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Sunday, 19 May 2013

DEATHLY Hallows...it's a pun, see?

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So I’m finally nearing the end of the line. With only two more Potter games left, the finish is in sight.  I just wish that they could be two good ones. Unfortunately, wishes don’t come true, and it would seem that the developers saved the worst for last.


 For some unknown reason, we’ve once again ditched the idea of an open Hogwarts (because of how well that idea turned out last time), and thrown in a darker, linear world that pushes you where you need to go. There is absolutely no exploration necessary, which is a first in these games, and it is definitely not a good thing.

Next comes the all new gameplay! Gone is the silly waving of the analogue sticks! Gone is this ridiculous idea that allows you to feel like a real wizard like never before! Welcome to the new age of Potter games! The third person shooter!

Don’t worry, your eyes aren’t failing you. The last two Harry Potter games decided to become third-person cover shooters. You find some cover, you duck behind it, you pop out and blast Death Eaters. Rinse and repeat for the rest of the game. From the beginning of the first chapter, you can see that this is not going to be fun.

Well at least you might unlock spells later on to make the game more varied and fun!

No. You do get to unlock spells later on, but they do absolutely anything but make the game more varied and fun. You aren’t forced to mix your spells as you are in the other games, which may seem like a good thing. Choice is always good right? Wrong again. There really isn’t much to choose from, and there isn’t a whole hell of a lot of differences between the choices that you get. The only one you’ll use is “Stupefy”, and you get that right at the beginning, making the whole thing pretty useless.

Well at least the graphics are quite good!

Wrong again! Both parts of the Deathly Hallows look terrible. The spells look bland, the environments look boring, and the character models look genuinely horrible. Hermione looks like a man in drag! Particularly at one point in Deathly Hallows Pt 2 when she glares at some death eaters, she looks terrifying...this is not good!


Ah yes, that brings me to Pt 2. After the colossal failure that was Pt 1, the developers decided to do the exactly the same thing. Although it is slightly more enjoyable, perhaps because of the more organized mission structure. Pt 1 has you moving around, doing missions in sets of 3. Unfortunately you’re doing the same 3 missions over and over again, so it just isn’t fun.

Pt 2 has you participating in the battle of Hogwarts, fighting off Death Eaters and thinning out their numbers. It’s better, but it’s still not great. You do get to play as a number of characters in Pt 2 though. Harry, Ron and Hermione are the obvious ones, but then you get Ginny, Seamus, McGonnagall and more, which I suppose gives the game something worth playing for, but it really isn’t much.


After playing through this long....long.......loooooong marathon, the highs and lows, the Stones and the Goblets, the happy times and the tears...you get the idea...one thing stuck out to me. I realized that one thing, above everything else is the downfall of the Potter games.

Action.

The Potter games have action in them, but it seems that the three games that have taken a more action-oriented approach (Goblet of Fire, Deathly Hallows) have been the bad ones, as opposed to the ones that focus on exploration (Philosopher’s Stone, Order of the Phoenix), which are the best ones.

It would seem that after all this time, I’ve finally worked out what is wrong with the Harry Potter games. Sayonara folks!

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