History Main / ItemCrafting

* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyTacticsA2'' has the bazaar, which is one of the only consistent ways to get good equipment. Rather than doing the crafting yourself, you trade away materials you've acquired to allow {{Non Player Character}}s to create new items which you can then buy.

** ''VideoGame/DragonAgeOrigins'' has item crafting available to the player character and companions; different skill trees enable the creation of different items. Herbalism is one of the most useful skills because it saves money on health and lyrium poultices, and can even be done at a profit. Poisons takes a close second in terms of usefulness; you can beat the entire game without using Poisons, but if you do use them they can be a nice way to help. Traps, on the other hand, are ''very'' situational and, unless you know what's ahead, you won't find them as easy to use. [[spoiler: It has been discovered, however, that you can surround a certain BonusBoss with traps; when she turns hostile, she sets them all off.]] The ''Awakening'' expansion adds Runecrafting, which is ungodly expensive but can be quite a boon. Again, it's entirely optional, but it can be helpful when you get some powerful runes to put on your equipment.

** Different kinds of wooden logs and branches from trees and be taken to Justin and crafted into furniture.

[[folder:Literature]]
* A curious example is within the tale of Ilvermorny School on ''Pottermore'' (a part of the ''Franchise/HarryPotter'' ExpandedUniverse). The Witch Isolt Sayre and her Muggle husband James Steward had trouble getting their newly-founded magical school off the ground, due to there being no wands or wandmakers in America. However, Isolt learned how to harvest wand cores and James learned how to create wands with Muggle wood carving techniques. The merging of magical and Muggle techniques created very powerful wands.
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* The Slime Science system in ''VideoGame/SlimeRancher'' allows you to make various contraptions that are placeable at certain points around the world. They range from useful item collectors for other slime science projects, to various helpful machines such as a turret that shoots water and a item transporter, to novelties like a basketball hoop. The challenge comes in the fact that these things require a lot of money to buy the blueprints for and a lot of various resources like Plorts and miscellaneous items from the aforementioned collectors and around the world to make them. This along with the cost of buying the Lab area the crafting station is placed in makes this a late-game project, unlike other crafting systems. This mechanic is overhauled in [[VideoGame/SlimeRancher2 the sequel]]; it's now available from the start, not every invention requires pink plorts, and all of them cost money to build.

* ''VideoGame/{{Terraria}}'' is all about exploration through digging, so finding ore and creating items with it only makes sense thematically.

** SpiritualSuccessor ''VideoGame/StardewValley'' features an extensive crafting system by which many varieties of item can be created from resources you acquire, including (but not restricted to) fertiliser, seasonal seeds, structures, furnishings, decor, and equipment for refining raw materials and processing artisan goods. It's also possible to cook meals from produce, fish, and foraged food after you upgrade your house with a kitchen.

* Some of the best equipment in ''VideoGame/GalaxyOnFire 2'' can only be obtained by first purchasing (or getting as part of the main storyline) a blueprint for it. Then you find a shopping list of "ingredients" you need, most of which can be obtained on {{Space Station}}s throughout the galaxy. Metals can be obtained either by finding them in markets or [[AsteroidMiners mining them on asteroids]]. Some items can also be obtained as drops from destroyed enemies. You can also disable them with EMP and loot more than from a destroyed ship, provided you have the top-level TractorBeam and scanner. The Khador Drive, which allows instantaneous jumps to any system (and the only way to reach isolated systems) avoiding the HyperspaceLanes, cannot be purchased and must be constructed. Interestingly, the game makes it easy by allowing the player to ship collected items to wherever the equipment is being constructed for a small fee, saving the player from constantly going back and forth. The ''Supernova'' DLC has certain volatile items that no one will agree to ship for you, meaning you have to transport them yourself in a NitroExpress through pirate-infested systems. There's no limit to how many items you can construct, although it takes time for items to be restocked on stations. The game justifies the crafting by claiming that these items are either prototypes that haven't yet hit the market or illegal (although no one will call you on it). You also can't make a living this way, as the constructed equipment is worth considerably less than what you spend on the "ingredients".
* In ''VideoGame/ShepherdsCrossing 2'', you can no only cook food, but you can also craft things like baskets and sacks at your work table. If you're playing as a female character, you'll also need to wash and spin wool to weave into blankets if you want to [[RomanceSidequest get married.]]
* ''VideoGame/{{Littlewood}}'': The player has the ability to craft construction materials from raw materials at a processing plant, build houses for the town's new residents, build furniture for said new residents and themself, and cook.

** 2nd edition revises the crafting system so that characters can salvage raw materials and even reverse engineer enemies' equipment.

