Latest / Revelio: A Wizarding World Podcast / Episode 37: Wizards of Gaming - The Original "Harry Potter" Video Games

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Episode 37: Wizards of Gaming - The Original "Harry Potter" Video Games · Revelio: A Wizarding World Podcast

• 0:09
  Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to episode thirty seven of Ravellio for
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: February fifth, twenty twenty six. I'm Amy and I'm Tom
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: and we're missing Nicole today, but that's okay. She'll be
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: back next episode, Yeah.
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: To discuss more over main discussion that's going to be
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: announced very soon. Yeah, Tom, we're going to miss Yeah,
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: we're going to miss you today, Nicole. Yeah, so how's everything.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: Things are good. You know, it's a single digit weather
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: here in New York, but oh nice, we're surviving.
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: You're thriving through the storm.
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: Oh. Yes, the snow banks will just never melt because
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: it's so cold.
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: Oh my gosh. Nice. I mean we don't get snow here,
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: but it's very wet and yeah, it's uh kind of freezing.
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: But yeah, I got my heater here next to me,
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: and it's all good. And as long as we can,
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: you know, combat this this cold away, then we're good.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: And you threw the spider out into the cold to
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: try and get that cold weather, I'll buy yourself out there.
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: Yes, I mean I hope she's I hope she's kind
• 1:40
  Speaker 2: of like Cole Proof. I hope she Yeah, I don't know, like, yeah, whoever, Yeah,
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: whoever listened to our previous episode might know probably some
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: of the bloopers or some of the like b rolls
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: the Spider. Yeah, so yeah, oh okay, So in this
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: episode we are going to be discussing the Harry Potter
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: video games. But first.
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: Listening to w WN the Wizarding Wireless Network. Now for
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: the latest headlines. All right, so we do have a
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: little bit of news here, most of it revolving around
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: the twenty five year anniversary of the Harry Potter films.
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: And if you remember last episode, we were complaining that
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: they were announcing anything about celebrating this milestone literally right
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: after we recorded. Yeah, they announced a whole bunch of stuff.
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: So there's a lot here. So we'll give a little
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: bit of a rundown first, all eight films. We'll be
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: back in theaters with the Sorcerer's Stone showing, featuring ten
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: minutes of behind the scenes content. It's quote ever before
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: seen in theaters, intriguing. Yeah, these showings are set to
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: happen from August twenty seventh to September third, so right
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: up back to Hogwarts time. So that's kind of a
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: fun way to celebrate. Yeah, they're also teasing that the
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: annual Back to Hogwarts showcase will be bigger and better
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: than ever. I know. Personally, I'm hoping for more information
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: about that. Hogwarts Express Ride dropped a little bit of
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: info last year.
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, very little, yeah, yeah, very small teas like sprinkles
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: of teasing, and that was it.
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: The website still exists, so I'm hoping that still means
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: is a thing. And then there's also this shared reality
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: experience as well that's supposed to happen this year at
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: some point. So reading off of their website, this is
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: the description. It's, i guess being put on by this
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: company called Cosma. I don't know how you would say that, cosm. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So,
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: utilizing cosms state of the art eighty seven foot diameter,
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: twelve K plus LED domes and proprietary full dome filmmaking technology,
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: Cosm will transport fans to feel as though they have
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: stepped into Hogwarts and the medical wizarding world of Harry Potter,
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: surrounding them in magic, enchantment and rich environments. They complement
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: the film while incorporating hidden Easter eggs for fans. The
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: website has some pictures. I'm guessing these are from past
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: events they've done. It looks pretty cool. So basically it's
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: like a theater and a dome, and I guess they
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: surround you with visuals, so.
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: Kind of reminds me of the Dome from Las Vegas. Yeah,
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: it would make sense that it gets screened over there,
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: but for some reason, I think to make the experience
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: more available to people from different parts of the US
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: than they're probably like making it in different locations because
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: it's in La Dallas, Atlanta, Detroit, so I'm probably thinking
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: it's going to be screening in all those locations.
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it looks really cool.
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: There's also a quote from the CEO of this company
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: and he says Cosm is reinvigorating the movie going experience,
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: transporting fans into the world of their favorite films, and
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: we are thrilled to continue building the experiential cinema category
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: in partnership with Warner Brothers Pictures. In the newest addition
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: to our lineup, the first Harry Potter film, Harry Potter
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: and the Sorcerer's Stone at Cosm will be a magical
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: experience celebrating the film and the fandom that makes the
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: Wizarding World so special. With key elements like butter beer
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: and chocolate frogs to delight guess along the way.
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: Mm because why not? Yeah, of course, grab a sip
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: of butter beer and a chocolate frog while you're watching
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: the first film, Like I mean, and I also imagine
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: there's going to be like interactive elements like I've seen sometimes.
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: I think I software the Wizard of Oss. They did
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: like I don't know if it was no or what
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: it was, but they would put like special effects into
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: like really like tangible things that you know. So it's
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: going to be really interesting to see how that plays
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: out in these screenings. I wish they were available in
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: different parts of the world, but yeah, we're gonna have
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: to fly to the to the States in order to
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: be able to experience it.
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah, even the US locations. I'm like, ugh mm hmmm.
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: I don't really want to go. I don't want to
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: go any of these places right now, Like, I just
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: that just seems so taxing on me to go to.
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: But you could you could go to LA and then
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: go to the theme park.
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: I could, you know, that might be the best option. Yeah,
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: Atlanta and August does not sound appealing to me.
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: Mm.
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so that looks really cool. Also, a twenty fifth
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: anniversary logo featuring the Patrona's charm will be on new
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: and existing products throughout the year. I have not seen
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: pictures of this logo yet, so I'm guessing that'll be
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: unveiled soon.
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: I think it's the one that we already saw that
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: was trademarked last year. I think they're putting it on
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: the poster. Is it not that one?
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: Maybe? I mean, yeah, they didn't have it in this article.
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: Because it is on the Lego sets, so I'm guessing
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: it's the same one.
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: I bet you that's it.
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: Mm hmmm. Yeah. Yeah, it's going to be like their
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: trademark for this year.
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah yeah. Also, of course Lego is getting in on this,
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: because why wouldn't they. So four Lego sets will come
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: with an exclusive Patronis figure and those sets are Hogwarts
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: Castle Sorting Ceremony, Hogwarts Castle Hospital, Wing, Secret Potions, Classroom,
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: and Luna Lovegood's House. M hm. So these four different
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: patronesses are exclusive to these sets and part of the celebration,
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: So that's cool.
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: Cool.
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: There's also going to be seven old Brand collaborations coming
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: up this year, including collections with Alex and Nani, Spinmaster, Lug, MGA, Jazzwear's, Hallmark,
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: Rain Spooner, Pyramid Lounge, fly TIMEX, Crocs and Vera Bradley.
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: You got it all.
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: Yes, so many brands, and of course our favorite brand,
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: Mina Alima will also be celebrating twenty five years. They
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: are going to release some commemorative designs, including twenty five
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: years of Hogwarts Acceptance Letter and twenty five years of
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: Hogwarts Express.
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: Nice.
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: I can't wait to see those. Yeah. A twenty fifth
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: anniversary range will be available for purchase at various official
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: Harry Potter shops too, so London, New York, Tokyo, Chicago.
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: I'm assuming basically anywhere there's an official store of any kind.
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: Some of the items in this range include a celebration bear,
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: a Philosopher's stone keychain, and a collectible pin set. And
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: of course, the studio tours in London and Tokyo are
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: also celebrating. They're going to have features from the first film,
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: including props, costumes, sets, all sorts of stuff. They've also
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: teased that there might be more to be announced in
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: regards to the studio tours, so people should keep an
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: eye out for that.
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I'd be exciting to see an new set, to
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: be honest, not just like props and costumes, because I
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: think we've gotten so much of that already that it'd
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: be nice for them to kind of like to spice
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: things up and be like, Okay, we're going to take
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: it to the next level, and we're going to introduce
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: this new set because it doesn't necessarily have to be
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: of the first film, like it could be of any
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: because it's a celebration of the films as whole too,
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: so it's a special occasion. And I hope they really,
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: they really, you know, use it to their own leverage
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: in the best possible way, because they know if they
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: are feeding us fans, then we're going to go and
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: we're going to want to invest in it. And hopefully
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: they have a lot more surprises planned. And I'm excited
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: as a huge fan of these films as we all are.
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: But yeah, like, yeah, I hope there's a lot more
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: to be announced, and I can't wait to see how
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: this year unfolds. We're only in January, so yeah.
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm really curious too. I know we talked about
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: some of the stuff with Universal Theme parks and what
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: they were saying they were going to have go on
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: this year. I'm curious to see what other details are
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: announced for those as well throughout the year, because I
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: know we had mentioned like usually back to Hogwarts is
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: just like any other day in the theme parks, like
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: what are they planning? What is going to be that event?
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: So I'm hoping in the coming months we'll start to
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: hear a little bit more about each of these things
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: so people can kind of start making their plans for
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: the year.
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, definitely.
