Mechanical Paintball Gun Buyer's Guide

The mechanical paintball gun is a remarkable piece of paintball gear that has evolved with the game and sport of paintball, remaining the backbone of the game throughout! More recently, mechanical paintball guns have become better than ever thanks to a rebirth of competitive and tournament paintball played with paintball guns with no batteries, screens, microswitches or computer screens. Rugged, reliable, simple and affordable while now able to offer performance on-par with many electronic paintball guns, modern mechanical paintball guns are better than ever and a great choice for almost any paintball player!

Affordable Mechanical

There was a time when mechanical paintball guns were the only kind of paintball guns in the world! Paintball started when a dozen people walked into the woods with bolt-action paintball pistols and it wasn’t long after that day in 1981 that the paintball arms race began! Players soon tired of grinding up their fingers working the bolt of their paintball pistols, so they fashioned pump handles to make that job easier. Pump paintball guns followed, and dominated the game until semi-automatic mechanical paintball guns came along, allowing players to shoot paintballs as fast as they could pull the trigger and their air sources could keep up! The mid-to-late nineties saw the first electronic paintball guns rise to the pinnacle of paintball performance, but mechanical paintball guns, thanks to their time-tested and refined operating concepts, stuck around, and remain to this day, the backbone of the game operating in rental fleets as the first paintball gun almost every paintball player will ever use on their first day playing the game.

Modern mechanical paintball guns are some of the most affordable available, like the Valken Blackhawk, Tippmann 98 Custom and the Spyder paintball gun line. These affordable mechanical paintball guns are generally available at around $100 and offer solid, reliable performance for players looking to begin their paintball adventure and learn the game without spending massive amounts. These paintball guns are often able to use either CO2 or compressed air as their propellant source and are semi-automatic, allowing the owner to fire as quickly as they can pull the trigger. With only a few upgrades like an aftermarket, more accurate barrel, these mechanical paintball guns can allow players to fall in love with the game of paintball and grow into the game, upgrading their paintball gun as they go! Many are also available in tactical configurations. For many players who simply enjoy the game in the woods with a few friends, these simple, reliable and affordable mechanical paintball guns may be the only paintball gun they’ll ever need!

Mid-Level Mechanical

In more recent times, mechanical paintball has enjoyed a resurgence thanks to feel-good era of paintball events like the Iron City Classic and the ICPL paintball tournament series that promote paintball tournament competition on wooded fields and mounds fields, or on special speedball fields built from corrugated piping called Hyperball fields. To feed this new need, companies like GOG and Planet Eclipse have brought outstanding paintball guns to market that, while mechanical in nature, offer an outstanding path to upgrades allowing owners to build their ideal mechanical paintball gun that punches well above its weight, with pneumatic, low-pressure operating systems that make them gentle on paintballs.

These paintball guns, the GOG eNMEy and eNMEy Pro, and the Planet Eclipse EMek, are affordable and function well right out of the box, but can be upgraded with new bolt systems, electronic paintball loaders that enable higher rates of fire, barrels and barrel kits for laser-like accuracy, on/off bottle adapters for added convenience and appearance kits to for unique, attractive style! While costing between $150 and $250, with just a few upgrades the GOG eNMEy and Eclipse EMek can, in the hands of an experienced player, make short work of less skilled players using much more expensive equipment and allow players to enjoy a high level of performance at an amazing entry price, and upgrade as they desire or can afford! For players who may want to take their paintball seriously on the field but might not have hundreds or thousands to spend on their paintball gear, there simply isn’t much better in the world than a mechanical paintball gun like the GOG eNMEy, eNMEy Pro or a Planet Eclipse EMek, and Valken has them with all the upgrades necessary to turn them into hardcore mechanical competitors!

High-End Mechanical

With the aforementioned resurgence of mechanical paintball in full swing and growing steadily, many paintball gun manufacturers have jumped on the bandwagon with their full weight, offering high-end, high-dollar mechanical paintball guns with all the standard features and performance serious competitive paintball players have come to expect and demand even from high-dollar electronic tournament paintball guns! These high-end mechanical paintball guns, like the Shocker CVO and upcoming Shocker AMP, and the Planet Eclipse M170R, are cut from lightweight aluminum for rugged dependability without sacrificing strength, offer light, snappy triggers and a list of standard features that include quick, easy field stripping for cleaning and maintenance, spool valve style operating systems that are low pressure and gentle on brittle tournament paintballs, lever clamping feed necks for use with high-dollar electronic paintball loaders, on/off bottle adapters and high-end multi-piece barrels for world class accuracy right out of the box.

Used by some of the best paintball players in the world to play their mechanical paintball, the Shocker and the Eclipse M170R are available in various anodized colors to suit any style, and when used with a tournament-level loader like a Dye LT-R, a Bunkerkings CTRL or Virtue Spire, along with a high quality compressed air system, they’re capable of going toe-to-toe with almost any paintball gun in the world, even their electronic stablemates! While they may not beideal for every serious paintball player, a high-end mechanical paintball gun can offer almost everything a high-end electronic tournament paintball gun can, with increased reliaibility and fewer batteries!