* In ''VideoGame/PuzzleQuest: Challenge Of The Warlords'', players can combine three types of Rune Stones (via a mini-game) to produce various uber-weapons, magical armors and other stat-boosting items. However, forging items using the more powerful Runes can be [[LuckBasedMission quite the crapshoot]] (as is actually getting the runes).

May be a form of EquipmentUpgrade if ingredients are used to improve a preexisting item. If the product of the crafting requires significantly less in terms of time and effort than one would expect from the finished product, you need to JustAddWater. See also DesignItYourselfEquipment. SocketedEquipment is a form of this, allowing for some customization but generally without the GameBreaker possibilities. Similarly, CookingMechanics involve the cooking of various dishes. Compare SpellCrafting.

* ''Webcomic/{{Homestuck}}'' features punchcard alchemy, which allows characters to combine their items in various configurations to create sweet loot (provided of course that said characters have sufficient resources). Most of the characters' equipment is created through various iterations of combinations and recombinations of this sort.

* ''VideoGame/{{BioShock|1}}'''s U-Invent machines allow you to craft ammo and various other items out of items that are apparently useless at first, like enzymes, batteries and glue. Items include gene tonics and usually the best ammunition for each weapon.

* ''VideoGame/LegendOfMana'':
** The game has an enormous variety of crafting systems, which you can use to make everything from weapons to armor to musical instruments to golems. And you can use any material to make any of these things; want to make a stone shirt, or a sword made of hemp? In this game, you can. And you can power up all these items, by infusing them with ''fruit'' (grown in your own personal garden).
** Weapon and Armor crafting deserves special mention on how ''insanely deep it is''. Not only there's a huge list of Materials, you can power up your gear (known as Tempering in-game) with every item in the game that isn't a material. Each one of these items may grant you stat bonuses, elemental affinity, immunity to status effects or insert a Card in your equipment (up to 3 Card slots [[GuideDangIt plus one that is completely hidden]]), which also can do all of this and much more, up to and including ''completely changing the rules of tempering altogether''. By the way, these are the ''basics''. In a game whose average weapon has around 50 Attack Power, Tempering can make one with above '''800''' plus insane stat bonuses[[labelnote:*]]And you'll ''need'' it in No Future mode[[/labelnote]].

* ''VideoGame/WurmOnline'' takes this concept UpToEleven; just about every single inventory item can be crafted, and indeed has to be if you don't want to spend real-world money or earn some cash working on someone else's construction project. Yes, this game faithfully simulates ''gruelling manual labour.''

* Taken UpToEleven in ''VideoGame/EvilIslands'', as you have to craft even ''spells''. Also disassemble a suit of armor and then assemble the metal into a sword and a helmet.

** ''VideoGame/RuneFactory'' games, being Action RPG/Simulation hybrids, take it UpToEleven from Harvest Moon's level; the player has the ability to make food, weapons, and medicines (and other various potions that help with farming). There are a couple of shops in the town that sell food and weapons and medicines, but they're either [[KarlMarxHatesYourGuts impractically expensive]] or useless once you've gotten past the first dungeon; anything worthwhile, you'll have to make yourself.

[[folder:Action Adventure]]

[[folder:Wide Open Sandbox]]

** ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaSkywardSword'' has a shop where you can use stuff that RandomlyDrops from enemies to [[EquipmentUpgrade improve your items]], making them tougher (shields are breakable in this game) and sometimes adding new abilities. There are at least two upgrades (Beetle to Hook Beetle and Digging Mitts to Mogma Mitts) that have to be acquired elsewhere, though. The nearby potion shop can use insects caught with your bug net to improve the potions they sell.

* In ''VideoGame/MegaManZero 4'', Zero can bring enemy parts that were RandomDrops to Resistance engineer Cerveau to create various chips that can be equipped to either Zero's helmet, body, or boots. Some recipes can be obtained from [=NPCs=], but the rest of it is GuideDangIt; a wrong combination can result in making "Junk".

[[folder:Role Playing Game]]

* ''VideoGame/BaldursGate 2'' and ''The Throne of Bhaal'' have two characters (a dwarven smith in the former, an imp in the latter) who can reforge certain potent items if you bring the various bits and pieces of them that are found in various locations throughout the game world. It is not actually the player character who does the crafting, but the end result is much the same.

* You can do this in ''VideoGame/{{Skyhill}}''.