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: And then just to wrap up the news here, we
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: do have some Harry Potter TV Show news. During an
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: interview with Deadline, Casey Bloyce, who is the chairman and
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: CEO of HBO and HBO Max Content, narrowed down the
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: projective release release date for the streaming series, saying, quote,
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: we've been saying twenty twenty seven. I would say to
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: narrow it down to some extent early twenty twenty seven.
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: And now you're going to ask does that mean January, February, March,
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: or April that we're not ready to say. So, yeah,
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: it looks like the first half of the year.
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: So that's I mean, that's good. Yeah, it's what people
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: were expecting to like kind of like write like top
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: of the year more than end of the year. Yeah, yeah,
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: m hm.
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah usually because then they can do all like the
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: holiday promotions. You know. I feel like that's kind of
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: the time for advertising, is like yeah, end of twenty
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: twenty six.
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, definitely.
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: All right, And that is all we have for the news.
• 13:27
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• 13:32
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• 13:37
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• 13:41
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• 13:47
  Speaker 2: Okay, and for today's main discussion, we are going to
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: be taking a step back in time to revisit this
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: all time classic loved by some I wouldn't say hate it,
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: but kind of like eh others, which are the Harry
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: Potter console and PC games. So I would say if
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: you're a fan of these games, you might want to
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: stick around. And even if you're not a fan, or
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: you haven't played them yet or kind of like your
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: memory is a little fuzzy, I think, yeah, there's a
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: lot of fun trivia in fact that might just peak
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: your curiosity. For these classics, so yeah, I.
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: Mean they're the subject of so many memes and Harry
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: Potter's culture poor Yeah.
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think they even had this this DLC or
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: this mask for him for the Quidditch game, the one
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: that they launched last year.
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: That's amazing.
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah, So it's almost like canon already, like it's something
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: they have made. It's so like it's so inherently like,
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: you know, part of our our culture as a fandom
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: already that you know, they're just yeah, seeing the profits
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: of it already. So yeah, just a quick recap, like
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: for those of you, like, I mean, I'm sure you
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: already know what these are about. But of course you know,
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: this is you getting to experience Hogwarts from the eyes
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: of Harry. So you don't just follow the main storyline,
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: but you also immerse yourself into daily school life. So
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: this includes going to classes, learning spells, interacting with student,
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: and exploring the castle and discovering many secrets. This includes
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: collecting a handful of berry Bots, every flavor beans, famous
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: wizard cards, and many more secrets. So yeah, so as
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: these games regrets, you are going to see how the
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: mechanics evolve. Just to keep brand freshness, and to keep
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: the players engaged throughout these years. And also there was
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: like such a huge technological push during the early two
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: thousands towards the end of the early two thousands, that
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: not the early by the two thousands, that there are
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: a lot of things and a lot of the game,
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: like the game rules changed so much, so many times
• 16:03
  Speaker 2: in the correct direction, but you know, many times it
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: came along with major setbacks, which we are going to
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: be discussing in this discussion.
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: So, yeah, it's so funny looking at like the Sorcerer's
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: Stone graphics compared to like Deathly Hallow's graphics.
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: Too, It's yeah, it's insane because you don't see that. Yeah,
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: you don't see that from like let's say twenty eleven
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: to twenty twenty. It's not that noticeable. So it's amazing
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: how much. And I think that applies to movies too,
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: like how everything started in the early two thousands to
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: where we were at the late two thousands. Like it's
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: crazy the jump in technology that I think and us
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: as millennials like we were living through it. We were
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: we went through not having cell phones to having you know,
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: social media like what we were you know, So yeah,
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: it was a crazy year, like a year, not year.
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: It was a crazy decade, and you know, we get
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: to be the general of that decade, which is cool.
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: So yeah, without further ado, let's jump into this discussion.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: So a little bit of backstory. In two thousand and one,
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: Electronic Arts at the time known as EA games secure
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: the rights to adapt the Harry Potter films into video
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: games as each movie released, aiming for faithful retailings of
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: the story that mirrored both the films and the books.
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: So for these first installments, at the very beginning, AA
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: did not build one unified game agent or team. Instead,
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: they spread the early titles across multiple developers at once,
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: theoretically most likely because of time constraints and how they were, like,
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: you know, they had to get these games done in
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: like twelve months or less, and at that time it
• 17:51
  Speaker 2: was like a huge stake, Like.
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: It was.
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: It wasn't like now, like you can even do like
• 17:57
  Speaker 2: things with AI with how things are advancing, but at
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: that time everything had to be done from scratch, and
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: it was it was a hard task really, So this
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: fragmented approach was not just a technical choice, it reflected
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: also how risky early franchise adaptation still felt, so each
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: version was contracted out to whichever studio could deliver by
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: the deadline, and the result was a mix of gameplay styles,
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: tonal shifts, and different emphasis on puzzles versus action versus
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: versions versus across all versions of the game, depending on
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: which consulet it was played in. So, yeah, I mean
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: I never realized that.
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: I didn't realize that they were like different depending on what.
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, it's and it's very different, Like they're completely
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: different games. We're going to touch on these as we
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: move forward. But yeah, and I also think it's it's
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: very telling of how, you know, Harry Potter was just
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: beginning to become this huge phenomenon and you know, they
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: didn't know how much they wanted to really invest in
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: it at the time because it's not you know, it
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: still hadn't reached the cusp of its popularity at this
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: stage by any means, Like it was really popular, the
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: books had broken out, and it was it was obviously
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: having a huge influence on our culture. But it's yeah,
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: like they were skeptical and you know for all the
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: you know, you could say the wrong reasons because there
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: was no reason to be skeptical at the end of
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: the day, but the first film hadn't even come out yet,
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: so there was no telling how it would go. So
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: for the first game, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: This game was released on November fifteenth, two thousand and one,
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: for PC, PlayStation One, game Boy Advance, and game Boy Color.
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: So this kind of puts you, you know, if you
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: weren't really much aware, like game Boy Advanced, Gameboard Color,
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: that can tell you how many years back this was. Yeah,
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: I never owned any of these, Like I never owned
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: game Boy Advants or game Boy Color. It was my
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: dream as a kid, but I never got one.
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: No need.
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I I don't think I started playing these until
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: the second one came out, but I do remember going
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: back and playing the first one. I was the kid
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: who was not allowed to have any gaming consoles, so
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: everything I played was on a PC mm hmm with
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: a little kitchen timers set so that I could get
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: kicked off. Because we also had dial up internet too,
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: so like if I was ever on the internet, it
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: was a problem and we couldn't get phone calls.
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and your mother picked up the phone and she
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: was like, who's on Who's online, and it'd be like, uh,
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: a little like thing.
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: They would pop up on the computer screen incoming calling.
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: Off this Yeah yeah, I mean we didn't even have
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: that at home. It was like if we got any
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: calls and they wouldn't come through, even like my mom
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: would pick up the phone and she'd be like, who's
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: because there was like this weird sound when you picked
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: up the phone and you were on dial up, and
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: they would be like, who's using the internet? Who didn't
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: ask for my permission? I was like, ah, you know
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: you would, Yeah, you would just scram So yeah, yeah
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: we're old guys. We're old. We're millennials, not that old.
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: But simpler.
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: We grew up with dial up.
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: But yeah, no, I I feel like the most vivid
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: memory of like these early games is flipendo hm hmm, yeah,
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: trying to trace those damn spell things.
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: Oh. I was so bad at that with a mouse.
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: That was so bad.
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm going to touch on that in particular, Yeah,
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: because there are some really interesting things about it. So
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: just to touch on how about these studios that were
• 22:11
  Speaker 2: handling these games. This was going to be handled by
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: different they were, these studios were going to be handling
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: different platforms. So Astronaut asked, no, Argunaut Games sorry, was
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: going to be handling PlayStation Aspire. I suppose hope, I'm
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: not butchering. It was going to take over mac os
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: Grip Tonight Games, uh, was going to overlook Game of
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: Color and Game Boy Advance, and last but not least,
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: No Wonder took the to charge of the PC version.
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: These were all, by the way, working independently, independently, so
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: it's not like they were cross you know, it wasn't
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: a cross functioning team like they each each of these
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: teams had their own connections with the producers of the
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: films or with JK. Rowling, but like individual like, they didn't.
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: They didn't really something that today wouldn't happen really, Like
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: it seems so like, I don't know, it seems like
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: so old fashioned, but yeah, that's the way it worked.
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: It seems like more work, honestly. Yeah, if they're not
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: communicating with each other to be like, oh, we're going
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: to do this, Oh that's a good idea. Let's deal
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: with that too, Like it's like, yeah.
• 23:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a little weird, especially since you know, EA
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: Games was this company who was like endorsing these games,
• 23:32
  Speaker 2: that there wasn't like this common thread that they could
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: all like or this you know hub where they could
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: all just connect and just put ideas together and make
• 23:41
  Speaker 2: the games consistent throughout across all platforms. So, like I said,
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: I mean, they were completely different games. They were based
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: on the same storyline and few featured similar challenges with
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: a generally kind of like puzzle focused structor the way
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: the events unfolded, and that this of the world. So
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: the maps, including Hogwarts and the grounds and you know,
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: all of that just varied significantly depending on the platform.
