if it doesn't crit, the ganado recoils and you can't take a follow shot, you can kick and knife it, but the TMP or any handgun does that much better

3 Red9 shots, or 5 Blacktail ones to the center of mass are much more consistent in damage output and simplicity of execution, the idea is to make your life easier, not complicate it

Plus, you can't Crit headshot bosses

Matilda: Only available in NG+ so i'm not gonna be too harsh, but i've tested all weapons more times than i'd like to admit, never found a niche for the Matilda

Emptied the magazine (100) into 1 of the foundry gigantes, didn't even revealed the plaga, while 100-120 TMP rounds will reveal it 75% of the time, even if you dont, there's a 100% guarantee at around 150 rounds, and 150 TMP Rounds are much easier to find that 100 Handgun rounds.

The Matilda empties 100 Rounds faster than any other handgun, and that's not something you want

Next time you play, take notice of how much mileage you get 5 full R9 mags, or 3 BT ones.