From the creative mind of Edmund McMillen came a dungeon crawler inspired by The Legend of Zelda, loaded with religious, astrological, pop culture, and toilet humor references. The Binding of Isaac was released in 2011 and has undergone a complete re-release since, along with four expansions. The latest of them, Repentance, was released at the end of March of 2021 and has received many updates.
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Each playthrough is a new experience, with every room and floor being randomly generated. The list of achievements, collectibles, and enemies is ever-growing. If you are lucky enough to unlock or stumble across certain items, though, your run is likely to go far better. Some items can only be unlocked by finishing the 20+ endings in the game, but some of the best can be found during a first playthrough of the game.
Updated September 2022 by Doruk Kaptan: The Binding of Isaac is quite possibly the most influential roguelike of the past decade. With an incredible amount of content being added to the game and great community interaction by the creators of the game, it has become the favorite of many indie-game fans over the years.
Several changes were made, and tons of new content has been added through expansions, DLCs, and even mods. Thus, The Binding of Isaac has become a huge game with practically infinite replayability. With over 700 items currently, some are bound to outshine others in terms of strength.
25 Glowing Hour Glass: It's Rewind Time
Glowing Hour Glass offers you one of the most powerful abilities in The Binding of Isaac: a chance to fix your mistakes. Say you lose too many hearts during a boss fight and miss the Devil or Angel Room. Or say you take a mystery item, and it turns out to ruin your game. With only a three-room charge, this active item can undo any of those actions by rewinding time and returning you to the last room you were in.
Suppose you don't like an item in a Treasure Room. In that case, you can also use Glowing Hour Glass to prevent yourself from opening the door in the first place, increasing your chance of finding powerful astrological items in Planetariums.
24 Mutant Spider: Quadruple Your Tears
It's always useful to cover ample ground with your tears in the chaotic dungeons that make up this game, and the Mutant Spider is a great way to do so. While it's nothing too spectacular visually, being able to spray four shots in a sweeping arc can be very efficient in staving off pursuing foes.
This item is great on its own, but it comes with a decrease in your tear rate that's nothing to scoff at. If you can combine it with at least one item that increases your tear rate again, Mutant Spider can be a run-saving item. More tears are always fun, so that also makes this item desirable.
23 Anima Sola: Shackle Your Enemies
From the fiery pits of hell emerge the red-hot chains known as Anima Sola. You'll get a lot of experience using this item as Tainted Jacob since it's his "pocket" active item, but it only meets its full potential when you start using it with other characters. Activating it will shackle the enemy closest to you, preventing them from moving and attacking for five seconds. This still leaves the enemy vulnerable to your tears, so you can get in a few safe hits before they're unfrozen.
Anima Sola can even prevent bosses like Hush from firing their tears or Delirium from transforming and teleporting. But the best feature is how it recharges: instead of having to clear rooms to use the item again, it recharges every 15 seconds. These two factors make it an invaluable item to use against end-game bosses.
22 4.5 Volt: Damaging Enemies Recharges Active Items
This is perhaps one of the most situational items in the game, but finding a good use for it lets you break everything. Found quite commonly in the Shop, this battery item prevents your active items from charging normally and instead makes you gain charges by hurting enemies. This item heavily relies on your active item since not every item will benefit from charging through damage.
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Because the damage dealt by active items like Mega Blast, Crack the Sky, and Shoop Da Whoop will recharge the item in question, you'll be able to use it many consecutive times against bosses. This alone is enough to make 4.5 Volt worth it, but with either the Doorstop trinket, the Mercurius item, or a golden bomb, you can walk in and out of the same room to gain infinite charges on almost any item.
21 Tech X: Turn Your Tears Into A Laser Ring
Tech X is an upgrade over previous technology items — the familiar single-direction laser is turned into a slow-moving ring with a near-infinite range. The longer you charge the ring, the larger it becomes and the more damage it does. But be warned: only the outer section of the ring deals damage, and it passes through enemies and obstacles, so you'll have to adapt to a new firing method.
Tech X is also a great item to pair with status effects like fire and poison since the laser ring can inflict damage on enemies more than once as it passes through them. With no drawbacks, this is for sure a great tear replacement.
