The Real Reason .45 Ammo Is Rare in RE Outbreak

109 1 minute read

The scarcity of ammunition for the .45 Automatic handgun in Resident Evil Outbreak is a deliberate design choice tied directly to the weapon’s power and its designated user, Raccoon City Police Officer Kevin Ryman. The fundamental reason for the extreme rarity is that the .45 Auto uses a unique ammunition type that is separate from the more common 9mm rounds used by the standard handguns found throughout the game’s scenarios.

The .45 Auto is Kevin Ryman’s starting weapon. It is significantly more powerful than the standard handgun, providing higher damage per shot and serving as one of the best handguns in the game. To balance this inherent advantage, the developers ensured that its specific .45 Auto Magazine ammunition is incredibly hard to find. Unlike the widespread availability of 9mm bullets, .45 rounds appear only in very limited, fixed locations within specific scenarios, forcing Kevin players to be hyper-conservative with every shot.

Kevin's .45 Auto is one of the game's most powerful pistols; however, most police officers seem to prefer 9mm handguns.
In real life, police forces abandoned this type of weapon in the 1980s due to its low magazine capacity, a detail reflected in the game's scarce ammo.#REBHFun pic.twitter.com/hZmL00vPSx
— SaculMonday (@SaculMonday) October 31, 2025

This weapon and ammunition scarcity is a key pillar of the Resident Evil Outbreak experience. The game is known for its uncompromising commitment to survival horror and resource management. Characters often have minimal inventory space, making the decision to carry a powerful weapon with scarce ammo a genuine tactical trade-off. Furthermore, the game features a realistic reload mechanic where players must load individual rounds into the magazine in real-time, adding tension and reinforcing the importance of every single .45 bullet found across the globe.

THIS IS Our Take

The design decision to make the .45 Auto ammo so rare is a masterful stroke of survival horror tension. If Kevin Ryman, the marksman of the group, started with a highly powerful pistol and plenty of ammo, the core threat of the game would be immediately undermined. By giving the best starting weapon the rarest ammunition, the developers expertly balanced Kevin’s early-game advantage while ensuring all players must still embrace the frantic, ammo-starved resource management that defines Resident Evil Outbreak. It’s a mechanic that truly elevates the constant pressure of Raccoon City.