Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (video game)
Infobox VG title = Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince developer = EA Bright Light Studio publisher = Electronic Arts designer = engine = released = Summer 2009 [cite web|url=http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/54614|title=Harry Potter Game&#8230;
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Team Xbox. [http://news.teamxbox.com/xbox/16293/EA-Announces-Harry-Potter-and-the-HalfBlood-Prince/ EA Announces Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince] "Team Xbox". Accessed 23 April 2008.] :

* Multiplayer (From the main menu you can choose single player story mode, or two player mode)

* Wizard Duels (one or two players)

* Potion making

* Quidditch

* Hogwarts free-roaming (similar to the previous Harry Potter game, Order of the Phoenix)

* Fully accessible areas including the Horcrux cave

* Four different times of day, allowing missions at night

* Classes

* Ron's love-life

* Online multiplayer

Gameplay

Harry is free to explore the entire grounds of Hogwarts. All the screenshots show this being done from a third-person perspective with a relatively fixed camera, however direct camera control will be available.

Screenshots show familiar areas of Hogwarts from the previous game, such as the Library, but also various new locations outside the castle, the dueling room, the quidditch pitch, and a couple of unknown rooms. Besides Hogwarts, the Horcrux cave is also explorable and has been shown in screenshots.

While exploring you can cast a number of spells to manipulate objects in the environment. Wingardium Leviosa is used very often. Incendio has been announced, and shown in screenshots being used on a "Devil's Snare". Reparo is also included. It was announced that the Nintendo DS version (and perhaps all versions) would have 6 environmental spells, leaving 2 other unknown spells.Reducto will not feature in this game, and Lumos is automatically cast if necessary.

There are plenty of puzzles involving objects around Hogwarts, such as tapestries that must be hit in a certain order to release crests.

Like all previous Harry Potter games there are objects you can collect (unrelated to the plot) as a reward for exploring and an incentive to find everything in the game. But this time Harry must find all the glowing grey Hogwarts crests, which there are 150 of. Some of these crests are obtained using the physics system, by knocking them with other levitated objects. The crests can also be smashed using physics, for example, in order to move the pieces through a locked gate, and then reconstituted on the other side by casting Reparo. Crest pieces can be found inside various objects, which need to be shaken to release their crest piece. Collecting crests allows you to unlock extra characters for dueling. There are also 30 achievement badges which can be earned, similar to the trophies in Order of the Phoenix.

Unlike Order of the Phoenix, which allowed the player to choose the level of difficulty, Half-Blood Prince automatically adjusts the level of difficulty based on the skill of the player.

Harry can also attend classes, play quidditch, mix potions, and duel against other students in the dueling room.

In Quidditch you play as the Seeker, Harry Potter, who is now Griffindor quidditch captain. Which means your job is to chase and catch the golden snitch. You do that by flying through star-shaped hoops which give you speed bonuses.

In dueling, you can move and dodge, and you can cast spells including Protego, Stupefy (with various levels of charging), Expelliarmus, Levicorpus, and Petrificus Totalus. It was earlier reported that 12 combat spells were available in the Nintendo DS version. Each student has their health bar shown in the form of orbs below them. A dueling match is best two out of three.

In Potions, you pour vials and bottles of ingredients into a cauldron, stir it, fan smoke out of the way, and add ingredients such as leeches, rat spleens, worms, and caterpillars. You must be careful to do just the right amount, and must do it within a time limit.

Unlike earlier games in the series, which only loosely followed the story, sometimes explained the plot poorly, and sometimes included many artificial challenges and monsters not from the book, this game promises to follow the plot of the story closely, and to tell the story better than the movie does. Although the player will still be able to roam freely around Hogwarts, exploring at their leisure, before completing each plot element.

Wii

The Wii version is the primary development target, with other platform versions being ported from the Wii. All controls are first designed for the Wii Remote.

Unlike Order of the Phoenix, while exploring Hogwarts, the Wii Remote pointer/sensor bar can be used for direct camera control by holding down the B button.

Spell controls are different. Wingardium Leviosa is now cast by holding the B button and drawing the Wii Remote towards you. Levitated objects are controlled by moving the nunchuk analogue stick.