20 Holy Mantle: Negate Damage Once Per Room
There aren't many bells and whistles to this minimalist item, but it's suitable for helping Isaac survive. This blessed shield protects Isaac from taking damage by deflecting one hit from almost any source, including those pesky Spiked and Mimic Chests. This may not sound like much, but what's really handy is that the shield will be restored each time another room is entered.
This not only gives it longevity as a life-saver, but it also allows Isaac to enter Curse Rooms without getting hurt. Holy Mantle can also be used offensively when paired with the right items, such as Midas Touch, which will instantly turn foes into gold following the nullified first hit.
19 D Infinity: All The Dice At Once
As a rule, any item that gives you more choices is incredible in The Binding of Isaac, and the D Infinity is the epitome of that rule. Only found in the Secret Room, this active item lets you access all the dice in the game for a range of different reroll effects. You can reroll items with the D6, pickups with the D20, your stats with the D8, or your entire run with the D4.
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Swapping between the different effects is as simple as pressing the button to swap cards, but you'll only be able to tell what die you're swapping to if you know how all the dice items look. Don't let that stop you from picking up and experimenting with the D Infinity because it has insane potential once you know how to use it.
18 Mega Blast: Huge Laser Beam, Huge Damage
Mega Blast is the mother of all damaging active items. You want damage? This one dishes it out like it's nobody's business, assaulting enemies with a gigantic laser beam that nearly covers the screen. You want even more damage? You can carry on firing the beam for 15 seconds while you walk through different rooms.
Mega Blast's main drawback is that it has a 12-room charge, but if you time it well enough, you can recharge it almost halfway before the beam goes away. If you've ever wanted to become a final boss, this item is your best chance.
17 The Mind: Knowledge Is Power
Similar to other excellent roguelikes, The Binding of Isaac has Secret Rooms packed with goodies on every level. Exploding certain walls can reveal these rooms, but because bombs are a limited resource, you won't always be able to find what you're looking for. However, with The Mind, things become much easier. This Angel or Treasure Room item has the combined effect of all the mapping items in The Binding of Isaac, revealing the location of all rooms on the floor.
By knowing exactly where everything is, you'll have the power to avoid dangerous rooms, make a beeline for items or the boss at any time, and bomb open every Secret Room with 100 percent accuracy. Traveling faster through the floors will also help you get to Boss Rush or Hush before they become inaccessible, so The Mind provides no shortage of benefits.
16 Revelation: Holy Beam Of Death
An awesome new addition to the Repentance DLC, this item impresses with an array of perks. These include the ability to take flight, two soul hearts, and most critically, a powerful beam that blasts all in its path. The holy beam needs to be charged and can only be unleashed by releasing the fire buttons, but it doesn't replace your tears or reduce their fire rate.
Since enemies in its path are inflicted with damage equal to Isaac's damage stat, Revelation is a powerful offensive tool. This already potent beam can be further augmented with items like Spoon Bender, which adds a nifty homing feature to the laser.
15 Brimstone: Replace Your Tears With A Demonic Blood-Laser
Brimstone is a fan favorite and is found exclusively in Devil Rooms. This upgrade will change your tears into a charged blood-laser beam that passes through obstacles and enemies. The beam covers the distance of an entire room, so it's useful for attacking enemies from far away, and much like your normal tears, the attack becomes more powerful as you collect damage upgrades.
If you pick up two Brimstone items in one run, or if you use the active item Sulfur while holding Brimstone, Isaac spews out a much wider and much stronger beam. And if you manage to get an extremely high rate of fire with items like Soy Milk or Almond Milk, the beam won't need to be charged anymore, as holding down the fire button will make you fire this deadly laser indefinitely.
14 Lil Dumpy: The Second Best Defensive Familiar
Lil Dumpy received a complete overhaul in one of Repentance's patches. Lil Dumpy was once an obnoxious, albeit cute familiar that wandered around the room randomly and farted on enemies, often pushing them into you. But like a phoenix, Lil Dumpy has since risen from the ashes of mediocrity to become one of the best defensive familiars in the game.
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The critter will stay directly behind you until an enemy, or a tear gets too close to hitting you, in which case it will blow them away with a fart, preventing you from taking damage. This fart will also propel it across the screen, leaving it unable to help you until you retrieve it. Far from the joke of an item it once was, Lil Dumpy is now awesome enough to rival Holy Mantle.
