Like any great spaghetti western, Gunman Clive is painstakingly slow to start and ends with a giant robot boss battle. And that's essentially the game in a nutshell: a western with robots. And ducks, a lot of ducks. 

Or so the game (and it's sequel) would like you to believe. The most recurring enemy in this game are ducks and for no reason other than to have a sense of quirkiness in the title. Because quirkiness equals triple A gaming these days! 

You'll notice this review is a bit tongue-in-cheek so far, and these sentences are rather short and succinct. To the point. It's almost like I'm reviewing a game that can be beaten in a half hour or something! 

There's nothing wrong with quirkiness and tongue-in-cheek humor if it's done well, and in the case of Gunman Clive, that's exactly the case. Except for the ducks. Why all the ducks? Ducks didn't exist in the Wild West! Okay -- so, neither did robots or lasers. 

Hey! It's a boss battle already! It's a review! Aw man. . .  I wanted it to be a duck in a spaceship. Wait -- nah, I'll save that for my next review. 

Gunman Clive is an independent video game developed by Horsberg Productions and released for the 3DS, PC, and smartphones worldwide. I'll be reviewing the 3DS version here. 

Alright! See you next mission! 

No, but seriously, this game is short. Each stage can be beaten in (roughly) a minute, and there are (about) 30 stages. Counting potential deaths, you're looking at a playtime of 40 minutes at max. So, the game's short, okay, awesome! But how is it? 

Well, it's awesome! And sufficiently so. The graphics are nice, with a superb sketchy aesthetic that combines 3D graphics on a 2D plane. The music is outstanding, and the level design is nothing short of brilliant. Well, about that. 

Every 5 stages is a boss battle. The boss battles are easy. The stages are short. 

GC starts out slow, as mentioned before, and it's almost droll, and bland. If you're not careful, you'll likely be bored to tears within minutes, but stick with it. I promise it jumps up in creativity around the third set of levels. But. . .

That's... kinda the problem. It starts out with your very basic platforming elements, bottomless pits, enemies to halt your progress, and three powerups to help you on your way. And for the most part, it stays like this for the remainder of the game. 

But eventually, new mechanics are brought into play, not necessarily innovative in and of themselves, but they're done incredibly well in GC that it's hard not to feel as if you're playing something new for the first time. 

And that's.. another bit of a problem. The game feels too familiar at times, and you can tell that this was designed with late 80's and early 90's platformers in mind -- with nothing to remind you that you're actually playing a 3DS game in 2013. 

I applaud Horsberg & co. for evoking that sense of nostalgia within me, but that's just it. This game survives largely on nostalgia and nothing that is unique to Gunman Clive. Oh, sure, you have robots in a Wild West setting, but that's a little too Wild Wild West for me. Oh, sure, you have a spread gun and explosive bullets and laser bullets -- oh, wait, Contra. Oh, sure, you have gravity lifts and the ability to walk on the ceiling -- ah, man, that's been done in too many games to count. 

And it's a true shame, because what is there is, surprisingly, really, really good. There's nothing inherently wrong with Gunman Clive other than a lack of identity. The controls are tight, the graphics are beautiful, the soundtrack is amazing, and the story's nice and short. To the point. 

I can't really say much else about the game, as it is pretty short, but a 2$ price tag will usually get that. 

Closing thoughts? Do I regret purchasing Gunman Clive? Absolutely not. It was a wonderful experience. Will I play it again? Even with the inclusion of two other characters, the Mayor's daughter (who just plays like Peach from SMB2 with a gun) and a duck (essentially pacifist mode), probably not. The game isn't different enough with the other characters to warrant any spectacular experience from it. The levels are still the same, the powerups are the same, the story is the same (though, reversed in Cowgirl Peach's case), it's just Gunman Clive with friends. 

Now if only there were dinosaurs. 

ARedLetterDay :

Hey, this is detailed - I'll say that to start! I like how you put your personality into it, made the review come to life. You made the game sound pretty good, but I'll probably end up passing on it because I don't really use my 3DS much anymore.

I know it's just a personal opinion, but the format drove me up the wall haha! It wasn't bad, I'm just used to the review being like, walls of text haha!

Hey, thanks for the review of my review! It was very informative!

Honestly, I'd say try it anyways! You also have it on PC and smartphones if you'd rather experience the game there. It's fairly cheap across all platforms so it's definitely not a waste of money. 

As for the format, yeah -- ha. . . , sorry about that! It drove me up the wall, too, but I figured since there wasn't much I could say in the way of positives or negatives, why bother making it a wall of text review? It'd just be padding out and it'd made the review itself seem very artificial. Being a writer, I can't stand reviews like that. 

But yes! Go on! Try the game. You definitely won't regret it, but you won't be coming back to it. 

That's a pretty good review you made there. I wasn't super interested in Gunman Clive before I read this. Now, I probably won't buy it mainly because I already have a ton of 3DS games and I've got more on the way that I want more. Still, I'm glad to have read this review, and I hope you'll make more of these in the future.

I loved how you introduced your game; your humorous tone is delightful. However, when you started describing the game proper it felt as it you rushed it. You only give a line or 2 for each metrics. Maybe that is because the game is as short as you say...

janus :

Pretty much, yeah. It's hard to talk about a game in-depth that can be beaten in the timespan of an episode of The Simpsons.