Best Upgrades and Upgrade Priority Guide

In the Dead Space Remake (2023), it's best to plan your upgrade priority to ensure you don't waste Power Nodes on inefficient bonuses. Read on to learn more about upgrade priority, the best item and weapon upgrades to get first, and how to max out all upgrades!

Upgrade Priority Guide

Dead Space Remake Upgrade Priority
Save Power Nodes for Extended Weapon Circuits Prioritize Suit Health Upgrades Boost Plasma Cutter Damage and Capacity Stick to Upgrading Four Weapons Upgrade Kinesis Range By Chapter 6 Improve Stasis on Higher Difficulties Minimize Oxygen Upgrades

Save Power Nodes for Extended Weapon Circuits

The Dead Space Remake introduces Weapon Upgrades for each of Isaac's weapons, which expands their upgrade circuits with more options. Due to this, we recommend sparing a few Power Nodes until you unlock your first round of Weapon Upgrades in Chapter 2 and Chapter 3.

Reserving your Power Nodes until this point provides you with better upgrade paths to follow and ensures that you don't spend them on avoidable and inefficient upgrades.

All Weapon Upgrade Locations

Prioritize Suit Health Upgrades

The best long-term upgrades you can work toward unlocking are Health Upgrades for your Suit. With enemies taking more punishment and dealing more damage as the game goes on, increasing your health to improve your survivability is never a bad idea.

Health Upgrades Restore HP

In addition, buying Health Upgrades for your RIG at the Bench fully restores Isaac's HP. Remember this tip whenever you find yourself severely wounded with a lack of Health Recovery items but have a spare Power Node on hand.

All Suit Locations

Boost Plasma Cutter Damage and Capacity

To ensure that you have a solid and reliable weapon that can pull its weight from the start to the end of the game, we recommend investing in Damage and Capacity upgrades for the Plasma Cutter.

Since the gun already has a relatively quick reload speed and rate of fire, it's much more efficient to prioritize using your Power Nodes on these two stats.

How to Get the Plasma Cutter

Stick to Upgrading Four Weapons

Since the game has a limited amount of Power Node drops and provides you with only four weapon slots, we highly recommend sticking to a loadout of four weapons.

Having four powerful weapons that cover multiple combat situations is much more ammo and upgrade efficient in the long run compared to having a wide array of weapons with marginal upgrades.

Upgrade Kinesis Range By Chapter 6

We also suggest placing a point into your Suit's Kinesis Grab Range by Chapter 6. Taking this range upgrade for your Kinesis Module will give you an easier time dealing with the upcoming Leviathan and Leviathan Remnant boss fights.

In addition, the extended Kinesis range is an excellent quality-of-life upgrade in general, allowing you to pick up dropped items, boxes, and explosive canisters from farther away.

Improve Stasis on Higher Difficulties

When playing through the game above Normal difficulty, we suggest placing a higher emphasis on Stasis Duration and Stasis Energy upgrades and taking at least one point in Stasis Size.

With the game offering fewer resources and deadlier enemies on Hard and higher, the extra time and space that an upgraded Stasis Module provides can be life-saving.

Minimize Oxygen Upgrades

When entering environments without oxygen, an ample amount of Oxygen Tanks and Oxygen Recharge Stations are placed throughout the area, so upgrading your suit's oxygen capacity is generally inefficient. We recommend only getting Air upgrades after you've finished upgrading the rest of your loadout.

Best Weapon Upgrades to Get

Top Weapon Upgrades For Each Weapon
Heat Accumulator (Plasma Cutter) High-Yield Grenades (Pulse Rifle) Angled Launcher (Ripper) Gellified Hydrazine (Flamethrower) Diffraction Module (Contact Beam) Precision Lasers (Line Gun) Subsonic Oscillator (Force Gun)

Heat Accumulator (Plasma Cutter)

The Heat Accumulator's special upgrade applies a damage-over-time effect to each of the Plasma Cutter's shots, making it even deadlier and allowing it to take down Necromorphs using less ammo.

This upgrade is also particularly useful in dark rooms, as it causes bullet wounds from the Plasma Cutter's shots to glow bright red for an extended period.

How to Get Heat Accumulator

High-Yield Grenades (Pulse Rifle)

The High-Yield Grenades' special upgrade provides the Pulse Rifle with increased grenade blast radius for its secondary fire, improving the crowd-control capabilities of its Proximity Mines.

