Hogwarts Legacy - Not as good as Dog Kid University

[Isaac]

I thought it looked pretty last-gen, oddly. I think it's the animation, which looks really quite bad.

 

Also never in a million years buying this so my opinion is invalid I guess.

[ryodi]

It has a weirdly somber colour palette and the gameplay they showed didn’t look much different from the Chamber of Secrets game I played on the GameCube back in the day. 

[Graham S]

 

 

[footle]

Plot twist: halfway through the game, our hero realises that the goblins are on the side of right and pivots to taking down the Stalinist Ministry of Magic, with the ultimate aim of razing Hogwarts to the ground.

[Isaac]

Jessie Earl at Gamespot has written a longform, detailed and impassioned article about the game, their thoughts on it (being transgender), and the wider debate about whether you should play it:

 

https://www.gamespot.com/articles/jk-rowlings-anti-transgender-stance-and-hogwarts-legacy/1100-6501632/

 

Quote

There is nothing at all wrong with having a desire to play Hogwarts Legacy; it looks to be a passion project finally delivering the wizarding RPG many, including myself, would have been clamoring for just a few short years ago. There are some who argue that Harry Potter can be decoupled from Rowling. There even seems to be a push within the franchise to lock Rowling out of her own legacy, exemplified by her lack of appearance in the recent HBO Max reunion special. Some even point to authors like horror icon HP Lovecraft, whose work has entered literary canon and gone on to inspire hundreds of works despite Lovecraft's undeniable history of overt racism (and dear heavens, don't look up the name of his cat).

 

Yet, the difference between Lovecraft and Rowling is that supporting Harry Potter can't currently be separated from supporting Rowling herself, despite some people's desire to uncouple the two. Rowling still sits at the head of the franchise, benefiting not only financially from every sale, but through its popularity. The more relevant Harry Potter remains, the more platform Rowling is given to perpetuate anti-transgender language. Further, while the books have finished, Rowling still works on Harry Potter, penning the scripts for the continuing Fantastic Beast franchise. Harry Potter is not only intrinsically linked with but supports the platform of a woman that used to inspire love who now uses her words to inspire hate. On top of that, Rowling herself has used the continued popularity of the franchise as evidence that people support her views, despite this not being the case.

 

As a result, I can't in good conscience support this game, no matter how well I wish the developers in their own personal endeavors. By buying the game, I'm not just supporting them, I'm supporting Harry Potter, which supports Rowling herself.

 

I wrote out this entire dissection of Rowling's words for two reasons. One, I wanted to take this opportunity provided by a game like Hogwarts Legacy to cut through the endless waves of misinformation against trans people and educate about the truth behind the damage Rowling, and more importantly, the larger gender-critical movement and right-wing groups, have caused. Secondly, I did it because I wanted to give you a chance to come to your own conclusions.

 

You're not a bad person if you want to play Hogwarts Legacy. Many trans people themselves are planning to buy the game despite their justified anger towards Rowling. Yet, the important thing is not to condemn the game or renounce your love of Harry Potter; it's to wrestle with the complexity of it and decide for yourself. Trans people don't get to ignore the pain the franchise has become intrinsically linked to, and those who wish to care for them shouldn't get to do so, either. Many will ignore this article and others like it in order to turn a blind eye to the harm done or seek absolution for their choice in buying the game. Some will even (and already have) proudly proclaim their forth-coming purchase in order to express their disdain for having to think about trans people at all. You don't get to defend Rowling or Harry Potter and not understand what that actually means to a trans person, or the ramification it has for all of us, not just trans people.

 

So supporting Hogwarts Legacy, a game about fighting magical fantasy bigots, isn't wrong, but ignoring its legacy within actual bigotry would be.

 

 

[Festoon]

Hogwarts: Mass Murderer.

 

It looks like someone made a collection of bits of the Witcher 3, Zelda games, Assassins Creed and Control.

 

But kinda boring looking.

 

Edit: It'll do gangbusters business.

[footle]

22 minutes ago, Festoon said:

Hogwarts: Mass Murderer.

 

It looks like someone made a collection of bits of the Witcher 3, Zelda games, Assassins Creed and Control.

 

I skipped through from "hello welcome to the class" to "let's do your first duel" to "something with so much spell based violence that if it was guns you'd call it ludicrously unrealistic".

[Opinionated Ham Scarecrow]

Fuck Rowling and fuck this game.

[Phantoon]

41 minutes ago, footle said:

 

I skipped through from "hello welcome to the class" to "let's do your first duel" to "something with so much spell based violence that if it was guns you'd call it ludicrously unrealistic".