* The alchemy pot in ''VideoGame/DragonQuestVIII'', which returns in ''VideoGame/DragonQuestIX'', allows you to combine items and equipment to create more powerful ones. Some of the recipes are intuitive (combining two {{Healing Herb}}s creates a more powerful one, go figure) and others can be found scattered around the world, but the most powerful ones tend to be a GuideDangIt.
* ''VideoGame/DragonQuestXI'' offers crafting via the Fun-Sized Forge. By playing a short mini game, you can craft items you have a recipe for, even upgrading items as high as +3. ''All'' of the game's best gear is made or upgrade in the Forge, including the InfinityPlusOneSword.
* And then there's the ''VideoGame/DragonQuestBuilders'' spinoff series, which might best be described as ''Minecraft'' with a plot.
* ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}'' allows you to build weapons from junk. You have to acquire a "blueprint" for each one, so there is no customization. A few of the weapons do border on GameBreaker, though. The Dart Gun, Shishkebab, and Nuka Grenade come to mind. In addition, ''The Pitt'' has an ammo-crafting machine.
* ''VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas'' greatly expands the crafting system seen in ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}'', although most of the weapons you create are expendable explosives. The crafting system is now primarily based on your level in certain skills, Repair and the new Survival skill being the requirements for the majority of recipes. It's a bit more balanced too; there are fewer blueprints and the really strong recipes require high skill levels. New Vegas also introduces cooking (allowing for superior food items to be made with the various raw ingredients around the game world) and handloading (allowing for ammo to be broken down into raw materials, collecting empty casings from hunting and firefights and reloading them, and building more powerful or specialized ammo types). A good survivalist will be able to save a lot of caps on food and ammunition by hunting and recycling empty casings/spent power cells.
* ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 4}}'' took the whole thing to the extreme with an extensive crafting system that allows players to use all of that useless junk lying around to customize weapons, armors, and power armor beyond most anything that can be found just in drops or stores. Said junk can also be used in the new settlement building system to allow players to acquire food, beds, water, and plastic flamingos.
* The only way to get new weapons in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVIII''; also, the synthesis shops in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyIX''.
* ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublicIITheSithLords'' allowed you to break down items into components and rebuild items using them. The number and quality of components you got and the quality of the crafted item depended on your crafting skill.

* In ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyX'', weapon customization, in patient (some would say masochistic) hands, allows for weapons which surpass (or have a more specialized, and therefore useful function than) the so-called [[InfinityPlusOneSword Ultimate Weapons]]; in the case of Tidus, especially, spending the endless hours grinding the Monster Arena is simpler than the maddeningly frustrating Perfect Chocobo Race. As there are no 'Ultimate Armors', as well, crafting is the only option to such an end, and indeed, to defeat some of the game's more superpowered enemies, crafting armors becomes a necessity. Likewise, creating overpowered characters relies on this.

* ''VideoGame/{{Persona 3}}'': [[UpdatedRerelease FES]] allows you to forge weapons at the Antique Shop by fusing your Personas with 'Nihil' weapons dropped by a MetalSlime. Most of the time the result is a fairly generic weapon with a special effect dependant on the Arcana of the Persona used, but certain combinations will yield [[InfinityPlusOneSword mythological weapons which are easily the best in the game]].
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIIRevenantWings'' takes this to ridiculous levels, not only requiring that you have the proper materials to craft each new item, but also the recipe books from which to work. (Apparently Cu Sith is incapable of original work.) Also, although each weapon/shield/item requires a combination of three materials to craft, the item's final strength is governed by the quality of the materials that went into it. (Gets insane in later levels, when high-quality {{Unobtainium}} requires eons of grinding and much save-point abuse to acquire.)
** Though on the upside, being able to name the weapons you craft could be surprisingly entertaining.

* You can fuse talons and saddles in ''Final Fantasy Fables: VideoGame/ChocobosDungeon'' to get any set of traits you want on one item.

* The gaiden game for the Franchise/ShinMegamiTensei series, ''Revelations: The Demon Slayer'', does this with monsters...

* The ''Franchise/KingdomHearts'' series has synthesis shops, run by the Moogles.

* Every game by Gust (''VideoGame/{{Atelier}}'' series, ''VideoGame/ExaPico'' series, etc.) has this.
** The ''VideoGame/{{Atelier}}'' series (and its spinoff, ''VideoGame/ManaKhemiaAlchemistsOfAlrevis'') is built around this. In fact, prior to the 1997 release of ''Atelier Marie'', crafting in [=JPRGs=] was virtually unknown; after ''Marie'' and its sequel went on to sell a quarter-million each partly on the strength of their absurdly deep crafting systems, nearly every JPRG since has featured some kind of crafting or item customization.

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[[caption-width-right:214:[-[[Series/LazyTown It's a piece of cake to bake a pretty cake...]]-] ]]

* ''VideoGame/{{Littlewood}}'': The player has the ability to craft construction materials from raw materials at a processing plant, build houses for the town's new residents, build furniture for said new residents and themselves, and cook.