Handgun (Resident Evil 4)

The "Silver Ghost" is Leon S. Kennedy's starting weapon in Resident Evil 4 and his primary weapon in Resident Evil: Degeneration, and was designed from the ground up by the gunsmith Joe Kendo in an attempt to create the ultimate tactical handgun. Like the majority of handguns in the series, it fires 9x19mm Parabellum ammunition.

Design


The Silver Ghost is often mistaken for a longer variant of the HK USP. Aside from added length however, a comparison reveals a plethora of discrepancies not readily visible to the untrained eye. Ryoumura Jyoshin (the weapon designer for the Devil May Cry, Biohazard, and Dino Crisis series) claims that he designed the Silver Ghost himself with no individual base model, though he admits that the USP was a source of aesthetic inspiration. Anatomically, the Silver Ghost bears a resemblance to the Smith & Wesson Sigma, especially in the slide, magazine, and lower frame. However, it is shown with a hammer as opposed to a striker. This, along with the controls (slide release, magazine catch and safety) all bear resemblance to the Ruger P85. The grips are wood framed with polymer panels and a central medallion on each side, similar to the design used on the Samurai Edge grips. The slide is stainless steel, likely for aesthetics, and the barrel is threaded for suppressors. Magazines are stainless steel and double stacked. A bullet-time shot from Resident Evil: Degeneration reveals the Silver Ghost rifling pattern to be a 9 groove conventional pattern with a right-hand twist and approximately a 10 inch pitch.

Gameplay
Being Leon's starting weapon, the player receives it for free, but it can also be purchased from the Merchant for 8,000 ptas, and it takes up 6 spaces in Leon's inventory (3x2). The Silver Ghost costs 198,000 ptas to upgrade, and when fully upgraded, has a resale value of 103,750 ptas.

It is the handgun with the most unsteady aiming in the game. Since it is officially the first gun Leon uses in the story, the unsteadiness seems to point to Leon's nervousness when he first enters the village.

Albert Wesker uses the fully upgraded Silver Ghost in the Mercenaries Mini game, albeit equipped with a removable supressor. The suppressor takes up 2x1 blocks of inventory. It is an optional attachment, and can be removed by the player at any time. It also is very effective at dampening the sound of each shot, meaning that Ganado are not alerted to Wesker's presence by the sound of gunfire. This allows the player to covertly take out Ganado until one of them raises the alarm, at which point the suppressor becomes pointless. While the suppressor does keep the Garrador from hearing the gunshots, this is only relevant during the a small part of the Mercenaries minigame. ( However, some players observe that the supressor seems to increase the critical headshot chance of the Silver Ghost, but this is more likely a function of the fact that Wesker's handgun is fully upgraded, which increases the chance of a critical headshot by five times.)

Upgrade Chart



 * Cost is in parentheses*

|Level| Firepower     | Firing Speed  | Reload Speed | Capacity     | |    |                |               |              |              | |  1  | 1.0            | 0.47          | 1.73         | 10           | |  2  | 1.2 (7,000)    | 0.40 (5,000)  | 1.47 (4,000) | 13 (4,000)   | |  3  | 1.4 (10,000)   | 0.33 (12,000) | 0.87 (10,000)| 16 (6,000)   | |  4  | 1.6 (15,000)   |       -       |       -      | 19 (8,000)   | |  5  | 1.8 (18,000)   |       -       |       -      | 22 (10,000)  | |  6  | 2.0 (20,000)   |       -       |       -      | 25 (12,000)  |

The Exclusive Upgrade for the Silver Ghost increases the chance for a critical headshot by x5. A critical headshot will instantly kill the enemy. The plagas will still appear, but less often.

Trivia



 * The Silver Ghost handgun canonically replaces the Heckler & Koch VP70 as Leon's prefered primary gun in the story.
 * No matter what gun Leon has equipped, in cutscenes where Leon uses a gun, it is always the Silver Ghost. He carries it in his drop leg holster.


 * There is a laser module attached to the frame, and a pressure switch affixed to the grips (these are strips that only activate the light or laser when the user applies pressure, and cut off when the user releases). In Degeneration, although retaining identical aesthetics, this module is changed to a flashlight.


 * When playing the Shooting Gallery mini-game provided by The Merchant, the Silver Ghost is one of the weapons usable when choosing Sniping Weapons. It has a capacity of 16 rounds, stock firepower, and reloading speed 1.47. This may possibly hint at the "real capacity" of the weapon, although this isn't for certain as the other weapons have capacities well past normal limits.


 * In Resident Evil: Degeneration, Leon uses the Silver Ghost as his main weapon, as well as having a Glock 30 as a backup.
 * The words "Kendo Custom Shop" can be seen engraved on the slide.


 * Leon himself never utilizes the threaded barrel in either Resident Evil 4 or Degeneration. It is only utilized by Albert Wesker for attaching a suppressor.


 * Wesker is seen using his suppressed version again during Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles, though an explanation as to how he obtained it as it is never given.
 * In the PS2 version of Resident Evil 4 the Silver Ghost's lower barrel is missing. However when equipped with a suppressor the lower barrel reappears.


 * The Silver Ghost makes a brief cameo in the first teaser trailer for Resident Evil 5, where Chris uses one outfitted with a compensator. It is left out in the final version of the game, however.
 * In Marvel vs Capcom 3, the Silver Ghost is seen used by Chris Redfield as his handgun.

Replicas


A limited run 1/6 scale model was released in Japan with preorders of the Resident Evil 4 PS2 game.

The January '06 issue of ARMS, a Japanese airsoft magazine, contained a Biohazard 4 special which included an article over a replica of the Silver Ghost built by the staff of ARMS in conjunction with Ryoumura Jyoshin. A translation of the article may be viewed here.