Hogwarts Legacy is a Triple-A title delving into the wizarding world of Harry Potter. The game takes place in the 1800’s, before the events of J.K. Rowling’s book series. The story follows your character, who was only admitted to Hogwarts in their fifth year. After the tutorial you’re faced with the choice of your house, which only changes some dialogue and customization options, and one whole quest. Let’s get into the best parts, game exploration and combat.

The Good

The combat in Hogwarts Legacy revolves around using spells matching with the shield of the enemy. The shields can have the following colors:

• Purple: Spells that move the enemy you’re targeting.
• Yellow: Spells that lock the enemy in place
• Red: Damage Spells,

These are the colors that you need to match in order to burst shields, though there are two more spell categories, utility spells, and the unforgivable curses. While utility spells are used to solve puzzles, the unforgivables are the most powerful spells in the game, which allow the player to ignore the shield of the opponent and curse them. Cursed opponents take more damage, and (depending on what upgrades you have) also do additional effects.

The unforgivable curses are as follows:

• Crucio: DOTs (damage over time) the target, and makes them unable to move for decent amount of time.
• Imperio: Turns an enemy into an ally and gives them damage resistance
• Avada Kedavra: Instantly kills the enemy (FYI: there are two enemies that this does not work on) 

These spells are extremely powerful, and can trivialize fights in the game; however, they do take time to get (especially Avada Kedavra, as they are tied into a relationship quest).

In order to earn other spells, you need to either complete story quests or professor assignments. Having said this, these are not the only forms of magic you wield. After reaching Hogsmeade for the first time you gain access to Ancient Magic; this lets you throw certain objects or do a meter burn to carry out an extremely powerful attack. The attacks from the burn can vary…from turning the enemy into a chicken or shrinking and stepping on them, all of the forms are very unique and emphasize their power. 

Combat in this game relies on you chaining together your various spells in order to defeat opponents. Some of the combos you can do are very simple, like casting Expulso to disarm an enemy then throwing their weapon at them. Others are far more complicated.

Even Avada Kedavra (which insta-kills enemies) has this synergy. If you have a certain upgrade for Crucio, (where every attack at an enemy spreads curse to nearby enemies), and the ability for Avada Kedavra (which insta-kills all cursed enemies), then you can instantly annihilate any sized group of enemies. Certain enemies even have unique interactions as well if you use spells at the right time; this includes ancient magic throwing back an enemies arrow, slamming a spider’s head into the ground, or even flipping a troll’s club into their face.

The open world of Hogwarts Legacy is very good, letting you explore the entirety of Hogwarts and Hogsmeade, as well as the areas surrounding (such as the Forbidden Forest). The areas in between are usually filled with small activities that you can do. Some of these include:

• Demiguise Moons
• Astronomy tables
• Merlin’s Trials
• Ancient Magic Fonts
• Enemy camps
• Infamous Foes
• Air Balloons

The great thing about these activities is that they’re not just time filler – they all have rewards directly linked to their completion, such as more Ancient Magic bars or inventory slots. For travel (which unfortunately is necessary to avoid wasting an exorbitant amount of time), you have three options to be unlocked at different times in the story: broom, flying mount, and the Graphorn.

These options all have their own pros and cons associated with transportation. The broom, while fast, is expensive to upgrade and loses speed the higher you go. The flying mounts have no height restrictions on speed, but are slower. The Graphorn is completely ground based; it moves fast, has a boost, and can damage enemies.

All three mounts are very enjoyable to use, though at some point you should only use the broom, as it’s speed will far eclipse the other options.

Dark Souls Dodges Are More Fair

The dodge roll in this game works horribly, especially if you have the short range teleport upgrade (enemies will then just snap straight to your new location with their next attack). This is annoying, as enemies will just slide along the ground to hit where you moved…which is just awful for a dodge roll. The dodge roll is meant to get you out of the way of an enemy and create an opening, not just have the enemy teleport to you.

There is also a stealth system in the game, but it does not feel satisfying to use; personally, I will usually Leroy Jenkins (which is also the name of my character in game) into enemies.

There are also doors in the game which hide chests; if you solve the symbol/math puzzle, you get the loot.

I have not done a single one.

I simply didn’t think they were enticing enough – they might have cool stuff, but I didn’t bother to learn how to do it. I went out of my way to get every demiguise moon and all of the dadealian keys, but simply could not be bothered to do math.

Last but not least, there is the problematic issue of who makes money from the game.

J.K. Rowling will make royalties off of the game – this is a given as it’s based off of her work. The decision to buy the game ultimately lies with you. I personally did not pay for the game, and uses someone else’s copy of the game for this review.

The game’s mechanics are superbly crafted with only a few issues, which is far more polished than most games that are released these days. The spell and combat system of the game really push the game over the edge, and makes it far better.

As for rating I’ll give it an Imperio out of Avada Kedavra.