The Binding Of Isaac: Repentance is the third and final expansion for the Binding of Isaac series. It wraps up the story and adds hundreds of new items, trinkets, two new characters, and new paths for the player to take – and there are a lot of new Binding of Isaac Repentance items.
While some fans claim the new expansion is much more difficult than Afterbirth or Afterbirth+, there are many new items that either flat out break the game or combine well with just about anything. Edmund McMillen, the creator of the game, even said that the new meta's difficulty is meant to force fans to try new methods of completing runs.
Updated August 18, 2021 by Erik Petrovich: Part of what makes The Binding of Isaac: Repentance so replayable is the completely unique items that the new DLC gives players. Items like Quints, which create hordes of followers, can be easily broken in The Binding of Isaac's alternate Greed Mode while being not so useful in a normal run. When it comes to Repentance new items, there are still combos that fans are figuring out months after the DLC was released. The best Repentance items fundamentally change how a player gets through a run, like opening new explorable areas or granting an extremely powerful new ability.
12 Quints
- Item Effect: Killing enemies spawns a random, non-moving familiar
- Requirements to Unlock: None, unlocked from the start
The Quints item looks like a group of five grey followers mirroring each other, and its granted passive ability is absolutely broken. Whenever the player kills an enemy, a random familiar will spawn at their death location and fire their respective tears in the same direction as Isaac.
The newly spawned familiars can't move, and they will despawn upon leaving the room. However, using Lilith in Greed Mode gives the potential for twice as many spawned familiars as usual, which piles up exponentially as long as the player doesn't leave the room. Even Greedier mode becomes a walk in the park with this method.
11 Tooth and Nail
- Item Effect: Become invincible and deal 40 contact damage every 5 seconds
- Requirements to Unlock: None, unlocked from the start
Tooth and Nail is a deceptively simple item that can make exploration a little less painful. Every five seconds the player becomes totally immune to damage for one second and will deal 40 contact damage to enemies. This item can be used, when timed properly, to get into Curse Rooms and open spiky chests without taking any damage.
This opens up a lot of doors for players, especially if there aren't many Health Up items in a playthrough. It doesn't have any particularly notable combos except for with the Gnawed Leaf, but the ability to do nothing while dealing small amounts of damage every five seconds isn't worth going for. It's one of the best Isaac Repentance items for its long-term health-saving potential.
10 Eye of the Occult
- Item Effect: +1 Damage, +2 Range, -0.16 Shot Speed, and tears become controllable
- Requirements to Unlock: None, unlocked from the start
The Eye of the Occult item is very similar to the Ludovico Technique except that Isaac can fire more than one tear to control. Additionally, the Eye of the Occult increases Isaac's damage by 1 and his range by 7.5, but it reduces his shot speed slightly.
The tears are controllable while in flight, which are otherwise like normal tears and are affected by Isaac's range – but the item does have special interactions with other items like Brimstone. It's found only in the Devil Room, or with items that spawn Devil Room chests.
9 Rock Bottom
- Item Effect: Prevents all further reduction of stats, Stat Downs have no effect
- Requirements to Unlock: Beat Boss Rush as Jacob and Esau, only found in Secret Rooms
With Rock Bottom Isaac gains a passive item that simply prevents the player's stats from being reduced by anything for the rest of the run. It pairs extremely well with Experimental Treatment by removing all downsides, as the item randomly increases and decreases stats.
However, while the item prevents outright stat reductions (e.g. from pills) it won't stop multipliers from lowering the player's damage. If an item multiplies the player's damage by a percentage below 1, Rock Bottom doesn't keep the original number. It can only be found in the Secret Room.
8 Immaculate Heart
- Item Effect: +1 HP, x1.2 Damage Multiplier, fully heals, and grants a chance to fire orbiting spectral tears
- Requirements to Unlock: None, unlocked from the start, but can only be found in Angel Rooms
The Immaculate Heart gives Isaac a chance to shoot additional tears that orbit around him, defending him from close-by enemies. It also gives Isaac an extra red heart and adds an extra 20 percent damage to his shots.
The Immaculate Heart would be a bit forgettable if not for the damage boost and extra health, and its extra ability to give Isaac orbiting tears bumps it above others significantly. As one of the best Repentance items, it's only found in Angel Rooms.
