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Lucky, lucky you. After spending a couple of months on the dole, you've struck it lucky by landing a job at Buckingham Palace as a flunky to the Royal Family. As such, you have to keep your employers (The Queen, Andy, Fergie, Charles and Di) happy by pandering to their each and every whim.

The action is viewed side-on, with the main character able to move 'in' and 'out' of the screen. At the start, Flunky walks out of his office into Buck House and is immediately told by the head butler to 'light all the fires' - an easy job, which is carried out by using the box of matches which Flunky already carries.

For some strange reason, Flunky is only allowed access to certain parts of the Palace if he is carrying the correct Royal's autograph. If he hasn't got the right signature, a guard steps out smartly and opens fire, removing one of the hero's five lives in the process. An autograph is collected whenever a task is completed, and to gain access to the final room, all five Royal signatures should be collected.

The five tasks are pretty peculiar, ranging from fetching a toy boat for Prince Andrew's bath and getting Di her wig to giving Fergie freckles! Each of these jobs is completed by using the objects that are carried at the start of the game, or by picking up and utilising others which are found around the royal residence.

If all signatures are collected within the set time, the Queen's throne room is entered where the final task can be completed. That done, your days as a royal flunky are successfully completed and you can retire happily with pots of cash!

Royalists should steer well clear of Piranha's latest release which definitely has anarchic overtones! The caricatures are quite good - they're all very recognisable - and the graphics are cleverly implemented throughout.

In fact, it's quite surprising how well the Commodore's hi-res mode can work when it wants to.

There's obviously been a lot of thought put into the design of the game to stop it looking a real mess and having oddly-coloured attributes all over the place.

The gameplay itself, however, is slightly on the eccentric side - some people may have to think hard and long over the problems involved.

This kind of game doesn't appeal to me, but I'm sure that fans of The Trap Door will love it.

Flunky's okay. The sprites are large and colourful and it does have a certain charm, but the action's slow and the puzzles are slightly odd.

I think that its greatest appeal lies in the fact that strutting around the worldplace in the role of dogsbody seems strangely familiar to me.

The whole thing seems to amble along quite happily, hardly generating any sense of excitement or urgency - even a confrontation with the Palace guard brings hardly a murmur (even if you do lose a life through it!).

Perhaps this game would appeal to the younger player (that's probably why I liked it), and if that's its target market that it should hit the bull. However, Flunky doesn't really have a lot to offer the more sophisticated player.

I wasn't particularly enarmoured with Trap Door, and this is very, very similar. The enormous graphics are admirable, and the extremely well-animated caricatures are particularly appealing - but other than that there's very little in the gameplay that appealed.

The first tasks are pretty off-beat and don't offer much scope for long-term play - consequently, once the game has been completed it loses its appeal.

Trap Door fans may think otherwise, but personally I couldn't find enough in it to put it near the top of my shopping list.

Presentation 77%
A restart option, and a rarely useful choice of languages.

Graphics 82%
Large and well animated characters - shame about the bland backdrops.

Sound 63%
A couple of suitable jingles which are let down by the jarring sound effects.

Hookability 67%
The tasks are quite hard to work out at times, and consequently it's tough for a first time player.

Lastability 71%
There are only five tasks to complete, although they're difficult enough to keep you puzzling.

Overall 68%
A competent arcade adventure which should appeal to Trap Door fans.