The first time it bothered me was Uncharted. I'd gunned down a number of people so great it'd make Arnie blush, then it was straight on to light hearted cut scene, oblivious to the lengthy mass murder I'd just perpetrated

[fat flatulent git]

The voice acting was a bit shit.

 

I liked the environments but not convinced by the character models.

 

It will be made or broken in the combat for me.  It looked fun, but I can't be bothered with games which are basically memory tests any more.

 

I'm amazed this is getting a Switch port.

 

So I'll be reading reviews.  If it reviews well, I'll get it on Series X and Switch.  If not, I'll wait until it's cheap and then pick it up on Series X only.

[tronied]

Looks good so if the reviews match up I'll give it a go. Harry Potter is still such a huge thing so I can see this doing very well.

[Benny]

Unfortunately.

[bradigor]

Don't fund hate. 

 

That should be the only thing to come out of this. 

[Strafe]

Environments and visuals look excellent, though the characters and lip syncing looks rather janky. I’ll get it if it reviews well. 
 

I am not quite sure how they’ll get it running on switch without some serious limitations.

 

 

[tronied]

6 minutes ago, bradigor said:

Don't fund hate. 

 

That should be the only thing to come out of this. 

Has JK Rowling said she hates and despises trans people? I haven't really been keeping up with it all. The last I read was her wanting a TV programme to acknowledge that people who menstruate are called women. After that it all got a bit confusing.

 

If she's actively pushing hate and encouraging others to hate / be prejudiced against any group then absolutely she should be taken to task for that. As it is I just haven't looked into it enough to understand what she's supposed to have said so can't make an informed decision one way or another. At present it certainly hasn't impacted my wife or my appreciation for the films / books though. Again, maybe I just haven't read enough into it...

 

*not wanting to derail the thread away from the game itself!

[bradigor]

She had actively been pursuing hate towards the trans community. She has also sided with right wing anti LGBTQ+ types lately too. 

 

Hey toxicity is part and o parcel of the brand now. 

[bradigor]

I get some just want to edit the games same as with Ubisoft/ ActiBlizz etc but I can't unfortunately.

[jonathanhoey]

25 minutes ago, tronied said:

Has JK Rowling said she hates and despises trans people? I haven't really been keeping up with it all. The last I read was her wanting a TV programme to acknowledge that people who menstruate are called women. After that it all got a bit confusing.

 

If she's actively pushing hate and encouraging others to hate / be prejudiced against any group then absolutely she should be taken to task for that. As it is I just haven't looked into it enough to understand what she's supposed to have said so can't make an informed decision one way or another. At present it certainly hasn't impacted my wife or my appreciation for the films / books though. Again, maybe I just haven't read enough into it...

 

*not wanting to derail the thread away from the game itself!

 

No, she hasn't said she hates or despises trans people. She's still slightly too clever for that. 

 

Instead she does a lot of false-equivalence stuff, largely centred around the totally spurious idea that trans women are men who put on dresses in order to gain access to women's spaces (eg changing rooms) so they can assault the women who are 'legitimately' supposed to be there. When challenged on this kind of thing, she (and the others like her, generally referred to as TERFs for convenience although it's a flawed label) will claim that she's been misrepresented and everyone's out to get her for just saying what we're all thinking. 

 

She absolutely is pushing hate. Fundamentally she doesn't believe that trans women have a right to exist. (She doesn't seem to give a shit about trans men either way, for what that's worth. Edit: Actually I retract that - she's started having a go at trans men too, such as the fuss about completely valid references to "people who menstruate" - since most people who menstruate are women, but some of them are trans men.)

 

It's not derailing - it's a totally valid conversation to have around this game because this stuff does matter when deciding what to spend money on.  @bradigor put it very well above when they said it comes down to "don't fund hate". 

[bear]

58 minutes ago, Strafe said:

Environments and visuals look excellent, though the characters and lip syncing looks rather janky. I’ll get it if it reviews well. 
 

I am not quite sure how they’ll get it running on switch without some serious limitations.

 

 

I think the Switch version will end up being a cloud version of the game like Guardians of the Galaxy or Kingdom hearts. 

[tronied]

@jonathanhoey Ok, thanks for the explanation 👍 It is unfortunate when someone who has brought enjoyment to so many decides to use the popularity to push their own agenda or ideas of morality. As I said, I still like the series and will still buy this game but can appreciate why you and others would be opposed to it. 

[moosegrinder]

 

[kensei]

1 hour ago, bradigor said:

Don't fund hate. 

 

That should be the only thing to come out of this. 