Obtaining this upgrade also opens up two Damage nodes for the Pulse Rifle's upgrade tree, making it a worthwhile upgrade to find after getting Master Override Security Clearance.

How to Get High-Yield Grenades

Angled Launcher (Ripper)

Like the other Ripper weapon upgrades, the Angled Launcher provides additional sawblade ricochets for its alternate fire, making it a stronger firing mode to use in narrow corridors.

On top of this special bonus, the weapon upgrade also opens up two Damage and Capacity nodes, which makes it a more important upgrade to find compared to the other two.

How to Get Angled Launcher

Gellified Hydrazine (Flamethrower)

The Gellified Hydrazine is an excellent upgrade to get for the Flamethrower, as it enhances its crowd-control potential by increasing the duration of its Fire Wall.

In addition, you can find the upgrade in Chapter 3, allowing you to have a solid sidearm for keeping Necromorphs at bay early in the game.

How to Get Gellified Hydrazine

Diffraction Module (Contact Beam)

The Diffraction Module's special upgrade greatly increases the explosion size of the Contact Beam's secondary fire, letting you hit more foes at once with its devastating Asteroid Cutter.

This weapon upgrade also opens up a few Primary and Secondary Fire Damage nodes, making it an excellent upgrade to look for to round out the Contact Beam's damage output.

How to Get Diffraction Module

Precision Lasers (Line Gun)

The Precision Lasers' special upgrade improves the Line Gun's Laser Traps to shoot out three targeting lasers instead of one, improving the weapon's area denial and crowd-control capabilities.

Getting this weapon upgrade also opens up Damage and Reload Time nodes for the Line Gun, letting it boost the weapon's damage output even further.

How to Get Precision Lasers

Subsonic Oscillator (Force Gun)

The Subsonic Oscillator's special upgrade adds damage over time to the Force Gun's Gravity Well secondary fire, stacking damage on top of an already-powerful crowd-control ability.

It also opens up two Damage nodes for the Force Gun's upgrade tree, making it an excellent upgrade to pick up at the Store immediately after obtaining the weapon in Chapter 6.

How to Get Subsonic Oscillator

How to Max Out All Upgrades

Speedrun Playthroughs on Easy

There aren't enough natural Power Node drops for you to fully upgrade your loadout in a single playthrough. However, you get to keep your inventory, upgrades, and Credits in New Game Plus. This allows players to max out all upgrades after multiple playthroughs.

It is highly recommended to speedrun on Easy if you only wish to farm for more Credits and Power Nodes before taking on harder difficulties.

New Game Plus:
Rewards, Changes, and What Carries Over

Dead Space Remake Related Guides

Dead Space Remake Tips and Tricks

Beginner's Guide

Dead Space Remake Tips and Tricks
How to Reload	How to Route Power
How to Save	How to Save Ammo
All Difficulty Settings	Impossible Mode Rewards and Changes
Enemy Weak Spots	How to Heal and Recover HP
How to Use Kinesis	How to Use Stasis
All Missable Content	How to Force Enemies into Gravity Panels
Best Settings for PC	Best Settings for Consoles
Best Quality-of-Life Settings	List of All Unlockables
Scan RIG to Unlock Workstation	Platinum Guide: How to Get 100% Completion
List of All Collectibles	Can You Respec?
Full Interactive Map

Story Puzzle Solutions

Dead Space Remake Puzzle Solutions
How to Activate and Get Past the Centrifuge	How to Fix the Comms Array

Gameplay Tricks

Dead Space Remake Gameplay Tips
Where to Find the Peng Treasure	All Schematic Locations
What to Buy in the Store	What to Sell in the Store
How to Farm Credits and Get Money Fast	How to Get More Ammo
Upgrade Priority Guide	Best Weapons: All Weapon Tier List
All Security Clearance Locks and Rewards	Circuit Breaker Locations
How to Increase Security Clearance	All Master Override Door Locations and Rewards
All Marker Fragment Locations	All Secrets and Easter Eggs

Trophy Guides

Dead Space Remake Trophy Guides
All Trophies and Achievements	How to Rip Off Limbs with Kinesis
How to Stomp Enemies	How to Play Zero-G Basketball
How to Survive the Shooting Gallery	How to Pin Enemies