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: So if you were playing PlayStation one, it was going
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: to be a completely different game to PC, which is
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: going to be a completely different game to PlayStation two,
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: which I mean had its perks because you could, you know,
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: play a single game three times, but different games at
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: the same time.
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so weird.
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, So a little bit digging a little bit deep
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: into how the PC game came to be. No Wonder
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: had twelve to fourteen months to finish the game. So
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: this happened between nineteen ninety nine and the year two thousand,
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: so a long time ago. The approval process was long
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: and strict, so decisions required signing of across multiple layers,
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: reflecting how important and closely guarded the Harry Potter ip
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: already was and the team they really struggled to define
• 25:04
  Speaker 2: a visual identity of the game, so they had no
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: clear idea of what the final film sets would look like.
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: They were not provided with detailed assets either, which is
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: crazy because they would have the rights by At the
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: same time, it's like, you don't have permission to see
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: these assets that you have to base this game off of.
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: So they do comment that they receive blurry photographs from
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: a production assistant when requested. Upon request, really, and they
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: were allowed to briefly visit the sets, but they could
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: only take notes. They weren't allowed to take any photos
• 25:42
  Speaker 2: or anything. Everything was treated as a top secret. Yeah,
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: it's crazy. Really, it's like, we're giving you permission to
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: do this game, but we're not giving you the tools
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: that will enable for these games to be successful or
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: to be consistent with the story that we are you know,
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: putting out right.
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: And I would imagine if it looked like too different
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: and too out there from the films, they'd be like yeah, no, no, no, no, no, no,
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: you can't do that. That doesn't look right, like, okay,
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: well then show us what it looks like.
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: Well, no, nope, can't do that. Yeah, exactly. They would
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: get guidance though on things that were probably maybe like
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: too you know, if something was too much of a stretch.
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: They'd be like getting advice either from JK. Rowling or
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: from one of the production assistants from the films, and
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: they'd be like, no, this is not quite it. But yeah,
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: I mean, it's crazy to think that they didn't have
• 26:34
  Speaker 2: at least sets from the picture. I mean, they had
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: someone going there and taking down notes, but it's not
• 26:40
  Speaker 2: the same. I mean, it had to be someone with
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: a real keen eye for detail, right. I Mean, I
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: don't think I would have been I would have been,
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: you know, good enough for it. So I'm sure they
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: sent their best asset there to just you know, kind
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: of like paint the picture to see how everything was.
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: So yeah, so they they realize heavily on book descriptions
• 27:02
  Speaker 2: real world architecture and buildings in England to imagine locations
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: and layouts. And that's why you see I don't know
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: if you noticed, but the the entrance hall in the
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: game is very similar to the one you see in Pottermore,
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: you know, when you when you back when it was
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: illustrations and we saw the Great Hall, not the Great Hall,
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: but the the the entrance hall. It was very similar
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: to those of the games. So yeah, that's actually pretty
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: cool because they didn't have you know, they didn't even
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: have of course, they didn't have the model of the castle,
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: they didn't have how the sets would look. So basing
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: it off of the description, it's pretty cool that you
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: come up with that, and then when you know, Pottermore
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: came out ten years later, it was very very similar.
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: So that's really cool.
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: I guess that shows you how descriptive things are.
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely. Yeah, So a little bit about the mechanics
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: of the gameplay, so it shaped spell design. So the
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: team was given a list of spells for first year students,
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: so they'd be like, this is the list. It's five spells.
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: That's all they're gonna learn. They you know, either by JK.
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: Rowling or someone from the team from the production of
• 28:23
  Speaker 2: the films. And we were talking about this earlier, but
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: flipendo in particular was adapted heavily for gameplay purposes. Yeah,
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: the infamous flipendo spell, the one that you used to
• 28:35
  Speaker 2: move barrels and pillars and you know everything you could.
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: You could shoot flipendo at basically anything. It was like
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: the stupefy of the video games. Yeah, more or less.
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: Or Harry's expoy armis that he uses for everything. So yeah, basically,
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: because the description in the book in the books was
• 28:54
  Speaker 2: kind of vague for the spell, the developers could kind
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: of like push push the edges a little bit and
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: they could have more creative freedom in favor of these mechanics.
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: And yeah, I mean they used it for everything. It's
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: like today, you know, Revellio on the game on Howwartz Legacy,
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: that was our Revellio back in the day. It was flippendo.
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: So true.
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And something interesting now that we were talking about
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: how the different each you know, this game was depending
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: on the platform. The PC version was a lot more linear,
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: so allowed exploration of certain areas of the castle only
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: within specific levels. So what I mean is that, like
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: let's say, for example, you had exitent, you know, a
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: level set in the Howartz Grounds, you can no longer
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: return to that area later. So let's say you were
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: meeting up with Hagrid and then you went to Herbology
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: lesson and then you would come back to the to
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: the school and you finish your mission there. Then that
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: was it, Like you wouldn't be able to explore again,
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: which was kind of a bummer because the one thing
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: that you wanted to do was being able to explore
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: Hogwarts in its entirety and fully immerse yourself. And by contrast,
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: the PlayStation and console versions allowed for more like free roaming,
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: and I feel like it made the world more tangible
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: and magical just because you have a bit more free will.
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: So yeah, that was a little bit of a of
• 30:22
  Speaker 2: a step back, I think in the PC version, at
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: least at least for me, Like I was always trying
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: to see how can I make it to the grounds now,
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: Like I couldn't go because there was a lock in there,
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: or there was like no way you couldn't go even
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: to the Great Hall.
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: In a few mists like chocolate frog cards or beans
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: or something like that, you couldn't go back and get
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: it later.
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: That was a loss for the rest of the game exactly.
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: So I mean that obviously changed in forthcoming installments, but
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: for that first one, it did feel like there was
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: some some things that were a little rushed and of
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: course in twelve months, you can only do so much,
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: especially when you have to imagine everything from scratch. So yeah,
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: the PlayStation version sold eight million copies by May two
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: thousand and three, and it made it the sixth best
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: selling PlayStation video game of all time.
• 31:17
  Speaker 3: Wow.
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's crazy. So it's kind of like shows how
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: popular these games were. I mean, they weren't by any
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: means one of the most popular games in history, but
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: you know, they did hold up pretty well, and I
• 31:32
  Speaker 2: think they they did. They did a good thing when
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: they when they decided to endorse these games because people
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: were invested, at least fans were. And curiously, this kind
• 31:45
  Speaker 2: of like a little trivia fact, but there was no
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: PlayStation two version released in two thousand and one, so
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: it didn't come out until two thousand and three. War
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: the games released versions for sixth generation consoles, so this
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: means GameCube PlayStation into an Xbox and they reused acids
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: from Chamber of Secrets. So the crazy thing is that
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: Chamber of Secrets came first and then SORCER's Stone for
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: these consoles, and the version, like the game for these
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: six generation consoles, is exactly the same game. The only
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: thing that changes is obviously the controls, because it was
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: different depending on which, you know, console you were playing in.
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: But yeah, I yeah, I remember because it would have
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: been around this time that I got into the games
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: because my friends got a game cube for Christmas and
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: got they got the first and second games, and I
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: just remember sitting there on the floor of their living
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: room all playing the game Cree Harry Potter games, and
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: then going home and begging my mom for a game
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: cube and she was like, yeah, no, but then she
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: found out they were on PC, so she got me
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: the PC.
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: And that was my win. Yeah, yeah, for sure, Yeah, definitely,
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: Like I didn't have a PlayStation one and I won
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: it one so badly, so I would try to get
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: those games emulated on my PC. So I ran these games,
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: and I played these games for PlayStation one in an emulator.
• 33:17
  Speaker 2: And we're talking about like the year two thousand and four,
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: two thousand and five, like that was a long time
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: ago and we were already kind of like dabbling with
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: these emulators. So emulators are really old. But yeah, like
• 33:27
  Speaker 2: they wouldn't run really nicely. They were on at like
• 33:29
  Speaker 2: fifteen frames per second, so that was kind of like
• 33:33
  Speaker 2: pretty bad, but at least you got to play it somehow.
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: We were determined.
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, okay. So only a year later, of course,
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: in correlation to the film to Chamber of Secrets coming
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: out in November two thousand and two, on November fifteenth,
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: the second game came out. So while the first game
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: did not have a dedicated team, following the success of Stone,
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: Urcom took over development for major console and handheld releases.
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: So this entry shifted the series in a way from
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: heavy puzzle solving and toward a more action focused gameplay,
• 34:12
  Speaker 2: including boss fights. So, yeah, you would start having like
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: these challenges, and you know, you would go and you
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: would learn if spell at the classroom. You would walk
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: through a door or through a wall, and you would
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: just have to retrieve this spell book that had the
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: spell that you were you know, expected to learn in
• 34:31
  Speaker 2: that lesson. So they sent you on these really dangerous
• 34:35
  Speaker 2: quests which were which were Yeah, they were like putting
• 34:40
  Speaker 2: their students in peril just for retrieving a book with
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: a spell on.
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: It and going this room with all these moving platforms.
