Unbelieveably NERF started out as a failed caveman game – the foam was used to great rocks, but the inventors saw people had more fun throwing the “rocks” around than playing the game and so the NERF foam was launched as a safe foam ball.

These balls morphed into various shapes before the first NERF guns were released in the 90s. From these humble origins they grew and developed and now there is a range of rapid fire, fully automatic NERF machine guns!

But which ones are the best for foam flinging fun?

N-Strike Elite HyperFire

The Hyperfire has essentially replaced the RapidFire as the N-Strike Elite fully auto blaster. It features some very cool space-aged styling and a 25 round drum magazine. This is an increase from the usual18 round magazines and it needs it as it can get up to 5 rounds per second!

As well as firing 50% more rounds per second than the RapidFire it is also more accurate as the flywheels are angled to spin the darts.
On the downside, I find it very uncomfortable to hold, but it is not designed for adult hands, and it can be a bit fussy with worn darts, but it is a mini-masterpiece of foam firing engineering!

NERF Mega Mastodon

The Mega range are essentially N-Strike Elite on steroids. The darts look very similar, just bigger….a lot bigger!

Most of the Mega range is just bigger versions of the N-Strike Elite blasters, eg The Mega CycloneShock is essentially just a bigger N-Strike Elite Disruptor. However there is one blaster that stands out as being nothing like any other blaster – the Mastodon.
This thing is HUGE! Hasbro don’t tend to use metal if they can help it, but this has metal catches for the sling, so you can be sure they are needed.

The Mastodon is fed from a large, 24 round revolver style turret, which is loaded by pushing darts in from the front. It chugs through these at about 4 rounds per second and the effect of these oversized darts richochetting around is immensely imposing.

Yes, the Mastodo is big, heavy, unweildy and impractical but it is just so much fun! If it wasn’t for my next choice, this would be the blaster I pick for maximum attack, however there is another…

NERF Rival Nemesis

The Rival range was developed by NERF for older kids, aged 14+ as an alternative to AirSoft. The Rival range fires what NERF call “high-impact rounds” which look like foam golf balls. These rounds are far more accurate and consistent thean either the Elite or Mega rounds and they are fired at around 100FPS – around 30FPS higher than the Elite blasters.

This in itself is impressive and the first full-auto Rival blaster, the Khaos, was impressive, featuring huge 40 round magazines and awesome power and accuraccy. However it has now been eclipsed by The Nemesis.

The Nemesis features a hopper of 100 rounds, which it can dispatch at a rate of over 4 per second. The hopper design is far more pratctical than the massive magazines of the Khaos, it has better ergonomics with things like sling points and a better stock, and it is lighter.

Just looking at the Nemesis made me want one, but the first time I got my hands on one…..it was just awesome! Nothing else can live with its insane firepower – you can simply let fly a hail of darts or pick off your opponents with it’s pin-point accuracy.

Yes, it is expensive and the delayed trigger action (something shared with the HyperFire and Khaos) are a little annoying, but everything else is just pure pleasure!

The Two big Rival blasters can also be fitted with a NERF rechargeable battery pack (you can get non-NERF branded ones for the HyperFire) which will pay for themselves very quickly as both the Khaos and Nemesis take 6 “D” batteries to operate and they eat them pretty fast. The rechargeable pack also has a higher output so it allows the blasters to fire faster and harder too, it is a really good upgrade.

Verdict

Only a few years ago NERF released their first auto blaster, the RapidFire. Since then things have moved on fast. A few short years later and the engineering has progressed massively. The latest generation are quieter, faster and down-right meaner and none of them are meaner than the Nemesis!

This is a guest post and you can find out more about the best NERF machine guns on Blaster Piece