Geese are dicks. I know that, and you know that. I don’t think there’s a single person who hasn’t got a story to share about being terrorised by these feathered menaces, these long-necked shits. My own involves cycling home on the Hertford Union Canal and coming across a small blockade just outside Victoria Park as other cyclists were threatened by one very angry, very aggressive goose. Then, after a short while, it started to attack standers-by, swinging its beak at exposed shins and hissing, its grotesque spiky tongue flapping as it went. Eventually, someone just had enough and kicked the goose square in the neck, forcing it to saunter off. Good. Geese are dicks.
Untitled Goose Game reviewDeveloper: House HousePublisher: PanicPlatform played: SwitchAvailability: Out now on PC and Switch
Untitled Goose Game knows that geese are dicks, and makes a virtue of it. Indeed, it makes an entire game out of it, because here you are the goose, terrorising a small village that gently unlocks as you progress through the short adventure. Be the arsehole. Live the dream. It’s a concept so pure, so universal, that developer House House didn’t even have to bother coming up with a name for its game. You know from the off what it involves. You know from its brilliantly unvarnished name that you want to play it.
And when you do, it’s glorious. The first few minutes spent in Untitled Goose Game’s company are side-splittingly hilarious – it’s no wonder this thing became a small Twitter phenomenon when early gameplay videos first did the rounds – and House House deliver on all the promise the concept implies. The detail here is wonderful, most notably in the goose itself and the pat-pat-pat of its webbed feet, the swagger of its waddle, the bark of its honk. Look at the little jerk go!
The meticulous realisation of the goose is met by an equally detailed world, full of things to prod and poke and people to antagonise. There’s a whimsy to this world, too, its flat-shaded textures and gently parochial nature of its town drawing to mind standards of any English 80s childhood such as Trumpton or Camberwick Green (which makes it all the more surprising that the devs themselves are Australian), and it’s underlined by a gentle, effective piano soundtrack that perfectly meets your actions. The mischief you get up to also feels like it’s been pulled from the 4.30pm slot on CBBC, as you’re chased through someone’s garden with their dirty washing trailing from your beak.