 

I'm sure J K Rowling will miss the second billion. Wait, no, she'll not notice.

 

The developer or QA tester with a mortgage and family will definitely miss their job though.

[LeighCb]

What. So that's why people should buy it? 

[Captain Kelsten]

People should buy it if they want to buy it, and not buy it if they don’t want to buy it, regardless of their reasoning, and not have people on here have a pop at them either way. 

[Mogster]

14 minutes ago, kensei said:

 

I'm sure J K Rowling will miss the second billion. Wait, no, she'll not notice.

 

The developer or QA tester with a mortgage and family will definitely miss their job though.

Won't someone think of the Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment?

 

As ever, this isn't some indie gig. Sales of the game are not directly funding the devs' wages. Even if it was, since when was buying a game seen as an act of charity? (Err, except for the obvious cases where games have been sold for charity).

 

And on the first point, I can only speak for myself but I don't see my decision not to buy the game as a way to somehow impact on the life of JK Rowling. It's purely that I don't want to give her any of my money, regardless of what impact it would have.

[kensei]

4 minutes ago, Mogster said:

Won't someone think of the Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment?

 

As ever, this isn't some indie gig. Sales of the game is not directly funding the devs' wages. Even if it was, since when was buying a game seen as an act of charity? (Err, except for the obvious cases where games have been sold for charity).

 

And on the first point, I can only speak for myself but I don't see my decision not to buy the game as a way to somehow impact on the life of JK Rowling. It's purely that I don't want to give her any of my money, regardless of what impact it would have.

 

So don't buy it if you don't want to. The "I don't want to fund hate" is spurious. Rowling has more than enough money to fund whatever she wants. Harry Potter will keep trucking on regardless of the success of this game.

 

The people most impacted by its failure will be the people making it. If you want to play it and aren't because of your views on Rowling, just be aware of the people it'll most impact. It's not your actual target.

 

6 minutes ago, Mogster said:

Won't someone think of the Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment?

 

As ever, this isn't some indie gig. Sales of the game is not directly funding the devs' wages. 

 

I have been through IT firings when things are not going well and they are no fun at all. Even in job markets where it's not catastrophic. My understanding of the gaming sector is it's worse in terms of failures impacting both employer and employee.

[Fry Crayola]

4 minutes ago, kensei said:

If you want to play it and aren't because of your views on Rowling, just be aware of the people it'll most impact.

 

I think the person it'll most impact is the individual deciding they don't want it on their conscience. And that holds regardless of how much weight you, I, or anyone else places on that.

[Clipper]

28 minutes ago, kensei said:

 

 

 

The developer or QA tester with a mortgage and family will definitely miss their job though.

This is not a consideration. The gaming industry hire and fire on whims, some have wholescale redundancies at the end of every project, others have redundancies when they make profits to make even more profits by cutting costs. It has little to do with sales

 

If people wish to not buy a game as they see it as funding hate (Hogwarts) or funding abusers (Ubisoft) then that is their decision. It will have zero impact on the dev who is likely going to be fucked over in some way at some point anyway because the people they work for are shitty (either directly or indirectly)

 

 

 

[Mogster]

1 minute ago, kensei said:

So don't buy it if you don't want to. The "I don't want to fund hate" is spurious. Rowling has more than enough money to fund whatever she wants. Harry Potter will keep trucking on regardless of the success of this game.

I won't, thanks, but it's not spurious at all. It's entirely possible to accept that Harry Potter, and JK Rowling's wealth will no doubt continue to thrive, while also not wanting to be a part of any of it.

 

4 minutes ago, kensei said:

The people most impacted by its failure will be the people making it. If you want to play it and aren't because of your views on Rowling, just be aware of the people it'll most impact. It's not your actual target.

Like you've just said, my decision not to buy the game is unlikely to impact the success of the game. Even if it did fail as a result of people not buying it due to the link to Rowling, then that's entirely the fault of the people running the business. Unless you're now claiming that any game that's flopped is because people didn't take pity on the devs, rather than the quality of the game, the marketing or whatever.

 

7 minutes ago, kensei said:

I have been through IT firings when things are not going well and they are no fun at all. Even in job markets where it's not catastrophic. My understanding of the gaming sector is it's worse in terms of failures impacting both employer and employee.

I'm sure you have, and that obviously sucks. Once again though, you've stated that my decision not to buy the game won't affect its success. Also once again, even if it did then this failure would rest with those in charge, not my decision not to buy the game. 

[ZOK]

I’m quite happy to boycott this because:

 

1) It looks shit.

2) Harry Potter is shit.

3) JK Rowling is a shit.