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: By the way, if you jump and you miss, you're dead.
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: You're dead because there might be lava on the floor
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: that it's yeah, like these teachers were reckless and they
• 35:01
  Speaker 2: were yeah yeah, So that was that was fun. But
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: you had to always you know, either it was a
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: gargoyle or it was this huge cauldron that would turn
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: into this humongous stove that would have like I don't know,
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: made up of like ten different stoves everywhere. You have
• 35:19
  Speaker 2: to disarm it and just you know, start Like it
• 35:22
  Speaker 2: was crazy, like you had all of these bosses on
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: each of these challenges. So I think that's what they
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: meant when they changed the that you know, those dynamics
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: a little bit. So the PlayStation two version stood out
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: by allowing free rome, so you would actually be able
• 35:38
  Speaker 2: to fly your broom around Hogwarts and it's something that
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: no other version supported. So and by the way, if
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: I'm mentioning PlayStation two, I'm also mentioning GameCube and Xbox
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: because it was the same game, like we said, but interestingly,
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: interestingly enough, the PC version went in the opposite direction,
• 35:58
  Speaker 2: so it retained the lower, more puzzit oriented style of
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: the first game, and we used many of the assets
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: of that first game. However, unlike sorcers Stone, where you
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: were like okay, you were locked out of a certain
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: area of the castle and you cann't return anymore. Well,
• 36:14
  Speaker 2: they kind of corrected the course in this one, and
• 36:16
  Speaker 2: they did allow for a bit more freedom to explore Hogwarts,
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: not a bit more, a lot more freedom because it's
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: one of the best games in terms of exploration really.
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: So it let players move around, like in and out
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: of the castle at will and discover secrets, collect large
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: amount of birdie bots, every flavor beans, and Wizards cards,
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: so that was a lot of fun. You could even
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: exchange with other students for birdie Bot beans, so you'd
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: be like exchanging chromes what was it Wizard cards. What
• 36:46
  Speaker 2: was the name of the chocolate frog cards? They had
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: a specific name, Oh, the chromes.
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: Like famous, which is in Wizards cards.
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so yeah it was yeah. Yeah.
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: They were in levels of bronze, silver, and gold.
• 37:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, and I remember the Yeah, the last one
• 37:09
  Speaker 2: I think was Harry. The last one when you completed
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: the collection was Harry. That was pretty cool and it
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: was a lot of fun because it changed the dynamics
• 37:18
  Speaker 2: a lot. I think you could do that in the
• 37:20
  Speaker 2: first game as well, but as I said, it was
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: just you know, so restricted by the level. So if
• 37:28
  Speaker 2: you were let's say you were, I don't know, in
• 37:30
  Speaker 2: the central hub, or you were at the entrance hall,
• 37:33
  Speaker 2: and you might not be able to go back there anymore.
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: So this one, yes, and Chamber of Secrets, you were
• 37:39
  Speaker 2: able to explore the castle during the day, night, everything
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: you name it like. It was a big, big improvement
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: from the first game. And again this was a different
• 37:52
  Speaker 2: experience depending on the platform. So in sixth Gen console
• 37:55
  Speaker 2: for example, and the Police PlayStation one versions, the game
• 37:58
  Speaker 2: begins at the borrow, so that's where you denome the
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: garden and get rid of the goal in the attic
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: it was.
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: Had to spin.
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: Yes, yes, that was amazing. Yeah, yeah, that was a
• 38:14
  Speaker 2: lot of it was And it was so much fun
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: to start at the borrow because it was like expanding
• 38:18
  Speaker 2: this universe a little by little and you started getting
• 38:21
  Speaker 2: into these different locations that you hadn't been to before.
• 38:26
  Speaker 2: But the PC version, the first playable level is the
• 38:29
  Speaker 2: weasles Ford Anglia flying car crashing into the wumping willow.
• 38:33
  Speaker 2: That's the first time. So everything that comes before that
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: are cut scenes. And this is just one example of
• 38:39
  Speaker 2: the many structural differences between the versions. The games are,
• 38:43
  Speaker 2: like the storyline is the same, but the way these
• 38:46
  Speaker 2: events unfold, the classes, the spells that you learn, the
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: map of the of the castle, everything is completely different. Yeah.
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: So jumping into the year two thousand and three, there
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: was this gap because suddenly we didn't have new Harry
• 39:05
  Speaker 2: Potter film. That was a year we started having, you know,
• 39:10
  Speaker 2: every now and then a film, because there would be
• 39:12
  Speaker 2: a year that we wouldn't we wouldn't get anything, and so,
• 39:16
  Speaker 2: you know, EA was like, what can we put out
• 39:19
  Speaker 2: now that we don't have, you know, the third one
• 39:22
  Speaker 2: still coming up? So they decided to release Quidditch World Cup,
• 39:28
  Speaker 2: and it was the first Harry Potter game to step
• 39:30
  Speaker 2: away entirely from film retellings and focus on a single
• 39:34
  Speaker 2: aspect of the Wizarding world. So, rather than adapting a
• 39:38
  Speaker 2: specific movie or book, the game center exclusively on Quidditch basically,
• 39:48
  Speaker 2: and it was handled by EA UK, which marked one
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: of the first signs that EA was beginning to consolidate
• 39:55
  Speaker 2: Harry Potter development internally rather than outsourcing every major release.
• 40:00
  Speaker 2: This is very interesting because this game in the PC
• 40:04
  Speaker 2: version was the same game as the PlayStation two, as
• 40:08
  Speaker 2: the GameCube Xbox versions, so we started having a bit
• 40:13
  Speaker 2: more of a you know, consistent image for these games,
• 40:19
  Speaker 2: at least for this one. So that helped establish a
• 40:23
  Speaker 2: more consistent visual and mechanic identity across platforms. So we
• 40:27
  Speaker 2: are seeing this like kind of like merging everything into
• 40:30
  Speaker 2: a single entity. And yeah, the game featured national teams
• 40:36
  Speaker 2: from around the wizard world. So this includes England, Ireland, Bulgaria, France,
• 40:40
  Speaker 2: German and Japan, Spain, the Nordic team, and the United States,
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: and also the Hogwarts houses. So you can play either
• 40:48
  Speaker 2: at Hogwarts or you could you know, start your own
• 40:51
  Speaker 2: team and just you know, go and enter World Cups.
• 40:57
  Speaker 2: And each team had distinct stadiums, crowd chance, and visual
• 41:01
  Speaker 2: styles and this all helped the game feel like a
• 41:03
  Speaker 2: global tournament rather than a side mode. So yeah, this
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: is something that was mentioned a little bit like this
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: whole quidditch thing. This whole quiddish not storyline, but element
• 41:16
  Speaker 2: was kind of sidelined in the games. You could play quidditch,
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: but it wasn't as major, it wasn't as polished or
• 41:22
  Speaker 2: as defined. So they decided to say, hey, people love quidditch,
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: why don't we just make a game out of it
• 41:28
  Speaker 2: and make it all about it.
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: This game was so fun too, I think because it
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: had such a good multiplayer like aspect to it. It
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: was just such a fun game. Like it was one that, yes,
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: you could play by yourself, but like playing with friends
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: was really cool because you could take on the different
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: roles and yeah, it was just such a fun game.
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: I love the game.
• 41:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I remember having it on PC. Yeah, I used
• 41:58
  Speaker 2: to play just in in where It's like I don't
• 42:00
  Speaker 2: remember going much, you know, like I was such a
• 42:04
  Speaker 2: fan of Harry and Hogwarts, so I just kind of
• 42:05
  Speaker 2: like stayed in there in that little niche. But I
• 42:08
  Speaker 2: remember having that game and really enjoying it. I might,
• 42:10
  Speaker 2: you know, I must have the case still there somewhere
• 42:14
  Speaker 2: I had it, like the Pirate version. I didn't even
• 42:17
  Speaker 2: have it, like official version of the of that game.
• 42:19
  Speaker 2: But yeah, like it brings back a lot of like
• 42:22
  Speaker 2: really good memories.
• 42:24
  Speaker 3: It was.
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: It was cool that there were so many different teams
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: to choose from too, Like this was pretty expansive for
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: its time, Like, yeah, to have that many different teams.
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: They all had different players on the teams, different uniforms,
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: like you said, different crowd chants, like this is very
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: detailed and specific to each of those.
• 42:45
  Speaker 2: Teams and it was very cool and the intro the
• 42:48
  Speaker 2: soundtrack is so epic. It's so I can already remember
• 42:52
  Speaker 2: it in my head, like it's playing in my head
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: right now. It was so good and like you said,
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: like you could be a chase beater seeker.
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 43:02
  Speaker 2: It had this emphasis on speed, spectacle, and accessibility rather
• 43:07
  Speaker 2: than strict realism. It was well received by fans for
• 43:12
  Speaker 2: delivering on a long standing fantasy that the mainline Harry
• 43:16
  Speaker 2: Potter games, like we said, had largely sidelined. I wouldn't say,
• 43:21
  Speaker 2: I don't know if i'd say largely, but they had
• 43:23
  Speaker 2: because even in Chamber of Secrets you could enter the
• 43:27
  Speaker 2: Quidditch House Cup and you had match and you could
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: play quidditch. But yeah, it also helped to prove that
• 43:34
  Speaker 2: the franchise could support successful spinoffs that were not tied
• 43:37
  Speaker 2: directly to the film narratives. So this is an interesting
• 43:40
  Speaker 2: starting point.
