Ayo the Clown Reviews

Actually a good game, but the pinball level was extremely annoying. It took ages to get out of the pinball machine because you were flying back and forth the whole time. I'm still missing 2 achievements. I have no idea how to do the The Final Final Ending achievement. I think I haven't bought everything in the city yet. According to the guide, you should defeat the final boss a second time. I did that, but didn't get the The Final Final Ending achievement. The only after homework achievement is also missing. I saw in the video that you have to climb up to a point where there are 2 enemies in the wheel and turn off the fire there, but for me there are no platforms with fire at that point. I don't actually want to give a negative review, but the game isn't worth a positive review. I would like to give a neutral review, but that's not possible. If anyone has any tips for the achievement or what you should do, please comment or write to me.

Non-evil clown rep. I love to see it. Seriously though, this game is so wholesome! Everything from the art style to the music to the character designs gives off the vibes of a kid's show from the early 2000s. It's rare that a video game makes me feel as warm inside as this game does. My favorite thing about this game (aside from the good clown rep) is that, as far as I can tell, the game is not going to take a dark or cynical turn. I did a little research just to be sure. It's also not trying to be snarky or self-aware of how childlike its tone is. Instead, this game is innocent in a very sincere way, and I appreciate that. We need more games like this.

This game is broken. Mechanics don't work when you need them to. slides will randomly speed up and shoot you off of the map. Some levels will just freeze when you get to the goal, and if you restart youll end up in a death loop. Got it on sale, still not worth it

Note: entire game was played on the Steam Deck. I've had my eye on Ayo the Clown for a while. The gameplay videos looked like a good time, and reminded me of the Yoshi's Island games. The game recently went on sale (for the first time ever), so I figured why not. So what stands out that's good? -The game is a side-scroller built in 3D, and it actually uses that 3D space, with hazards, enemies, and platforms moving in from the background/foreground. -The level layouts for the most part tend to be pretty good. -NPCs have optional quests. -The ideas and designs around some of the bosses. That all sounds well and good, but the game has several issues, and these are too much to overlook. The controls too often feel unresponsive and unreliable. This is evident from the game's opening menus, when I have to press the A button at least twice to get anywhere. This doesn't get much better in game, as I entered a "farm" level and found that I could not immediately jump out of the truck the game spawned me in; Ayo wouldn't move at all. With some moves, the wall jump in particular, I never had confidence that I would be able to pull off the move before running out of wall, as for whatever reason Ayo has to slide down the wall some distance before the game allows for the wall jump. For yet another example, grabbing onto "mesh backgrounds" requires a button press (RB on the Steam Deck), but too often Ayo would not grab onto the mesh and instead fall into pits. These unresponsive controls make the game more frustrating than it needs to be. Making it even more frustrating is the inconsistent hitboxes/collision. I can jump on an enemy without issue, but then jump on the same enemy at the same angle but get hurt. I can bounce on an enemy several times in a row one moment, but then get hurt the next. Maybe that laser will register a hit, maybe it won't. Maybe that section of wall has collision, maybe it doesn't. Maybe I'll fall through a section of floor when I'm trying to explore these levels. Speaking of levels, while I maintain the layouts are generally good, the levels themselves are often far too long. Many of them could have been split in half and still feel fairly substantial. The camera also doesn't help. It will sometimes get stuck leaving Ayo at an odd (and usually unadvantageous) place on the screen. It's positioning also leads to more than a few deaths, because I knew there was ground beneath where Ayo was, but the game decided the ground was gone, and it was now a pit. I can think of one level in particular, where I had to jump up from the ground and grab onto a mesh above me, and navigate a maze of sorts using those mesh backgrounds. If I missed a jump while navigating that maze, Ayo did not fall back to the ground to let me try again; he screamed as he fell into a pit, and the game started back at the checkpoint. I could make other criticisms, but those seem like nitpicks compared to unreliable controls, inconsistent collision, and a camera that works against the player. These ultimately are why I cannot recommend this game.