I played it back in like 2013 or something originally and boy did I play the heck out of it then. Just went back to it today and man, it's as good as ever. The soundtrack is great, the art is phenomenal, the gameplay is as crisp as I remember. It's super short, beat it on normal this playthrough in just under 26 minutes. It seems really inspired by Mega Man almost to a fault at some points. There are a fair few annoyingly difficult jumps where if you don't do them just right you're instantly killed and have to restart the level. Fortunately, the levels are insanely short so that's never too big an issue. Plus, the music keeps going when you die rather than restart every time which is a nice change from some other games in the genre that most people might not really think about. Good game, I love Gunman Clive.

Over the course of the hour it takes to complete, Gunman Clive constantly introduces you to new concepts and mechanics in each bitesize level, but not all of these are executed to the same standard. Some are good fun while others aren’t as polished whether it be through environmental objects not consistently interacting as expected or uninspired level design. Though the aesthetic is very plain, there is something strangely charming about the wild west theme the game runs with and the classic save the damsel in distress story. A nice touch are the additional unlockable characters adding a bit of replay value and variety to proceedings. Gunman Clive is a decent platformer especially considering it was the work of one man, but it doesn’t do enough to separate itself from the countless alternatives on the market.

+Great Value
+Classic Platforming
+Different characters to play
+Nice ascetic look that makes it more of a western
~Short, but sweet

Gunman Clive is a simple indie run-n-gun with a little bit of challenge that is easily worth the $2 (or $5 if you have the HD Collection). What drew me into the game was the sketch-shaded aesthetic that fits the Western atmosphere very well, alongside its music

While the whole game lasts about 30 minutes to complete, it is very replayable with three characters to play as, each control a little differently from the other

There are not a lot of video games where we can play as a duck, we should fix that

i somehow never beat this when i owned it as a kid but it's a decently fun and short classic megaman inspired platformer with a neat style. not very hard, there are a couple moments that'll trip you up but it shouldnt be too difficult to breeze through in like 30 minutes. theres also other playable characters with different abilities which is nice if you ever want to come back to this and boot it up for a quick replay. iirc this game was also like really cheap on the eshop prior to it getting shut down, like 2 or 3 dollars so there was no reason not to pick it up if you had a couple dollars to spare

Beyond a unique, charming art-style, Gunman Clive offers a serviceable albeit remarkably shallow experience: the stages remain of consistently average quality for most of the extremely short campaign with only a few, extremely dull bosses. It offers a nice diversity of enemies, mechanics and platforming twists to keep the gameplay flow decently entertaining, but everything is too streamlined, simplistic and ultimately mediocre to be interesting or exciting in any meaningful way, aggravated by a forgettable soundtrack.

You ever wanted Mega Man but kinda stylised and set in the Wild West? Boy, do I have the game for you! Gunman Clive's a pretty neat hour long thing; simple as all get out with Mega Man being the obvious template for mechanics. You jump, shoot, get shot at, fight the odd boss, you know the rigamarole. You've got alternate guns, the spreader from Contra, a bomb gun and something akin to the Wave Beam from Metroid, but they're treated like schmup power-ups, rather than Mega Man. Kind of a shame, think it might've worked to the game's benefit to have the more traditional robot master weapon acquisition.

But you know what does work for the game's benefit, kinda? The pacing! Every stage is a bite sized challenge, usually only a few screens long. It makes the game go by at an insanely brisk pace, but also doesn't let every level feel like it's quite getting the time it needs to stretch its legs. Kind of a shame, but I suppose something was gonna have to give. One thing's for sure; if I were playing this in between secondary school classes on my 3DS, it'd be like crack to me. The game's got a few kinda irksome sections, to be sure, with spikes instantly killing you in spite of invincibility frames being chief among them. The antigravity section near the end that had me holding left on the d-pad threw me through a fuck of a loop, could've done without that stage, but ya know, every Mega Man-like has a level or two.

But that's kind of the thing. How much of a game can you complain about, when those bad segments are just brief enough to not get on your nerves too much? Combined with the game's dirt cheap price point, it's hard to not at least suggest you give Gunman Clive a shot. If anything, I don't think either my time or money were wasted, and that's always a good feeling to have, even when you're dealing with a game in the lower end of the good half of the review scale.

For being as cheap as a bag of chips this is quite an enjoyable game. Decently challenging and the playable characters are different enough to provide some interesting changes on repeated runs. Which you should replay this game at least twice due to its short length, but this also makes it almost like an arcade game with how quickly you can start up a new run and reach the end a short while later. That's honestly the best way to think of it, a more meticulous and slow paced arcade game with Mega Man like level design.