I completely support your opinion on "You like the old games because of nostalghia". You are not the only one who thinks that way,because IMO old games were more fun and made with passion,not just for money

I respect, a lot more, the opinion of someone who has played all the older games before HL. I'm really tired of everyone claiming those games were just awful cash grabs and this one is actually the definitive HP experience, without having played them at all or only recently afterwards...

A harry potter game should make you feel like a WIZARD. Learning spells that depend on button inputs perhaps, racking your brain trying to solve problems and actually attenting classes and reading books to LEARN SPELLS not just progress in the game. That would be a good modern harry potter game.

Played this with my GF who is an insane Potter head (I'm more a Lotr bloke) but even she found it a massive let down. Biggest problem imo is they made it a souless open world ubisoft style, and didn't play into the fantasy of being a Hogwarts student. Load of bizarre choices like why make your character start in year 5? I think they should haven taken more inspiration from Persona having a set schedule and classes then ubisoft. EDIT: Biggest problem with the game as a non fan is that the writing was really dialled in along with the voice acting did like the art design though.

The game was the biggest disappointment of my life for all the reasons you named. It's like the developers had no idea what made Harry Potter Harry Potter, it was devoid of any kind of magic or soul, they just slapped HP on it to have guaranteed sales. I could not believe all the praise it got, I started three different characters of different houses, hoping to give them different personalities or find ANYTHING that would make the game interesting and gave up at around the middle of the story with each of them

I totally agree with your opinion , however I can’t deny that I enjoy Sebastian and ominous mission and my second character as hufflefuff going to Azkaban it was really great , but when I nearly finished the game and fully upgrade my character and perfected my room of requirement , then no more side missions our extra map to explore , basically I have finished everything and my character is so strong so what’s the point there’s no more missions to do and I have explored everything.

Such a boring game. For the past 10 months, anytime i open it, i just fly around for a minute, marvel at how pretty Hogwarts is, then get bored and play Dragon Quest 8.

So true about Morrowind. I just played that for the first time last year and it has become one of my favorite RPGs ever. Even as a pure vanilla, unmodded experience, it is a masterpiece. Another great vid, NWG.

Happy to see youve not abandoned your channel... 😊

My mom and I both looked forward to this game's release, we played it and... eh? Not to say we regret buying or playing it, we wanted it, but was it that revolutionary, breathtaking of an experience? No. It was a game. Beautiful, no question about it, but what's the use of pretty graphics when there's hardly anything behind them? When older games offered more in terms of mechanic such as classes and potion-making that made the experience more believable? When in Chamber Of Secrets on PC (the one I played the most, the one I remembered the most, the one I recently decided to replay) I could run into a student by accident and get a response out of them? It's those little things that make Hogwarts feel so alive in this old PC game. When I play this game, yes, I see why Harry thinks of this place as his home, I feel the fairy tale, I believe it. Hogwarts Legacy, on the other hand, is sterile. While it's true that I probably like a lot of my favorite old games because of nostalgia, they gave me plenty of reasons to remember them as fondly as I do. Hogwarts Legacy, pretty as it is, and not without merits, is just not welcoming enough, my character feels out of place there. Like my mom put it, "My avatar just kinda stands there and smiles like an idiot no matter what is going on." Heck, one of the face options looks exactly like me, I made a perfect reflection of me, it was so accurate it was creepy, and yet I hardly saw myself in this copy. I don't need to feel represented in the game to enjoy it, but I hardly felt any connection to the protagonist, none. I simply didn't care much. Another complaint I have may be a bit unpopular, but for a game set in the Victorian era, it's too... modern in terms of the environment and characters. I have nothing against them, if anything, they weren't even impactful or memorable enough to affect the practically non-existent story, but they hardly did anything with the era that brought us so much change and progress. One could argue that the wizards always isolated themselves from muggles, at least for the most part, but even so, they took such an interesting period in human history and did nothing with it. I've already mentioned Chamber Of Secrets, and I could compare it to The Sims 2, while Hogwarts Legacy is The Sims 4. The former, while a bit dated by modern standards, still has charming graphics and content to boot, while the latter is undoubtedly pretty, yes, but so utterly lacking in its very core. And honestly, nostalgia never got in the way of new games that I came to enjoy and appreciate. Now, I'm glad I didn't hate Hogwarts Legacy, I suppose, but at the same time I wish I actually felt something instead of simply acknowledging its existence. I'd rather give in to nostalgia and play a somewhat dated game that makes me feel welcome and actually wants to be played rather than a big pile of pretty nothing. P.S.: Ironically, one of my favorite characters in the game is a bland one, Natty. I know she's boring, but I feel like the game did her dirty because we get so much out of Sebastian's story, and yet someone who could easily become our best and most reliable friend (and I was so hoping for it) just falls flat. Justice for Natty.

As a black man that character customization was amazing especially the hair styles because our hair doesn't get a lot of love so it was great for my character to walk around in the wizarding world with a tapered afro.

Great review; appreciated the meta-analysis. I haven't played Hogwarts Legacy; thought about it, but didn't hear anything- good or bad- about the story, so I lost interest. I have played the first two Harry Potter games on PC when I was a kid, so was looking into what became of the game series.

Thanks for another thorough review. I have this game on my wishlist... would you recommend it for someone like me who doesn't have an emotional attachment to Harry Potter but enjoys open world/action RPG games?

I love Hogwarts Legacy but it really doesn't have some of the most important elements that build a character just like Harry Potter books and movies also your created character decisions in the game doesn't really have any impact. Modern day open world game's maps feel generic and soul less like Starfield especially with RPGs for almost 8 years

Oh and also it was super dissapointing not being able to go to diagon alley or board the hogwarts express.

