Review by YOR on 13 Feb 2019 (Rating: 3)
Spitting Image was a satirical puppet show that transformed various well known people, including politicians, pop stars and tv presenters into puppets in order to take the piss out of them, and it was brilliant. And of course, at the height of its fame and popularity Domark, yes that fucking Domark, brought out a game based on it for all hilarity. Apparently there's a World War that will take place and it will be so great even the Swiss will get involved and so terrible the Italians have already surrendered. One leader will emerge from this war to rule the world, and we have six to choose from - Margaret Thatcher, Mikhail Gorbachev, Pope John Paul II, Ronald Reagan, Ayatollah Khomeini and P. W. Botha. What's sad about this is that at the time of this review, Gorby is the only one still alive. Evidently this is a fighting game. Each of the six characters have a sidekick which you activate by pressing the chosen button you define and they throw something at your opponent, for instance Maggie's sidekick is her husband Dennis. As well as that, each has their own stage, Maggie's is 10 Downing Street, Botha's is a rugby field and Ronnie's is a restaurant called...Ronnie's! They also have unique traits when fighting, Ronnie has a stretchy neck, Botha pisses on you and The Pope uses a guitar like it's a gun, although it looks more like a banjo but who am I to judge? The fights are officiated by The Queen and the main title screen features a great rendition of the Spitting Image theme which is done by David Whittaker. The idea is noble, the humour is there, but the gameplay is confusing to say the least. There are times where it's hard to determine if you are doing any damage and before you do you realise your opponent has taken much your health away. I also felt confused with the match format, I won my first fight 3-0 which made me think that it was the best of 5 rounds and the first to 3, in my second fight I was 2-0 down and won the next 3, yet thinking I won Queenie told us to keep going, I lost the next round and the fight, despite it being 3-3 in rounds. I also found the sidekicks to be useless most of the time as well. Spitting Image had the potential to be a fun fighting game with plenty of laughs and thrills, but in the end, while still being a nice enough game, it falls short of excellence.
1988 Domark(UK)
by David Beresford and Graham Stafford
I was completely unaware of the existance of a beat 'em up based on the TV Show with the same name, I remember quite well the excellent puzzle game also released by Domark in 1986 called SpLitting Images, which I played extensively, and it seems originated a breach of copyright complaint by Central Television, for too many similarities between the game and the show, the game name was then changed to Split Personalities.
Later Domark released a properly licensed game based on the TV Show, which I'm now reviewing.
I'm must say I'm glad I discovered this game, because I love anything related to English humour, which I think is the best there is.
This game however is a bit shalow in gameplay terms, it's just your everyday beat 'em up, with the famous names of the age, like Reagan, Thatcher, the Ayatola, etc instead of proper fighters. The TV Show had so many great ideas which could have spawned such great themes for a game, so why a beat 'em up...
Graphically it's cute enough, I've seen a lot better cartoonish characters, this are just ok, the scenery is awful, and the fighting moves, well they are in fact quite nice and add a bit of dept to the gameplay, nothing crazy of course, but enjoyable enough for several plays.