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: Yeah, this is like the predecessor of Hogwarts Legacy.
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and all of these games that you know, yeah, yeah,
• 43:53
  Speaker 2: that came after it, like a lot, not just console
• 43:56
  Speaker 2: games but also mobile games, were going to be discussing
• 44:00
  Speaker 2: a lot more of this series of you know, video games,
• 44:02
  Speaker 2: but yeah, really planted the seed for what would become,
• 44:07
  Speaker 2: you know, the future of the franchise in terms of
• 44:10
  Speaker 2: spin offs. And the game was really PC, PlayStation two, Xbox,
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: and GameCube and later became part of World of Harry
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: Potter PC compilation alongside the first three mainline games. So yeah,
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: that's Quish World Cup. So we are jumping into the
• 44:28
  Speaker 2: year two thousand and four with Harry Potter and The
• 44:30
  Speaker 2: Prisoner of Azkaban, and this holds a really special place
• 44:34
  Speaker 2: in my heart. It was released between May and June
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: of two thousand and four, depending on the platform, So
• 44:39
  Speaker 2: we don't really have a specific release date for these
• 44:44
  Speaker 2: games because they were all kind of like scattered, you
• 44:48
  Speaker 2: know in in you know, weeks or days. So by
• 44:54
  Speaker 2: the time Prisoner of Azkaban where I was released, the
• 44:56
  Speaker 2: series began to find a clearer identity. So this wasso
• 44:59
  Speaker 2: ready kind of like planted in Quidditch World Cup, and
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: separate PC and console versions were developed, with EA UK
• 45:08
  Speaker 2: handling the console release, and for the first time, here's
• 45:11
  Speaker 2: the Choker, Harry, Ron and Hermione were all fully playable characters,
• 45:16
  Speaker 2: and it was a huge change in the mechanics of
• 45:19
  Speaker 2: what we were used to.
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I remember this game coming out and it just
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: being so different from the first two.
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah, just like the film. So it's kind of like
• 45:29
  Speaker 2: they decided to kind of like play by that, Oh
• 45:33
  Speaker 2: everything is going to change. We're going to do that
• 45:35
  Speaker 2: for the game too. I remember it was so pissed
• 45:38
  Speaker 2: at the beginning because you know, I'm a person that
• 45:40
  Speaker 2: you already kind of like already know this, but I
• 45:43
  Speaker 2: am a little reluctant to change. I like this the
• 45:45
  Speaker 2: way they are, Yeah, can you believe it? But yeah, yeah,
• 45:52
  Speaker 2: But you know when I saw that you could play
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: It's run on Hermione, I was like, ah, well, this
• 45:57
  Speaker 2: is not going to feel the same because I want
• 45:58
  Speaker 2: to play as Harry and you know, I mean, I
• 46:02
  Speaker 2: think it's the best thing that they could have ever done.
• 46:06
  Speaker 2: And also because I think Prisoner of Azkaban just started
• 46:09
  Speaker 2: becoming a more like Trio centered storyline, not so much
• 46:13
  Speaker 2: in Harry. So it allowed for that, you know, for
• 46:16
  Speaker 2: that dynamic playability, and it was a great, great game. Again,
• 46:24
  Speaker 2: there were clear distinctions between platforms. While the opening of
• 46:28
  Speaker 2: the game is largely identical across versions, so you begin
• 46:31
  Speaker 2: on the Howards Express chasing after scabers. Later missions diverged
• 46:37
  Speaker 2: while still following the same overarching story, like we already
• 46:41
  Speaker 2: mentioned for the previous games. So in the PC version,
• 46:45
  Speaker 2: for example, Ron and Hermione were playable only in specific
• 46:48
  Speaker 2: challenges and levels, and players could not really switch between them,
• 46:53
  Speaker 2: unlike in the console versions. So if I wanted to
• 46:56
  Speaker 2: be Hermione or I wanted to be Run for most
• 46:58
  Speaker 2: of the gameplay, I could if I was playing the
• 47:00
  Speaker 2: console versions, but if I was doing just playing the
• 47:04
  Speaker 2: PC one, it was very annoying because you couldn't play
• 47:07
  Speaker 2: as any of the other characters, just as Harry unless
• 47:10
  Speaker 2: you were on this challenge. So each of them. Ron
• 47:14
  Speaker 2: had a challenge, Harry had one, Hermione had one, and
• 47:18
  Speaker 2: you had like specific parts of a level that required
• 47:21
  Speaker 2: a character. So that's what the you know, the the
• 47:24
  Speaker 2: game would swap between characters, but you would never be
• 47:27
  Speaker 2: able to do that. So in that regard, and I'd
• 47:33
  Speaker 2: say in every single aspect, the console version is so
• 47:37
  Speaker 2: much better than the PC version, even though I love
• 47:40
  Speaker 2: the PC version, but it just, yeah, it just improved
• 47:44
  Speaker 2: everything from all the previous games, and yeah, like I
• 47:51
  Speaker 2: don't know, I feel like, well, for example, the game
• 47:54
  Speaker 2: Boy Advanced version was particularly well received, and so critics
• 47:58
  Speaker 2: compared its RPG style mechanics two games such as Crono
• 48:02
  Speaker 2: Tiger and Pokemon. And I remember a lot of people
• 48:07
  Speaker 2: talking really nicely about this game, and you know, for
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: this specific the game Boy Advanced version, there's a lot
• 48:13
  Speaker 2: of like chat about it, like being a really good game,
• 48:17
  Speaker 2: even though you'd say, oh, it's a handheld console, like
• 48:20
  Speaker 2: what could be so good about it? But no, it
• 48:22
  Speaker 2: actually was. I haven't played it again. I never had one,
• 48:25
  Speaker 2: So I'd be interested to see if Switch ever comes
• 48:29
  Speaker 2: out with you know, any of these licensed games. That
• 48:32
  Speaker 2: would be pretty cool.
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: Oh I wish they would. I mean they did the
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: lego Harry Potter for Switch.
• 48:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they should go.
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: Back and make fun I know, so fun.
• 48:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah. So these versions like PlayStation two, game Boy, and
• 48:50
  Speaker 2: Xbox version is often considered by fans to be the
• 48:53
  Speaker 2: best entry in the franchise thanks to you, like we said,
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: multi character gameplay, it's free exploration design, the ability to
• 49:01
  Speaker 2: fly buck bak around Hogwarts and ex grounds, and also
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: like little details like only Hermione and Harry could write
• 49:08
  Speaker 2: Buck bak Ron wasn't able to he would get kicked
• 49:11
  Speaker 2: by buck Baak if he ever tried.
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: But it was.
• 49:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but it was so good because each of them
• 49:19
  Speaker 2: had their own skills and abilities, and there's certain spells
• 49:22
  Speaker 2: that required I remember Ron having Luma's duo, so he
• 49:26
  Speaker 2: would use that to collect certain ingredients for potions, and
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: that's something that I loved as well, Like you would
• 49:32
  Speaker 2: have these potion lessons and you had to like go
• 49:34
  Speaker 2: looking around the castle for these ingredients, and you have
• 49:37
  Speaker 2: to go out out into the grounds and you know,
• 49:42
  Speaker 2: write Buckbeak and go to different areas to look for
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: these items. It was really, really fun. It's an amazing game.
• 49:49
  Speaker 2: So even if time has passed by, like I would
• 49:52
  Speaker 2: highly recommend anyone to play this one because it's it's
• 49:56
  Speaker 2: I think it's phenomenal.
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, this is a good one. I think Chamber of
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: Secrets I think will always be my favorite. I think
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: it's just a nostalgia thing. But I do remember really
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: enjoying Prisoner of Azkaban when it came out.
• 50:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, same, Like Chamber of Secrets was my
• 50:17
  Speaker 2: first Harry Potter game literally in PC. Became obsessed with
• 50:22
  Speaker 2: it and then I just started branching into like all
• 50:24
  Speaker 2: of these other other games. But yeah, definitely Prisoner of Azkaban.
• 50:28
  Speaker 2: When it came out, it was it was so different
• 50:31
  Speaker 2: that the graphics card had to be updated and my
• 50:34
  Speaker 2: computer couldn't run the game. I had to get my
• 50:37
  Speaker 2: computer yeah, like all kind of like pimped and just
• 50:43
  Speaker 2: like you know, just get it like upgraded, because I
• 50:46
  Speaker 2: couldn't run the game. It was. I remember so vividly
• 50:49
  Speaker 2: getting to seventy two percent of installation process and it
• 50:54
  Speaker 2: would crash every single time. I was like, no, I
• 50:58
  Speaker 2: need to play this game. And I remember being able
• 51:01
  Speaker 2: to install it at the end, but it was playing
• 51:03
  Speaker 2: like a really low resolution. It was like pixels. I
• 51:07
  Speaker 2: was just happy just playing it, and it crashed later
• 51:10
  Speaker 2: on in the game and I couldn't play it anymore.