I don’t know why but I feel no nostalgia at all for Harry Potter at all even though the books were a huge part of my childhood. Glad I didn’t pick this up, good thorough review. Have you ever played Subnautica btw? By far my favourite open world game of the last 10 years. Highly recommend if you want some amazing exploration based gameplay.

I wanted to enjoy this game, I really did. I tried really hard to enjoy it but it was just so boring. Every time I loaded up the game I would get bored of it after an hour of playing. Sometimes even less.

I agree with you 100% once I finished the story I was done a major let down for sure . For me at least I hated that I couldn't talk to anyone or do anything w them.

I think it could be better. My idea to rewrite the story in a more interesting way could be : we are sensitive for ancient magic and we were under the supervision of the magic ministry thing and then after several years of szpervision lets us to be in hogwarts what solves the assignments and the fifth year thing, also with the mission of Ranrok rebellion and not earn spellls like a fetch quest but like in Star Wars: Fallen order remembering to spells when we needed it and in zhe memories know about more the ministry. We could use our houses like real factions and in the starz of the game we coulf choose pure bloor or half blood magician what could influence some houses students react to us, and for likr a soulsborne game not letting thr plwyer instantly in the open world( i already explorer the whole map at the first section of the game) but putting for a first time really hard area with really good loot. With that not scale the enemies with the player, but lets have areal scaling, be legendar arnaments that matter ( like seriously, a green clothing is better then a legendary?!) and make wand creation matter too! when we create the wand lets matter what i choose and how and let it have some benefits and restriction the wand gives first qnd with the modifications we find in the open world decrease our wands restrictions( as restrictions like casting speed, damage, spell lenght...etc)

Because i played the game on switch (sad i know) i was focused on gameplay not graphics. And the game is just super mediocre if not BAD without pretty dopamine to look at.

The combat was good but it didnt feel like harry potter in my opinion. Harry potter should be more like gunslinging since in both the books and movies people cant just suck up spells like its nothing. Only a few creatures are spell resistant. Humans get knocked out or killed pretty easily. Even experienced wizards dont become more durable. It should be more like fencing or gunplay than devil may cry ish combo based combat.

Goblin Rebellion is canon in the Harry Potter lore whats, not canon is your main character and his/her ability

Imo too many goblins. I expected the goblin population to be smaller

I personally absolutely loved it I thot it was the best one we ever had I mean it's no masterpiece but still super fun

I've always wondered if the could have done online stuff for HL.

Actually i got griffindor my sorting in that game. I always get griffindor in anything though im basically a weasley.

I remember seeing reviews on this game, had it wishlisted on Steam but wanted to spend my money on other things. When reviews came out saying there is no true "evil playthrough" and the utter lack of variations of playstyle it was disappointing and I lost interest. For reference the only Harry Potter game I played was Sorcerer's Stone on the Gamecube but I was bad at it and couldn't get past the Womping Willow.

I loved Hogwarts Legacy. The hat does not always pick Hufflepuff, I got Ravenclaw as my suggestion my first play through and i have different answers the second time and got Slytherin. I'd also argue the game has replay value for at least on replay. Play the game without using the dark arts the first time and use them the second time or vice versa. Besides Spider-Man 2 Hogwarts Legacy was my favorite game last year.

I really disagree. We are not big “gamers” in our house, but we really enjoyed the game play, the puzzles, and the site seeing aspects of the game. We thought it was exceptional.

Uhm, I'm seriously not opposed to be an unstoppable force of nature, destined for greatness - but I do want to be able to viably build to that, within the role I choose to play and work toward. So long as the leveling up and stats gained are noteable in difference by power level by the end, and don't require niche as fuck builds or gear. I DON'T want to waste all my time grinding for peanuts in power, only to face an end boss that has three to seven health bars (Dragon's Dogma 2 - I'm looking at you and that dumb dragon's plague BS) AND spend hours doing it, just because every RPG seems to want to "not be special" As the MAIN CHARACTER! Fuck that. If I wanted to play a farmer that picked up a sword and said fuck it, let's go save the world... there's Fable. Oh, wait... o.O My two biggest problems other than the fifth year thing you mentioned was: The ubisoft bullshit that doesn't need to be as heavy handed as it is. The unskippable racing quest crap, or any minigame really that ended up being tied to a main quest (that accio spell pissed me right the hell off) And the fact you CAN completely get away with using all the dark side powers. By the time you GET there though, you're like 3/4rths done the game, and there's really not much point. There's the fact you have to knowingly choose to be "evil" to use them and that's counter to the whole point of that world's lore. There's the fact that there is SUPPOSED to be a shop you can buy for yourself (that's playstation exclusive >.< Genius') so you can actually make money and COULD have done so before you can get the animal breeding (which has unsavory conotations if you think about the messaging, versus what you do to make money) which is ALSO half way through the damned game at least to unlock. You can't get the quest if you don't have a PS5 and I play on Xbox Series X, so I'm well fucked. The "ancient magic" is either an instant win, or you forget you even have it, and it's nothing but plot convenient BS.

Yo Nordic, you should play the Lego Harry Potter games.

The bad Goblin is not bad because of "reasons", if you find the character that will tell you the WHY he is evil, you'll find the game much more enjoyable. The same goes for other stuff. I'm not saying that everything you've said is false, it really is quite correct, but you do have more options to learn about the world you are in during gameplay.

*it was my GOTY 2023 🕵 I loved the detail of the school and how realistic the physics of the female protagonists movements were 👍 but definitely not anything groundbreaking....nothing in 2023 was groundbreaking* 💁

I've been enjoying playing tekken 8

Felt like a Ubisoft phone game port to PC.

Nordic ?? Were are you from ( var kommer du ifrån)

Says a nobody