Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince

For years now, EA have been doing a pretty decent job when it comes to milking the Harry Potter brand name. With every book and movie comes a game, and with every game we are left slightly disappointed. Hardcore Harry Potter fans probably wish the developers would step up and make it happen already and with the release of Half-Blood Prince the hopes are actually pretty high. In this 6th game in the series, EA introduces a few new gameplay elements, creative Wii controls and an improved graphics system. Is that enough to earn the series some respect already though?

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince the game is just partially based on the book/movie. You will be spending most of your time with this game exploring Hogwarts. With open ended games a trend these days, EA kind of picked the right time to apply that on the series. The game does follow the story plot overall and actually does mention or show some key elements and scenes related to the story, but people that bought the game without reading the book will struggle in understanding what exactly is going on. Some little, yet important, details are not mentioned or even hinted at. We do however appreciate the efforts by the developers to concentrate on the gameplay and give the story a backseat.

You will actually spend most your time in Hogwarts exploring and searching for crests, playing Quidditch, dueling and mixing potions. The variety of the gameplay is very welcome. You will find yourself racing high in the sky then dueling in the school yard before using some of your luck to come up with the right potion. While the four gameplay elements manage to offer a much needed degree of variety, each gameplay style could have been a little more interesting and for some a bit harder. Each element is pretty shallow and fails to challenge you or entertain you enough to come back after completing the game asking for more.

The exploring has you going around the school searching for items and collecting hidden crests. Quidditch is a lot of fun and has you flying all over the highly detailed world, too bad the game itself isn’t all that deep. Dueling has you going one on one against another Wizard. Dueling on the Wii has you swinging your Wiimote around. Sadly, it is still pretty easy on all systems however, considering the amount of spamming you can unleash in one attack. Finally, the potion mixing is actually a little fun. You will have to mix some potions in class to clear certain hurdles in the story. This might require some luck to be honest. To the delight of all Wii owning Harry Potter fans, the mixing is done using the Wiimote as well.

The game is out on all major systems. So as you might have guessed, The PS3 and 360 version of the game are identical with pretty graphics and typical game controls, while the Wii version offers some innovative controls but is less of a graphical beauty.

The 360/PS3 version of the game runs smoothly while making the whole campus look fantastic in HD. Both systems are pretty loaded with titles like this however; good graphics on its own don’t make or break a game anymore. With the Wii version of the game on the other hand, you can sense a little more creativity put to work. The game will use the Wii motion capturing controls in duel fights and potion mixing. Swinging the Wiimote in a few different directions is not one bit difficult, so some might see the motion controls as a rip-off. But mixing up the exploration controls with the animated ones certainly makes up for the lackluster Wii graphics.

Like we mentioned earlier, the graphics differ from one version to another. On one hand you have some very good HD graphics on both the PS3 and 360 version of the game. The characters look more fluid and move and act in a much more realistic fashion. Gamers that prefer beauty over content might prefer to go with this version of the game. The Wii graphics just fail to impress or at the very least convince us. The school looks pretty much off and the characters seem to be half dead while talking in some cut scenes. In a nutshell, the graphics is surely not the reason you will picking this game up for the Wii.

The sound quality is identical on all systems, which is pretty good news. The voice acting job is well done, something we should be expecting from a movie licensed game. Only problem here is that the characters look a bit off talking and expressing their emotions. But then again maybe we are asking for too much from one game. Other then that the sound effects are good and the sound track is what you would expect in every situation, a little touch of spooky and intense during the duels for example.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood prince is actually a good game. It will not turn heads around and impress every gamer out there but Harry Potter fans should be more then happy. The game gives them the chance to explore their favorite school, a dream come true for many of them. All of that while racing around and dueling with any young wizard in the school yard. All 3 versions of the game provide you with a pretty similar experience overall, with the graphics and controls canceling each other out.