• 51:12
  Speaker 2: And then I had to upgrade my computer and everything
• 51:14
  Speaker 2: was fine. But oh my gosh, yes it was. It
• 51:17
  Speaker 2: was a real struggle back in the day.
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: It was so I remember because now you're saying that
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: it's bringing back the memory. The same Christmas, I got
• 51:27
  Speaker 1: the Preserve Azkaban game and the Lord of the Rings
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: Battle for Middle Earth PC game. Neither one would install
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: on the computer. Yeah, so I just had these games
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: and I could not play for like another year until
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: it got a new computer. But I just remember just like, oh,
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: just the moment of finally being able to put this
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: disc in the computer and it would work and it
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: would have install it, I could.
• 51:55
  Speaker 2: Play these games. Yeah, Like we said, we were determined
• 52:00
  Speaker 2: and back in the day to get things working. It
• 52:04
  Speaker 2: was a real, real struggle, like like literally and like
• 52:10
  Speaker 2: you said, like you would have to wait because you
• 52:12
  Speaker 2: just couldn't get your computer upgraded on the spot, like
• 52:14
  Speaker 2: you It wasn't you know. I had this this technician
• 52:18
  Speaker 2: come in and he took the computer, he installed more.
• 52:20
  Speaker 2: I remember vividly. It was two hundred and fifty six
• 52:24
  Speaker 2: megabytes of RAM that we needed to have to run
• 52:29
  Speaker 2: the game, and mine had one hundred and twenty eight.
• 52:34
  Speaker 2: And I was like, oh my gosh, I you know,
• 52:36
  Speaker 2: it was so frustrating. I was so excited to play
• 52:39
  Speaker 2: that game. And I swear I remember the night that
• 52:41
  Speaker 2: I got it, and I remember being so frustrated that
• 52:44
  Speaker 2: I couldn't install it. Oh but yeah, I did my best. Yeah,
• 52:51
  Speaker 2: So yeah, that was a huge step in terms of graphics,
• 52:56
  Speaker 2: and you know, just really tell us how things were
• 52:58
  Speaker 2: kind of like you had to keep up and it
• 53:00
  Speaker 2: was hard to keep up with technology at that time
• 53:03
  Speaker 2: because everything was moving so fast. So a year later
• 53:08
  Speaker 2: came Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fires. So this
• 53:11
  Speaker 2: game was released between November eighth to the eighteenth, two
• 53:15
  Speaker 2: thousand and five, depending on again on the console platform
• 53:18
  Speaker 2: that you were playing it on, and development was fully
• 53:21
  Speaker 2: consolidated under EA UK later known as EAD Bright Light.
• 53:26
  Speaker 2: So this coincided with a noticeable tonal shift as well.
• 53:30
  Speaker 2: So Goblet of Fire abandoned the open explanatory structure of
• 53:35
  Speaker 2: the earlier titles in favor of more linear, level based
• 53:38
  Speaker 2: design that closely followed the film. So something that was
• 53:43
  Speaker 2: introduced was multiplayer. They considered They had considered it for
• 53:47
  Speaker 2: a Prisoner of Azkabant, which would have would have made
• 53:50
  Speaker 2: a lot of sense back in the day, but at
• 53:53
  Speaker 2: the end, because of time constraints and just not being
• 53:56
  Speaker 2: able to get things done in time like, they couldn't
• 53:59
  Speaker 2: really allowed to include it, so they decided to leave
• 54:02
  Speaker 2: it for this for this game. So it allowed up
• 54:06
  Speaker 2: to three players to control Harry, Ron and Hermione simultaneously,
• 54:10
  Speaker 2: so again you could play it as any of the
• 54:11
  Speaker 2: three characters, unless you were in one of the trywizard
• 54:15
  Speaker 2: tasks that you obviously had to be Harry. And this
• 54:18
  Speaker 2: entry also marked the series debut on the Nintendo DS,
• 54:22
  Speaker 2: and for the first time, the game went from having
• 54:25
  Speaker 2: multiple versions to a single version across different platforms. So
• 54:29
  Speaker 2: this is the time the games were consolidated as a
• 54:32
  Speaker 2: single playable mechanic, so as to say something, it was
• 54:40
  Speaker 2: the same game. So, I mean, the only thing that
• 54:42
  Speaker 2: deferred was the definition of the graphics and the detail
• 54:45
  Speaker 2: of the texters. But it all ran under the same
• 54:49
  Speaker 2: let's say engine, So the maps were the same, the
• 54:51
  Speaker 2: levels were the same. Everything just started being so it
• 54:55
  Speaker 2: was a little it kind of like took the stress
• 54:57
  Speaker 2: off of people having to like own different consoles to
• 55:00
  Speaker 2: play all of the different versions. But yeah, this would
• 55:05
  Speaker 2: be like this would be the beginning of this consolidation. There,
• 55:10
  Speaker 2: this consolidation actually went in full form and effect, and
• 55:15
  Speaker 2: you know, the game was heavily criticized. Why well, for once,
• 55:23
  Speaker 2: players could not freely explore Hogwarts or its grounds unless
• 55:26
  Speaker 2: they were at a specific level and a specific location.
• 55:29
  Speaker 2: So let's say you were at the prefixed bathroom, or
• 55:32
  Speaker 2: you were at the greenhouses, or you were attending matt
• 55:36
  Speaker 2: I Moody's defense against the Dark Arts lesson.
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 55:40
  Speaker 2: The game also used fixed cinematic third person camera, so
• 55:44
  Speaker 2: it removed player control, which meant that the camera was
• 55:48
  Speaker 2: just you know, making its own thing, like you wouldn't
• 55:51
  Speaker 2: control the camera anymore, and it often plays a character
• 55:54
  Speaker 2: far from view, so you would only see these tiny
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: little things that looked like polypockets from as just you know,
• 56:02
  Speaker 2: casting spells. And I mean the game. I did not
• 56:05
  Speaker 2: like the game when it came out. I remember it
• 56:07
  Speaker 2: being such a bummer that I could no longer explore
• 56:09
  Speaker 2: Hogwarts because it was the best element of the games
• 56:12
  Speaker 2: and they deprived after from that, like they decided to
• 56:15
  Speaker 2: scratch it, even though it was probably the most important
• 56:18
  Speaker 2: element that they would have to keep. And yeah, I
• 56:21
  Speaker 2: remember really really not liking this game.
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah, this is where I started to fall off. One
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: of these games was this one. I was like, it
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: didn't have the elements that I liked about the first three.
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: So yeah, I don't think I ever finished.
• 56:39
  Speaker 2: It was just and you would have Ron saying every
• 56:42
  Speaker 2: two seconds beans, Birdie bought beans.
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: So annoying.
• 56:47
  Speaker 2: It was then yes we don't need the narration. Yeah. Yeah,
• 56:53
  Speaker 2: and also like it didn't. You couldn't even exchange beans anymore,
• 56:56
  Speaker 2: Like I think you could buy Yeah, you could buy
• 57:01
  Speaker 2: you know what you could buy. You could buy still
• 57:04
  Speaker 2: images from the film. Oh yeah, so you would unlock
• 57:08
  Speaker 2: these stills, which was so weird.
• 57:10
  Speaker 1: Why why do I want to collect still images? I
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: know we had Google at that point, we could just
• 57:16
  Speaker 1: look up.
• 57:16
  Speaker 2: These still images exactly. Yes, Like all of these dynamics
• 57:20
  Speaker 2: that were so cool about the previous games were like, no,
• 57:24
  Speaker 2: we're going to go, you know, through a different direction.
• 57:26
  Speaker 2: Now we're gonna just I hate when they change things
• 57:28
  Speaker 2: that don't need fixing, and this was one of those cases.
• 57:31
  Speaker 2: Like they had made such a huge improvement with the
• 57:34
  Speaker 2: Prisoner of Azkaband, so they were like, Okay, we're going
• 57:36
  Speaker 2: to keep this kind of like multiplayer, you know, swapping
• 57:39
  Speaker 2: between characters thing alive, but we're just going to change
• 57:42
  Speaker 2: it completely. And it was so bad, like the whole
• 57:47
  Speaker 2: like even the levels that you were like, I remember
• 57:50
  Speaker 2: the one when you learned was it aqua eructo? I
• 57:54
  Speaker 2: think it was a spell that you learned No with
• 57:57
  Speaker 2: matt I Moody. I can't remember what spell. I don't
• 57:59
  Speaker 2: even remb remember if you learned any spells. To be honest, I.
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: Don't remember either. I feel like this game and like
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: moving into the next several it was almost like they
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: were looking back at the first three and like cringing
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: and being like, oh, like that's so hokey, we need
• 58:18
  Speaker 1: to move away from that. But like that hokiness is
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: what made those first three games so exactly that was
• 58:25
  Speaker 1: what they were. And then you took it away and
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: then it was just like this really generic like any
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: old video game that was coming out at the time.
• 58:36
  Speaker 2: Yes, it just wasn't.
