“Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban” video game

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Review by Damon

This is my personal review of the latest game, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban from EA Games, and it doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll have the same opinion or that everyone else that works for the site will either. That being said, I would advise anyone interested in purchasing the game to change their mind and save their money.

I ordered the game from EBgames.com with overnight shipping, and it arrived Wednesday morning. Seeing as the last two versions of the game had taken several days to complete and had been quite challenging, this one was expected to be the same. I could not have been more incorrect.

The game lasts from beginning to a mostly-cutscene rescue of Sirius Black (no, you don’t get to fly Buckbeak to the tower, or ever outside of a learning experience) ending for almost two and a half hours. The entire game is comprised of basically four locations: Hogwarts castle and its grounds and the three areas where you learn three new spells. That’s it. No more. No Hogsmeade. No Forbidden Forest. No boggarts. No Professor Trelawney.

Even thinking about the game makes me reconsider the word “disappointing” since it doesn’t seem severe enough.

Please do not trust the box that says the game is more challenging and that you are allowed to play as Harry, Hermione, or Ron. That is partially true; you do play as different characters… just you’re never given an opportunity to decide which character you’re playing as. Sound fun? No, probably not.

Here’s hoping EA chooses a different design team for Goblet of Fire, or we may well lose all three tasks in the Triwizard Challenge or that insignificant scene at the end where Lord Voldemort returns.

Before you go, if you do purchase the game, there will be a surprise in it. You’ll think you get to play Quidditch for a bit when there’s a cut scene introducing it, but I, too, was fooled. It’s just a cutscene about the Dementors, and then you’re back to normal. This game was both a waste of time and money,  even on EA’s part.