Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince video game review
reviews games_Xbox video_games technology nintendo
Kieran Kelly Daniel Woolfson Will Macpherson Albert Tait Patrick Sawer John Percy Nick Cowen
The Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince video game is enjoyable, but it won't capture the imagination of fans in same way that the books or films have.
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The Telegraph
As the sixth Harry Potter film opens across the UK this week, it can be said that JK Rowling's adolescent wizard has finally conquered both the literary and cinematic mediums. However, fans are still waiting for the release of a video game which completely transports console owner to the dark and magical Harry Potter universe. EA have made several decent stabs at this, but the winning formula still eludes them. Sadly this is a trend that continues with the release of the video game adaptation of Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince, a game which, while far from terrible, will in no way capture the imagination of fans in same way that the books or films have.

Perhaps the most surprising thing about the game is how incomplete the story feels. While it covers most of the major plot developments of the sixth book, it is by no means a faithful retelling. The action dots around a lot and Harry Potter fans are likely to be disappointed by how disjointed the end result feels.

As with last year's Harry Potter and The Order Of The Phoenix, the game's trump card is its faithful recreation of Hogwarts. Most of the magical academy's major characteristics are all present and correct – the moving staircases, the talking paintings, the secret passages – and thanks to the students and teachers bustling about the place, fans are likely to feel very much like they're a student at the School Of Wizardry & Witchcraft. Another nice touch is that whenever players are uncertain of which direction to head in, a quick tap of the minus button summons the Gryffindor House ghost, Nearly Headless Nick, who will guide them to their destination and provide some plummy commentary while en route.

However, one of the game's weaknesses is that it the player's progression feels extremely linear for a game which is set in such an immersive open-world environment. While players have the whole of Hogwarts (minus one or two environments from the previous game) to explore, there's very little incentive for them to do so. There are various crests to pick up to boost Harry's health bar in duels, but the game can be beaten without them and only obsessives will bother to collect them all. Much of the gameplay involves running from one location of the map to another to trigger either a cut-scene or one of three types of mini-games; duelling, potion-mixing and Quidditch. These mini-games essentially serve to break-up Harry's continuous travails around Hogwarts, and they are a mixed bag in terms of appeal.

The strongest of them is the potion-mixing; players are presented with a table of creepy ingredients and then tasked with making a potion within a certain time limit. It all feels like an abridged version of Cooking Mama, with the player mimicking pouring, stirring and occasionally shaking motions with the Wii-mote. Despite lacking a little in the way of depth, the potion mini-game can get very addictive, especially after players join the potion-mixing club at Hogwarts; they'll find the recipes become increasingly harder as the ingredients they start to work with become more unstable and fiddly.

The Quidditch element is probably the weakest of the three. Players aren't required to avoid Bludgers or hurl the Quaffle through their opponent's goals as the levels always start with the release of the Golden Snitch. Play essentially involves racing around an invisible predetermined route while piloting Harry's broomstick through star-shaped gates. Once Harry hits the final gate, he automatically grabs the Snitch with absolutely no skill required on the part of the player.

Duelling involves facing down opponents using magic; Harry has access to a total of six spells and players cast them by moving the nunchuck and Wii-mote as instructed by the game. Players can hone their magical abilities in the duelling clubs at Hogwarts and, combined with the fact they'll encounter a large number of bullies on their travels, they'll get in plenty of practice before they come up against their first Deatheater. Initially duelling is fun, but over time it can start to feel repetitive and due to the limited spells on offer, players usually end up winning each duel the same way – by incapacitating their opponent with a stun or levitate spell and then hurling Stupefy bolts until they're unconscious. Also, the interface occasionally misinterpreting the player's movements presents its own set of problems – trying to cast the Expelliarmus stun on a downed opponent, only to have a Protego shield appear is aggravating to say the least. Duelling against a friend in the multiplayer mode can be fun, but the gameplay isn't deep enough to sustain interest for long.

Harry also uses non-combative spells in a series of puzzle solving events, which involving levitating and occasionally repairing objects. Once again, these aren't too challenging, and their inclusion seems to more aimed at fleshing out the very thin gameplay rather than seriously testing the player.

It's the overall lack of challenge and depth which proves to be the major sticking point. This game is most likely to appeal to very casual players aged seven and up who simply want to play a Harry Potter video game, and EA is fortunate that the number of people who fall into this demographic can be counted in the millions. It isn't really a shock that, at the time of this writing, Harry Potter is already doing very respectably in sales (chart-track.co.uk currently ranks it as tenth a mere five days after its release) despite being, at best, a mediocre affair. That's not to say it's not enjoyable, and it's certainly capable of holding your attention for most of the campaign's brief four hour duration. However, seasoned players and indeed anyone who requires depth and longevity from their entertainment (especially when it costs almost £50) will find little here to entice them beyond an afternoon's rental.

In the end, it all depends on how badly you want to be Harry Potter, and whether shallow and repetitive gameplay, in an admittedly charming game, is something you're willing to put up with for the privilege.