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: There wasn't anything like special or unique about it. No.
• 58:42
  Speaker 2: I mean even from a like a design point of view,
• 58:45
  Speaker 2: like the maps and everything, it was so inaccurate, Like
• 58:48
  Speaker 2: you would go outside and there would be like a
• 58:50
  Speaker 2: thousand towers. It wouldn't even replicate the school like the
• 58:54
  Speaker 2: assets should like it did look like the towers from
• 58:57
  Speaker 2: the model from the from the films, but they would
• 58:59
  Speaker 2: be like five of those, like you know, and there'd
• 59:03
  Speaker 2: be like think five o clock towers and things that
• 59:07
  Speaker 2: were so weird, like they just started placing things all
• 59:09
  Speaker 2: over the map. And it's just a game that I
• 59:11
  Speaker 2: feel was so underdeveloped. I think the only enjoyable levels
• 59:19
  Speaker 2: are the Try Wizard task because they do feel like
• 59:21
  Speaker 2: they would have fit the previous games just the same way.
• 59:24
  Speaker 2: Like it does feel a bit more like in tune
• 59:27
  Speaker 2: with that, but anything that goes out of it, like,
• 59:30
  Speaker 2: you know, everything was so annoying, Like I did not
• 59:33
  Speaker 2: enjoy this game at all, but I still played it
• 59:35
  Speaker 2: because I was a huge fan of these, but I
• 59:37
  Speaker 2: remember saying, oh my gosh, like I missed the old
• 59:40
  Speaker 2: school playability. Yeah, so we're going to jump into the
• 59:49
  Speaker 2: year two thousand and seven now, the year that Harry
• 59:52
  Speaker 2: Potter and the Order of the Phoenix was released, which
• 59:56
  Speaker 2: came out in June two thousand and seven. So it
• 59:59
  Speaker 2: seems like a kind of listened to the heavy criticism
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 2: Goblet of Fire made, so they kind of did a
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 2: partial course correction, returning to a free roaming Hogwarts and
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 2: removing multiplayer entirely. So we would go kind of like
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 2: back to basics on this one. We would just be
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 2: playing as Harry. So, unlike Prisoner of Azkaban and Goblet
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: of Fire, Ron and Hermione were no longer playable characters. However,
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 2: there were certain characters playable during specific missions, so you
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 2: had Series Black during a duel with Lucy's Malfoy and
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 2: Belichick's with Strange, and the Department of Mysteries Albus Dumbledore
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 2: during his duel against Valdemort. Remus Lupin playable on the
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 2: Nintendo DS during the Department of Mysteries battle, Ron Weasley
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 2: playable during combat sequences on the Nintendo DS, and Hermione
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 2: Granger playable during combat sequences on the Nintendo DS as well.
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 2: So you did get to play a little bits here
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 2: and there. But I think they kind of like decided
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 2: to And I remember seeing interviews back in the day
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 2: of the with the developers and they were like, we
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 2: want players to fully immerse themselves into Hogwarts again. And
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 2: I remember seeing the teasers for the video game. I
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 2: was like, oh my gosh, I'm gushing about this already,
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 2: Like I'm so so excited because we came from such
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 2: a letdown that was Goblet of Fire, and suddenly we
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 2: were seeing like Hogwarts again and the moving staircases and
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 2: the Great Hall and just you know, moving around the castle,
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 2: going to the boat house. It just looked so so
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 2: phenomenal based on these previews.
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: Listen, anyone who is ever making anything to do with
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: Harry Potter For us millennial fans, you need to understand
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 1: all we want is to run around Hogwarts. This is
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: all we want in our lives, whether it's in a
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: video game, whether it's in a theme park, like, just
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: let us run around and do magic. That's all we want.
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: We don't care about anything else as like, as we
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: have that ability, we'll be happy.
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 2: Yes, yes, mysa for the day, Yes, yes, universal takedown notes.
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 2: We still want that fully explorable Hogwarts, not just you know,
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 2: the whole like silhouette. We need to enter that castle
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 2: and have like a great hall experience, dining experience, please, yes, yes, yes,
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 2: I attest to that, and yeah, so it's it was
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 2: so you know, it was so pleasing to see that
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 2: we would be able to explore Hogwarts again. Of course,
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 2: there were like mechanics that you know, we were no
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 2: longer going to be collecting Birdie bought beans or you know,
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 2: wizard cards, but you know, we did get to go
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 2: on quests and missions, and the development involved closer collaboration
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 2: with JK. Rowling, particularly regarding in game rules and details
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 2: that later became canon, such as card games like Gobstones
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 2: and Exploding snow Up. So that was that's really interesting.
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 2: And also, in an interview with MTV lead designer Chris
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 2: Roberts discussed this collaboration and he explained that Rolling was
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 2: not afraid to intervene when something was, you know, felt
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 2: kind of like out of character. So there was one
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 2: mission in particular which involved Nevill Loungbotton sabotaging the Hogwarts
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: clock Tower to get back at Dolores on Bridge, and
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 2: Rolling suggested Dean Thomas instead, stating that Neville, you know that, no, sorry,
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 2: that Dean would be more likely to do so, so
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 2: the team changed that mission accordingly. So kind of reminds
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 2: me when Alfonso Quran kind of suggested Jak Rolling to
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 2: have I think it was goblins in in the in
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 2: or was it? Yeah? I think it was like little
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 2: like it was one of these creatures that you know,
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 2: he wanted in the Great Hall for the for the
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 2: opening fee ceremony, and Jake Rolling was like, no, no, no,
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 2: these are not part of my world and we no, no, no,
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 2: he was like no, but I think they would look no, no, no,
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 2: we're not. We can't include that. I think they were Dwars. Yeah,
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 2: I think it was something like that. And she's that's
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 2: how protected she was of Verrwolla, and I think, you know,
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 2: she obviously still is, so that, you know, it's really
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 2: cool whenever you have that input that is from the
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 2: creator herself.
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: It's so interesting too with these later games because at
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: this point the movies are so fully fledged, and like
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: you can tell that difference. Whereas the first few weren't
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: quite so identical to the movies, the later ones start
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: to look far more like you're running through the movieset basically.
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I mean this is what they they say,
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 2: like this Order of the Phoenix is the one that's
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 2: closest to Hogwarts from the films, just because of everything,
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 2: how everything is laid out. And what I loved about
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 2: it is that we could start putting, you know, connecting
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 2: the dots on where everything was so kind of like
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 2: you knew that this tower pertained to this specific location,
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 2: and you knew that this was this and this and
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 2: that was that, and you know you started like seeing
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 2: all of these things that you kind of like only
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 2: saw in like isolated scenes now connected to the overall
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 2: map of the school and how everything like, oh, so
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 2: this is how you get from you know, from the
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 2: Great Hall into Potions classroom and this is how you
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 2: get to the Transfiguration classroom. So it was so enlightening
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 2: because it was you know, literally you imagining the characters
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 2: how they would go from one place to the other,
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 2: and it was it was amazing. I really really enjoyed
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 2: this this game. And it was also the first entry
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 2: to use motion capture from the film actors, so, like
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 2: we said, like they started adding these things that were
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 2: much more in tune with the films. So this added
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 2: a new level of authenticity to character performances. And not
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 2: only that, but several actors from the films provided voice work.
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 2: This includes Ruber Grint, Bonnie Rye, Tom Felton, Natalie Antenna,
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 2: and the Phelps Twins, and also Hugh Mitchell also returned
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 2: to voice Colin Creevy, so you know, they really kind
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 2: of like went full on with this project because you know,
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 2: Colin Creevy hadn't appeared since Chamber of Secrets film, so
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 2: he even returned to Reprices World for the game. It
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 2: was a really nice addition. And also the game included
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 2: book exclusive plot points and characters that were not featured
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 2: in the film. Like we mentioned, Colin Creevy were also
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 2: the you know portable swamps that the Weasley Twins put
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 2: on you know, across the school. That was a lot
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 2: of fun to read too, because not to read to play,
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 2: because we were like, oh, this is exactly like the books.
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 2: Or also like dialogues that happened, like you know, Ron
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 2: talking to Shoe about her favorite quidditch team and things
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 2: that you probably never knew from the films, but they
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 2: were like information that was in the books. So it
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 2: was a lot more expansive for sure. And you also
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 2: got to train for your OWL exams to get to
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 2: attend different lessons, like you know, I remember potions. I
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 2: don't know if it was potions, but I do remember
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 2: having something to do with snape. And then you also
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 2: had what else did you do? You could take.
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: What all?
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 2: What other classes do you have? There weren't too many classes,
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 2: but there were a few that you know, you could
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 2: take and you could kind of like get like graded
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 2: for so kind of like this would have been an
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 2: exceed expectations in your OL exam. And that was also
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 2: pretty pretty cool. I remember having classes with Flitwig two,
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 2: so yeah, that was that was fun. It was kind
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 2: of like a little bit more our student life standard.
