Game Review: Her Majesty’s SPIFFING (Xbox One)

Her Majesty’s SPIFFING is a point & click adventure game developed and published by Billy Goat Entertainment. Filled with British wit and humour, thinly veiled jabs at modern politics and tongue in cheek stereo-types, the game succeeds at being entertaining. However, it is found lacking elsewhere.

The story begins after the UK’s withdrawal from the European Union (yes, this game references Brexit). The Queen, sick of under-performing governments has disbanded it and taken control of the country herself. Under her rule, the UK has grown and grown to the point of having a space program called SPIFFING (Special Planetary Investigative Force for Inhabiting New Galaxies).

In an attempt to establish a galactic British Empire, Captain Frank Lee English and his Welsh co-polit Aled Jones are sent into space to find new planets. It’s the former, an affable middle-class Englishman who players take control of for most of the game.

The best thing about Her Majesty’s SPIFFING are the gags. The dry British humour that pokes fun at stereotypes and British history works for the most part although there are a few jokes that miss the mark. There are also a bunch of fun game and movie references too for players to try and spot!

It’s one of those games that poke fun at its own style of gameplay and the limitations that come with it but does nothing to fix it. Why point and laugh when your game is doing the exact same things?

While the dialogue of Frank English is well done, the dialogue of Aled Jones is not. Ending almost every sentence with ‘boyo’ quickly gets old.

The game looks nice, the cartoon visuals suit the gameplay and story but it does suffer from occasional screen tear. Also, the camera can be slow in some areas, struggling to keep up as you move Frank around. That would be a bigger problem if the game wasn’t kind enough to clearly highlight what you can interact with.

That makes it far easier to navigate and solve puzzles. Something that rarely challenges provided you pay attention. Listen carefully to dialogue and you’ll easily find the solution to move on to the next area.

Difficulty isn’t an issue and it keeps the game moving at a substantial pace and then…it’s over. Yes, Her Majesty’s SPIFFING is really short, so short that you are kind of left with buyer’s remorse. This is a point and click adventure game that can be completed in less then 2 hours. It also ends really abruptly and without any kind of proper ending. It stinks of the first episode in a planned series which really makes you question the high price.

Is it a bad game? Absolutely not. It’s funny most of the time, looks good, plays well and feels like the result of a lot of hard work. However, it just misses the mark on some key points such as the voice acting of Aled, the screen tearing and the super-short length. Worth a buy if it is on sale.