13 20/20: Double The Fun
20/20 is not exciting at first glance, both mechanically and visually. These reading glasses give Isaac double tears, and that's it. It's definitely less exciting than Mutant Spider and Inner Eye, which give Isaac quadruple and triple tears, respectively.
However, 20/20 stands out by not having a single drawback. The other tear multipliers come with an impactful tear rate down but not 20/20. It will instantly bump up your damage output and tear effect infliction. Hindsight is 20/20, and so is one of the best items in The Binding of Isaac
12 Birthright: Character-Specific Upgrades
Ever wish picking your character meant more than a different starting item and slightly different stats? With Birthright, this wish can become a reality. This item's effect changes based on your character to enhance their abilities: Magdalene gains one red heart container and the ability to gain 18 hearts instead of 12, while Eve gains the effects of whor* of Babylon and Dead Bird without needing to lose hearts.
Birthright is always an obvious purchase since even if you don't know how your character will change, it will always be for the better. While not all characters are at the same level of strength, with Birthright, all will be better than before.
11 Death Certificate: Take Any Item In The Game
This DLC item has quickly become one of the best Binding of Isaac items. Death Certificate transports Isaac to an abandoned version of the Home floor, which brings the highly useful perk of being able to pick just about any item you want. This can certainly turn the fight in your favor, as you'll be able to hone in on some of the best items the game has to offer.
Only one item can be selected, but having this vast array of choices at your disposal is still quite handy. As an added bonus, there are also a number of pickups and chests to rummage through on the Home floor.
10 Abaddon: Evil Is Just Strong
Abaddon may not be the best at any of the things it does, and there are better defensive, offensive, and utility items. However, Abaddon does all of that to a more than adequate level, and the combination of all of these things in a single item is worth mentioning.
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Abaddon gives Isaac, damage up, speed up, black hearts (removing red hearts), and even a chance to shoot fear tears. It is a definite pickup, barring a few builds that would hurt from losing their red hearts, and is undoubtedly one of the strongest items in the game.
9 Psy Fly: The Best Defensive Familiar
This trusty fly familiar can go a long way in taking a lot of the heat off Isaac, despite its small size. This orbital pet will swiftly fly around and deflect all enemy tears en route toward hitting Isaac. This deflection also shifts those tears into homing tears that inflict two damage on enemies.
This fly is not infallible, as foes in extremely close range or unleashing a barrage of fire may be too much for it. Psy Fly is also a living creature, so it needs to take breaks every now and then. But generally speaking, this item makes for a great defensive option that can go a long way towards survival.
8 Death's Touch: Scythe Tears
To begin with, Death's Touch is so cool. Instead of shooting tears, Isaac begins shooting large, piercing scythes once you take this item. The scythes come with a decent damage buff but lowers your tear rate ever so slightly.
The key thing here is large tears that pierce. With so many tear effects in Isaac, piercing enemies and landing many hits are both useful. While not game-breaking on its own, Death's Touch combines incredibly well with many lower-tier items, turning it into an excellent pickup for any run.
7 C Section: Isaac Shoots Fetuses
This Treasure Room item is gross by description, which is nothing out of the ordinary for The Binding of Isaac, one of the strangest, most unique, and brilliantly disgusting games in recent memory. Its damage potential, however, is astronomical. C Section cuts a line down Isaac's stomach so he can fire floating fetuses at his enemies in the place of tears. These fetuses home in on enemies and deal constant damage to them for a few seconds, applying any of Isaac's tear effects in the process.
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C Section also has an unusually large selection of synergies for a tear-altering item. The fetuses can carry and swing a sword with Spirit Sword, emit rings of lasers with Tech X, or split into loads of smaller fetuses with The Parasite. As gross as this item may be, don't let that be an excuse for passing up a free win.
6 The Wafer: Minimize Damage Taken
If you take contact damage from a boss or any damage after the Depths II, you'll take a whopping one heart of damage. Unless you have The Wafer, that is. This ceremonial cake effectively doubles your health in later sections of the game by reducing any instance of damage you take to half a heart of damage (though, unfortunately, this doesn't change Rotten Hearts).
This may not sound very different from Holy Mantle, but The Wafer has many more applications. You can use Demon Beggars, Sacrifice Rooms, and Blood Donation Machines twice as often, get more benefits from items that do self-inflicted damage, and just generally play a lot riskier. If you're looking for protection, there's no better option than The Wafer.
