(review below re-written 12/15/2024 after I had some more time with yoyo)
I started throwing just under a year ago and like many at this stage I’ve been rapidly adding to my collection. I have a Magic Yoyo Z01 and was looking for other budget bimetals when I came across the AceYo Mercy 6. I loved the anime character designs that some of the colorways sport and it cost less than most bimetals so I bought one … and I absolutely LOVE it.
INTRO and ACE YO
The Ace Yo Mercy 6 is a wide, V-shaped, bimetal, yoyo with large flared out steel rims. It’s similar to the Duncan Orbital GTX in overall shape and dimensions but differs in play.
AceYo is a smaller, predominantly Asian brand (based in China I believe), which makes a wide range of decent yoyos. Unlike some other Chinese brands, they don’t seem to flood online markets and they sponsor a few contests and players in Asia. So they seem to contribute to the yoyo community. YoYoS@m (am I allowed to mention another vendor here?) seems to be the only official US based vendor that carries Ace Yo and they can also be purchased from Aliexpress (which is where I got mine because they had the Ace Girl design ones.)
Mercy 6 specs::
Price: ~$50 to $60 USD
Width: 46mm
Diameter: 56mm
Weight: 64.6g
Ace Yo seems to revise many of their yoyos at a fast rate with new versions sometimes diverging from their previous specs and design by a noticeable amount. The Mercy 7 is out and they’ve teased the 8 on social media. But given how much they seem to like to alter their designs and specs between versions, I wouldn’t necessarily interpret the 7 as superseding the 6. I also have their Gravitation 7 and 8 monometal yoyos and the difference between those two is to the point where it probably needs a DNA test to see if the 7 really is its father.
The construction and quality of the Mercy 6 (as well as my other Ace Yo’s), is very good with it unscrewing smoothly, the edges where the steel meets the aluminum being very seamless, and a nice uniform finish. I don’t quite understand the obsession with vibe myself since it seems irrelevant to me unless it’s bad, but this came out of the box with minimal nail vibe and after accidentally crashing it into my ceiling and a few other objects in the room really hard (which left it ringing like a tuning fork), I’m pleased to report that it still has minimal vibe. Another online post about it mentioned that it develops a vibe over time, but that has not been my experience at all and I’ve been unintentionally hard on it.
PLAY
I’m less than a year into my yoyo adventure so I don’t always hold the strings straight, I don’t have the greatest accuracy, and it takes me time to learn new tricks. The Mercy 6 is forgiving of all of these things. It has a lot of lasting spin power from the large steel rings and it is very stable. It resists tilting and turning on me more than most of my other throws while I fumble slowly through tricks and combos. Its wide V shape and flared out rims also makes it much easier to catch since the catch zone is effectively the entire width of the yoyo.
Its shape is similar to the Duncan Orbital GTX, but it plays differently. The Orbital GTX is light on the string and often described as floaty. I would describe the Mercy 6 as medium weight on the string and not floaty, which is perfect for me. It’s not “heavy”, but for me it has just enough weight on the string that I can feel what it’s doing and manipulate it a little better than the lighter playing Orbital at my current skill level. The Orbital GTX is a fantastic yoyo, but when I play them back-to-back I feel like the Mercy 6 has more spin power and stability (which I need at my current level.) A more seasoned player might prefer the Orbital though.
I initially tried it with the normal string that it came with, but binds were slippy to the point where it was an issue for me. I put some Kitty Fat on and it helped a lot. But then after a good bit of play it started feeling like the fat string was slowing it down a little bit, so I went back to regular string and binds are not as slippy now? I think the response pads needed breaking in. The response isn’t bad, it just hasn’t been a perfectly consistent experience in the few months I’ve had it.
The center trac bearing that it comes with makes a bit of a loud but typical buzzing sound but spins freely and long. The sound does get louder when the yoyo is experiencing G-forces and it feels to me like G-forces kill it’s spin faster than other yoyos which have better bearings. I would say the bearing it comes with is acceptable, but if you are demanding or competitive you might want to put something better in or give it a tiny bit of lube.
COLORWAYS/DESIGNS
The Mercy 6 comes in many different designs and colorways. I’ve seen pictures of it with gold rims, steel rims, various solid colors, and of course about 4 or 5 different colors with the “Ace Girl” character laser engraved on it. This really makes it novel and different from other brands which have (IMHO) boring splash color or random laser engraved graphic designs. The cup is flat and the walls are flared out, so finger spins and thumb grinds are pretty much no-goes and the laser etching of Ace Girl feels like sandpaper making spins on that design even less of a possibility. I have two Mercy 6’s - one which is a shiny blue and would not work great for finger grinds, but my orange one has more of an egg shell or blasted texture making finger grinds doable as long as you avoid the steel rings which would increase friction with the skin.
CONCLUSION
While my tastes and style are still in flux since I’m a relatively new player, I really do LOVE this yoyo. It is my favorite and default much of the time. It’s long spinning and forgiving which is helping me learn new tricks and do longer combos which I find satisfying and helpful. It’s also a good looking yoyo and very novel with its Ace Girl anime’ish character designs.
Bimetals at this lower price point are limited. You can wait until Duncan has a holiday sale and get a Grasshopper GTX or Orbital GTX for close to this price, Magicyoyo is another OK Chinese brand which has some affordable bimetals, but IMHO Magicyoyo lacks a little bit of the flare and fun factor that I find Ace Yo throws to have. Then there are all kinds of other Chinese “professional bimetal” yoyos utterly flooding Amazon and eBay who I think are more of a detriment to the space than a plus.
So my recommendation is if you’re curious about the Mercy 6 or Ace Yo in general pick one up. They are great and well worth it! Their response and bearings may not be industry leading, but those things are easily upgraded for competitive players. I would like to some day enter a yoyo contest just for fun and as of now the Mercy 6 is my likely yoyo of choice for that. Especially since you can get 2-3 of these for the cost of just one of many other high quality bimetals.