Harry Potter and the Moderately Fun Video Game
Harry Potter is one of the biggest book and movie sensations there have ever been. But how does that translate into a video game? As most of us know, licensed video games are generally not the greatest. They can be put together poorly, or they can have generic gameplay that doesn’t offer anything to the player. Honestly, most of them just suck. Licensed video games are also infamous for straying significantly from their source material. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, however, is the first of the Harry Potter video games that follows along with the movie it represents. But let’s break it down and see just what works and what doesn’t.

Graphics: 9
Being an earlier video game on the Xbox 360, the graphics can’t be expected to match those of the later releases. Despite this, it still does a pretty good job. The characters look just like the actors that play them. Hogwarts looks great too. It is clear that a lot of work went into developing the setting so it’s appealing to the player, and this work was not in vain. It’s also worth pointing out that the spells are bright and colorful too, which is always a plus. Though it doesn’t have the sleek graphics that some Xbox 360 games boast, Order of the Phoenix can definitely hold its own.

Sound: 7
To put it bluntly, the sound in Order of the Phoenix isn’t anything special. It has some basic music, sound effects make the impression they need to make, and all of the sounds are where they need to be. It works, but just being adequate won’t allow it to rise to the top. The reason it got as high of a score as it did would be the fact that many of the characters are voiced by their actors from the films. There may be some lines that get repeated over and over and the dialogue may seem rather generic, but the characters sound like themselves.

Addictiveness: 6
Order of the Phoenix can be very interesting when you first start playing. The first thing you do is learn how to cast a few basic spells. The first 30 minutes of gameplay or so can pull any Harry Potter fan in. Unfortunately, once this initial thrill wears off, the game can become rather dry. The gameplay does not offer anything particularly unique, and a large portion of the game consists of walking around Hogwarts to find people and things. The game could afford to be a little more interesting, but it definitely has its moments.

Story: 7
You can call it cheating since the story is ripped directly from the movie, which in turn ripped its story directly from the book. Despite this, the story does work. It’s a little watered down in the video game, but that is to be expected. The video game does follow the story very well, especially when you consider that it’s just a video game adoption. The various side quests and mini-games do hamper the overall story a little bit, but it’s nothing to get upset over.

Depth: 6
When you play Order of the Phoenix, the main thing you’re going to be doing is running around Hogwarts in various fetch-quests and searches. While this makes up the bulk of the game, there are a few other things going on. The most obvious would be dueling. Just find a random Slytherin walking around outside and hit him with a spell. Odds are, you’ll start a duel where you can cast spells at them until you knock them down. Besides this, there are also a few mini-games placed around Hogwarts, including Gobstones (same thing as marbles), Exploding Snap (same thing as card matching), and Wizard’s Chess (same thing as not-wizard’s chess).

Difficulty: 2
If you’re good enough at video games just to turn the game on, then you’re probably good enough to beat it. There is no real challenge at any point in this game. You can lose the mini-games, but that’s really about it. The quests are all really straight forward, and most of the “challenge” is just finding where things are. Sure, I might have got stuck on one part for two years because I couldn’t find the $%@# spot to put that %#@$ bench, but that’s just because I’m a stupid person. You probably won’t have any trouble with this game whatsoever.

Overall: 6.8
Order of the Phoenix really doesn’t have too much to offer (and neglects to tell you where to put that bench). Despite this, it does have some fun moments, and sometimes it’s relaxing to jinx some Slytherins when nobody is looking. If you’re looking for an action-packed and exciting game full of surprises and thrills, look somewhere else. But if you’re just a Harry Potter fan looking for something casual to play, than I suggest you give this game a try.
  Graphics 9   Sound 7   Addictive 6   Depth 6   Story 7   Difficulty 3

Overall 6.8    Graphics 9    Sound 7    Addictive 6    Story 7    Depth 6    Difficulty 3

Harry Potter and the Moderately Fun Video Game   Thebiguglyalien
Harry Potter is one of the biggest book and movie sensations there have ever been. But how does that...
  Graphics 9   Sound 7   Addictive 6   Story 7   Depth 6   Difficulty 3
      Review Rating: 3/5     Submitted: 01-02-15     Updated: 01-02-15     Review Replies: 1

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