7 Member Card
- Item Effect: Future shops gain a trapdoor leading to a pricey shop with boss and Devil/Angel Room items
- Requirements to Unlock: Spend 40 or more coins in the same shop (doesn't carry between floors)
The Member Card is an item that opens a special shop underneath the regular shop on each level. The item causes a trapdoor to spawn, which reveals the additional shop. It can contain up to 5 items, including trinkets, items, cards, runes, and various types of hearts.
Each pedestal item in the room costs more than usual, anywhere from 15 to 30 cents for normal items and up to 99 cents for Secret Room items. The Member Card is unlocked by spending 40 coins in a single shop, making it one of the easiest The Binding of Isaac Repentance items to unlock.
6 Genesis
- Item Effect: Removes passives, offers 3 Pedestal Items for each Passive removed, teleports Isaac to special room
- Requirements to Unlock: Beat Greedier Mode as Jacob and Esau
Genesis is functionally a way to reset a run in the middle of the run. It teleports Isaac to a bedroom with two chests, two sacks, a trinket and a trap door that takes him to the next layer down (without having to clear the floor Isaac teleported from).
The item takes away every single item Isaac picked up in the run and offers a choice of three items for each one taken away. At its worst, it's an item that will change how you play the rest of the run. At it's best, it flat-out breaks the game with the huge array of synergies presented.
5 Mega Mush
- Item Effect: Enlargens Isaac, making him invincible, crush objects, deal 1600 contact damage, and other major stat ups for 30 seconds
- Requirements to Unlock: Get every Hard Mode check mark for every character, not including Tainted versions
The Mega Mush is a new mushroom-type item in The Binding Of Isaac: Repentance and, like the other mushrooms, significantly affects the player's stats. When this active item is used, it makes Isaac turn gigantic for half a minute and increases his damage fourfold.
However, while the player is far more powerful and has a much longer range, the tear delay stat is also multiplied by 2.5 times. The slow shoot speed is balanced by the fact that Isaac turns invincible, deals contact damage, and can destroy just about anything in his path. To unlock this, the player must fully complete hard mode with all characters.
4 4.5 Volt
- Item Effect: Dealing damage to enemies charges items, not clearing rooms
- Requirements to Unlock: None, unlocked from the start
The 4.5 Volt is a passive item that changes the way the charge on active items works. Instead of gaining charge when completing rooms or picking up batteries, Isaac's active item charges when he deals damage to enemies.
His item will charge one bar's worth for every 60 damage that Isaac deals to enemies. It should be unlocked from the get-go upon downloading the DLC, and it's one of the Isaac Repentance best items for Greed Mode when paired with an active item.
3 False PHD
- Item Effect: Identifies all pills and makes them negative, giving bonuses depending on which negative pills are consumed
- Requirements to Unlock: None, unlocked from the start
The False PHD is very similar to the PHD item, but with a twist. They both identify pills before they are picked up, but whereas the PHD item gets rid of all negative pills in the game, the False PHD gets rid of every positive pill.
Each pill that would normally cause a stat down also gives Isaac a small permanent damage boost. It gives one black pill when picked up, and can only be found in the Curse Room, the Devil Room, or in red chests.
2 Soul Locket
- Item Effect: Gives future Soul Hearts additional minor stat bonuses
- Requirements to Unlock: Beat Greed mode as Bethany
The Soul Locket is a slow-burning item, but one that becomes more powerful the earlier in the run it is acquired. This item gives Isaac a small increase to a random stat (except health and shot height) whenever a Soul Heart is picked up.
It doesn't apply to alternative hearts like Black Hearts or Bone Hearts, and it doesn't work with items that give Isaac Soul Hearts directly. To unlock the Soul Locket, beat Ultra Greed while playing as Bethany.
1 Sacred Orb
- Item Effect: Item quality across the board is increased, raising the rarity of all future items found in a playthrough
- Requirements to Unlock: Defeat The Beast as Tainted Lost
The Sacred Orb is a very simple but very, very powerful item. When picked up, for the rest of the run every item Isaac finds will be of a higher quality than normal. In the game's code, every item is assigned a ranking from zero to four, zero being awful items and four being overpowered items.
The Sacred Orb will automatically re-roll items with a quality score of zero or one, and has a one-third chance to re-roll items with a quality score of two. It's not a guaranteed victory, but it's incredibly useful to just cut out a huge number of useless or situational items.