American game development studio Illfonic is no stranger to asymmetrical multiplayer games based on popular properties. In the past few years, it has released games like Friday 13th: The Game and Ghostbusters: Spirits Unleashed, which take full advantage of the franchises they are based on to provide fun multiplayer experiences. Following the release of the latter, the developer started working on Killer Klowns From Outer Space: The Game, another asymmetrical multiplayer game based on the comedic horror movie released back in 1988, which promises to be great fun.
In Killer Klowns From Outer Space: The Game, players can either play as one of the three Klowns or one of the seven humans in 15-minute-long matches. The match objectives change quite a bit, depending on the type of character: Klowns must kill all humans before they escape, while humans must explore the map fully to gather useful items as well as escape tools that grant access to escape routes.
While the basics of the Killer Klowns From Outer Space: The Game experience are pretty easy to grasp, the game hides a decent amount of depth beneath its crazy surface. Klowns, for example, have a lot of different weapons and tools at their disposal to kill humans. Alongside the Cotton Candy Raygun, which can be used to trap humans inside a cocoon made of cotton candy to be brought to a special machine to level up and unlock more weapons and tools, Klowns can also use the shotgun-like Popcorn Launcher, or the Boxing Gloves and the Mallet to bring the fight directly to humans. Reducing a human's health to zero will also allow a Klown to unleash a hilarious Klowntality to add some juicy disrespect to the kill. Other tools include the Hypnotic Lure, a great tool to have as it forces humans nearby to go towards the Klown that activated it.
Humans may not have the same number of options the Klowns do, but they are not exactly defenseless. Alongside a variety of items that can heal health and grant welcome buffs, humans can also find a variety of weapons to fight the Klowns head-on, including melee and ranged weapons. Once defeated, however, Klowns will respawn after a short while, so the humans' main focus should be getting out of Crescent Cove and not fighting the aliens. Once humans are dead, they will not respawn, and their only second chance depends on the activation of the Resurrection Machine, which can only be used once in a match. Even after a human is dead, and the Resurrection Machine has already been used, they are not out of the match completely. While spectating, it is possible to play several different mini-games that grant dead humans the ability to pass some useful items to humans still in the game. This is an excellent way to address one of the biggest issues in asymmetrical multiplayer games, and it will surely stop more than a few players from quitting back to the main menu once defeated for good.
Having been able to play just two matches together with members of Illfonic using an early version of the game, it is hard to say if the Killer Klowns From Outer Space: The Game experience will stay as fun as it was in my first 30 minutes or so with it, but I feel there's enough craziness to make it a compelling experience, especially if maps other than the Carnival map will feature the same solid design and offer the same number of possibilities to do some crazy mischief. With solid post-launch support, which will include additional content, the game has a very good chance to become rather popular, although it may have a hard time competing with the asymmetrical multiplayer juggernaut that Dead by Daylight is in terms of popularity.
Killer Klowns From Outer Space: The Game launches on PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, and Xbox Series S on June 4th worldwide.
About the author: Francesco De Meo has been covering video games and technology since 2012, starting his career at small outlets like Gamersyndrome and GeekSnack. After joining Wccftech gaming section in 2015, he quickly expanded his video gaming coverage with in-depth reporting, interviews with iconic industry figures such as Grasshopper Manufacture founder and No More Heroes creator Goichi "Suda51" Suda, Resident Evil series creator Shinji Mikami, Team NINJA's president and Nioh series director Fumihiko Yasuda, and Silent Hill creator Keiichiro Toyama, reviews and on-the-ground coverage of major industry events such as Gamescom and E3. When he's not reporting or reviewing, Francesco can be found playing the genres he loves most, spending time with his six cats, reading, writing music, playing guitar and drumming for his progressive rock band.
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