Arcade Adventures: Ninja Clowns

Sun, 10 May 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Ninja Clowns
Release Year: 1991
Developers: Strata
Genre: Beat ’em up
Players: 2 (co-op)
Platform: Arcade - M6809
Ports: N/A

The side-scrolling beat ’em up is one of the most popular genres of arcade game. Several have gone down in history as true classics of the genre, and even some of the most iconic games of all time: Final Fight, Dungeons & Dragons: Shadow Over Mystara, Streets of Rage. Ninja Clowns, a 1991 effort by Strata (an offshoot of Golden Tee Golf developers Incredible Technologies)… is not one of them.

You’re in control of a nameless clown (or a palette swap of him in 2-player mode). You’ve got a simple attack string, some jump attacks and a desperation move - a kind of breakdance attack that seems to be infinitely spammable as it doesn’t cost health to use, unlike most other games. Aside from some weapons to pick up, like the classic clown kit of a spray water bottle or boxing glove on a stick, that’s all there is to it: use this limited, repetitive moveset to beat up everything in your path. Speaking of repetition, while there are a total of nine levels, five of them are recolours of the earlier ones, making it feel like you’re playing the same thing over and over again.

Graphics are hit-or-miss. On the one hand, there’s some decent imagination when it comes to basic enemies and bosses. You’ll fight businessmen, mechanics, carnival sideshows, hippies, the police, and Elvis impersonators, all drawn in an exaggerated comic style. Bosses include mechanical contraptions, a wizard and a giant spider, but most disturbing of all is the giant chicken lady who assaults you with eggs fired out of her… well, guess. But none of the sprites have nearly enough frames; everything moves in a jerky, flickering way. It’s like they drew only the bare minimum of frames to achieve motion and called it a day.

In the end, that’s the overall feeling of Ninja Clowns. It’s got all the right elements of a beat ’em up, but half-arses almost all of them, resulting in a mediocre experience elevated only by its madcap graphics. And you know the worst part? The clowns aren’t even ninjas. They failed at the most basic requirement of a game titled Ninja Clowns, and that takes a special kind of incompetence.

This was an Arcade Adventure brought to you by myself and the amazing Alma! You can see our playthrough on YouTube below:

Strata on GamingFluid

Arcade Adventures: Ninja Clowns

Screenshots