The first thing to note about this game is that it was first sold in 1982, and it shows. You get a small box (about 20cm by 15cm) and inside is a photocopy quality half page of instructions and 28, square, screen printed pieces of felt cloth. The cloth is orange and the printing is black - two tone only.

In the end, this is little more than a free form jigsaw -- just as the description says, but a very simple one. You can mix and match to create different looking clowns, and, apparently, you can try to put all 28 squares together to make a single image although I've not spent enough time with it to work it out.

I bought the puzzle thinking it was more like the old felt character games I played when I was a kid -- but they were colorful and you could create lots of different scenes. With Clowns, the number of clown bodies included in the set mean there's only a handful of possibilities. It might keep a 3-4 year old amused for 5-10 minutes OR a real puzzle maniac for about the same time, but the quality of the components is a long way behind what you'd expect to get - frankly, even for the low price. I bought Rivers, Roads & Rails at the same time and for the same toddler, and although the two are a different theme, the quality and interest is incomparable -- Rivers, Roads & Rails, is a beautiful puzzle with really good quality components and much more re-play value.