Klaymen (derived from clay man) is the protagonist of The Neverhood. The game starts when Klaymen is first born. Klaymen wanders around The Neverhood and soon discovers that the king Hoborg has been overthrown by Klaymen's brother Klogg. Klaymen is told the story of what happened by his cousin Willie.
Character Description
Klaymen has a human-like form and is made of different colours of clay. He, unlike Willie Trombone, wears very limited clothing except for the brown brief-like garment that he wears. Klaymen takes his time when walking and performs actions slowly, but efficiently. Klaymen has three buttons on his chest that serve different purposes, only one of which is normally seen. Pressing the right-side button opens up Klaymen's stomach area in which he can keep various objects such as Willie's water beaker or disks. When the player does not perform an action for a bit of time, Klaymen uses his other two buttons to perform non-essential tasks that do nothing contributory to the game. Klaymen is normally quiet and does not speak with the exception of screaming while attempting to avoid the Weasel (as well as falling out of the Neverhood after diving down the drain), telling Hoborg his name in the Good Ending, and yelling and laughing evilly in the Bad Ending.
Birth
In the Neverhood, people are born from seeds that come from Hoborg's crown. Before Hoborg was overthrown, he dropped a seed out of the crown without Klogg noticing. The seed jumped out of his frozen hand towards Willie after Hoborg fell asleep. Willie took the seed and threw it on the ground in the Nursery and Klaymen was born.
Adventure in The Neverhood
After Klaymen's birth, he wakes up in the Nursery and starts to explore the Neverhood, the deserted neighbourhood he finds himself in. He slowly discovers more and more parts of his world and by picking up disks that were left scattered over Neverhood, he learns about the unfortunate events that happened there: Klogg, Klaymen's evil older brother, overthrew Hoborg, their father and creator of the world, and Klaymen's cousin Willie Trombone relies on him to defeat Klogg and save the world.
Soon Klaymen meets Big Robot Bil, Hoborg's and Willie's helper who had been made by Klogg to work for his side, and turns a switch in him back from bad to good. Klaymen, Willie and Bil head for the castle, where Klogg and Hoborg are dwelling. Klogg sees what is happening and sends the Clockwork Beast to stop them. Bil manages to defeat the Beast, force-opens the castle and lets Klaymen in; however, Klogg shoots Bil in the chest with the cannon, and Bil and Willie both fall off the Neverhood.
Klaymen then finds Hoborg's throne room and meets Hoborg, who fell deeply asleep without his crown, and Klogg. Klogg pressures him into joining him in ruling the Neverhood.
Bad ending
If Klaymen chooses to obey Klogg, he puts on the crown, which transforms him into an evil Klogg-like creature. Klogg laughs evilly, having got rid of the last danger for his ruling, however Klaymen then kills him and the game ends.
Good ending
If Klaymen chooses to save Hoborg, he outruns Klogg and returns the crown to Hoborg. Hoborg wakes up and is thanking Klaymen when Klogg charges at him with a knife. However he steps on his remote control for the cannon and it shoots him out of the Neverhood. Hoborg then creates several new beings and brings back Willie and Bil.
Adventure in Skullmonkeys
In Skullmonkeys, Klogg lands on planet Idznak and convenes the creatures on that planet (called Skullmonkeys because they have a skull for a head) to help him destroy the Neverhood. He wants them to build a machine called Evil Engine Number 9. However there is one intelligent skull monkey named Jerry-O. He sends a flying device to retrieve Klaymen and bring him to planet Idznak.
Klaymen battles through several foes and eventually fights Klogg in Evil Engine Number 9. He kills Klogg in the final battle and the machine is destroyed. The monkeys rejoice and Klaymen goes home.