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 2: Even though it followed the order of the Phoenix plot,
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 2: it feels like it was, you know, more for you
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 2: to immerse yourself and feel as a hogwart student, which
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 2: you know, I'll give it to them because you know,
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 2: they really seem to have you know, the game was
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 2: not perfect, but they really did seem to listen to
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 2: fans who had complained from Goblet Fire. So the game
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 2: was released on PC, PlayStation two, PlayStation three, PSP, WE N,
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 2: Xbox three sixty and it was the first game in
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 2: the franchise to receive a WI version, obviously because the
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 2: console came out around that time. So, yeah, I never
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 2: played it on WI.
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: I had this one for the Wii.
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 2: Oh it was so bad.
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 1: It was really awful, Like should not have been on
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 1: the Wii.
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 2: Oh was it like not good, like not intuitive or anything?
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 2: Was it like to wobbly?
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it was weird with the controls like it just
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 1: it didn't. It didn't work.
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 2: And it was because one would think that it would
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 2: because it'd be like I remember you had to do
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 2: like Akio and you would have to or when Guard
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 2: we had to like I remember playing it for PC
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 2: and you had to do like these you know, motion
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 2: things with your mouse to activate certain spells, so it
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 2: was not anymore pressing all button and just casting a spell.
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 2: You just had to like really find your way around
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 2: each of them.
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so if you remember like how the Wii was
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 1: especially kind of when it first came out, the motion
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 1: sensor was not so great and it was very frustrating
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 1: because you'd be sitting there trying to do the achio thing,
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 1: nothing would move and you couldn't move on it was horrible.
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, well, I hope they made it a little
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 2: bit better for the next installment, which was half left Prince.
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 2: I don't know if you have that one, but you're
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 2: gonna let us know. So this game was initially completed
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 2: by two thousand and eight, and have Blood Prints followed
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 2: in late June two thousand and nine after an eight
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 2: un delay of the film just to release alongside it.
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 2: And we all remember where we were when that film
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 2: was pushed back and it was announced, very very traumatizing
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 2: for fans. But yeah, mechanically it stayed close to Order
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 2: the Phoenix, so it maintained a single player focus and
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 2: limited limitated playable characters such as Ron and Genny to
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 2: specific sections so I remember there's this level that you
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 2: have to you have to play as Genny. It's one
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 2: of the quidditch matches I think. I think it's the
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 2: last quidditch match of the of the game, and you
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 2: have to you know, I think Harry is trapped in
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 2: the clock tower and you have to as Genny. You
• 1:10:57
  Speaker 2: have to free him, and then you have free roaming
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 2: camera control, which was reintroduced. This is something that hadn't
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 2: been present since Prison Our Basketbad. So that was cool.
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 2: Because Order Phoenis as much as it was, you know,
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 2: as much as I liked it because of its depth
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 2: and detail, it did get a little like the camera
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 2: was still following the same mechanic as Goblet of Fires,
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 2: so you didn't control it quite but here you could
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 2: just three hundred and sixty control of it, and it
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 2: just to me it felt even more immersive. And yeah,
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 2: I don't know speaking of control, but I don't know
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 2: if you played the Wei version now, I'm curious to
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 2: know if they improved that I did not.
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 1: I actually don't think I played any of the last
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 1: three of these games. Oh well, I don't have any
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 1: memory of it anyway, but.
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 2: You should check haploot prints because it's not I mean,
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 2: hopwarts is not as explorable i'd say, but I don't know.
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 2: I think I think it's just the graphic improvement and
• 1:12:05
  Speaker 2: how it looks a little bit more like the film version,
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 2: and also like how you can move freely around the
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 2: castle and the camera control I think adds a lot
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 2: more to that, because that's what I loved most doing,
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 2: like like you said, exploring the castle. So yeah, that
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 2: was I really enjoyed that one. Several members of the
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 2: films returned to lend their voices, so you know, we
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 2: had again Rupert, Bonnie Warwick, Tom Felton among other actors.
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 2: So it started becoming like this recurrent thing where you know,
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 2: they would be modeling their faces and then they would
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 2: be lending their voices and just to kind of like
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 2: tighten even more closely to the films. So, like you said,
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 2: it's amazing how it started being almost like something completely
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 2: independent with its own identity, and it evolved and it
• 1:12:53
  Speaker 2: started like clashing with the films and merging into them seamlessly,
• 1:13:00
  Speaker 2: just to be like a complete replica of the films,
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 2: but in video game version.
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:13:08
  Speaker 2: So yeah, so along with Prisoner of Azkaban on PlayStation two.
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 2: This is my actual favorite Harry Potter game just because
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 2: of exploration.
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: Really.
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean it's actually in a popular opinion, Yeah,
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 2: it could be a little controversial, so I'm not sure
• 1:13:24
  Speaker 2: if our listeners are going to agree. But what I
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 2: loved it was, you know, the freedom of exploration and
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 2: camera control actually, and it truly felt like being inside
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 2: the film. And I know a lot of the players
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 2: dislike collecting shields scattered across the school because you have
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 2: these Hogwarts shield that you have to collect. So sometimes
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 2: they're hidden, so you have to kind of like these
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 2: puzzles where you have to like see how you retrieve them,
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 2: and you either with a spell or you have to
• 1:13:48
  Speaker 2: you know, just you know, just throw an item at
• 1:13:52
  Speaker 2: it for it to crash into the ground. You have
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 2: to you know, hit verparo and then it just forms
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 2: back again and you collect it. So, I mean it
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 2: was fun and it is. It kind of encouraged exploration
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 2: both inside and outside of the castle.
• 1:14:06
  Speaker 1: It's like a throwback to the Wizard Cards a little bit.
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean you couldn't you couldn't exchange anything because
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 2: they weren't like, I mean, the purpose of the Shields
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 2: wasn't even like if it didn't really make much sense,
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 2: but but it's fun. It's fun. You even have these
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 2: like caves that you go inside and you explore, and
• 1:14:26
  Speaker 2: now it's a lot of fun. Like I really really
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 2: enjoy it just because of these aspects. And also obviously
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 2: the when you talk about graphics, is probably the one
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 2: that has the better graphics, you know, up to that
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 2: that installment. So yeah, definitely check it out.
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I'll have to.
• 1:14:47
  Speaker 2: Lives up. Yeah.
• 1:14:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 2: So yeah, that's it for the first six games. So
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 2: we're now moving on to the final couple of games
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 2: that came out. Of course, we would have to games
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 2: where Harry Potter into Deathly Hollows Part one and Part
• 1:15:03
  Speaker 2: two each coming out twenty ten in two thousand and eleven.
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 2: So basically this series concluded with Part one in twenty
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 2: ten and Part two in twenty eleven, and these final
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 2: entries were a dramatic departure from everything that came before.
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 2: So obviously, as we know, it's largely set outside of Hogwarts,
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 2: so they leaned heavily into stealth and combat mechanics inspired
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 2: by modern shooters, which is a weird mechanic to introduce
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 2: so far off in the series and for what we
• 1:15:34
  Speaker 2: were used to EA bright Light described the games as
• 1:15:39
  Speaker 2: darker and more action oriented, and reflecting both the tone
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 2: of the films and broader industry trends at the time. So,
• 1:15:47
  Speaker 2: like I said, the gameplay resembled a third person shooter,
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 2: which many felt was unstable and ultimately detracted from immersion
• 1:15:55
  Speaker 2: rather than enhancing it. It went even as far as
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 2: having death Eaters attack you at every turn when Harry
• 1:16:01
  Speaker 2: decides to surrender and the Battle of Hogwarts something that
• 1:16:05
  Speaker 2: kind of like undercuts the narrative intent. So it's supposed
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 2: to be a very peaceful, you know, walk to the
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 2: forest because you are, you know, it's it's also a
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 2: time when kind of like it's not a white flag,
• 1:16:16
  Speaker 2: but it's kind of like this this kind of like
• 1:16:19
  Speaker 2: pause in the war and saying, hey, hey, if Harry
• 1:16:21
  Speaker 2: Potter surrenders and he comes to me, then you know
• 1:16:27
  Speaker 2: everyone will be spared. So it's a very and you
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 2: had in the game there were like death eaters throwing
• 1:16:32
  Speaker 2: spells in you and wanting to kill you for no reason,
• 1:16:35
  Speaker 2: and that's the whole game. Really, it's just trying to
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 2: trying to flee from death eaters and snatchers and having
• 1:16:41
  Speaker 2: these weird side quests at the Ministry rescuing mubble borns,
• 1:16:46
  Speaker 2: and it is it's not I don't know. I did
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 2: not enjoy this game either. I think it's just too
• 1:16:56
  Speaker 2: like too chaotic.
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and just too different from what the rest of
• 1:17:02
  Speaker 1: the series was. I just yeah, yeah, I did not
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 1: play these ones because at this point, this is when
• 1:17:11
  Speaker 1: the Lego games were coming out, and I started to
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 1: get a lot more invested in the Harry Potter Lego games.
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 1: That's true, yeah, which we will talk about, but yeah,
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 1: so yeah.
• 1:17:25
  Speaker 2: Same here. I mean, I remember literally year twenty eleven
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 2: playing Harry Potter Years one to four summer, well my
• 1:17:35
  Speaker 2: summer of twenty eleven, so it was kind of like
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 2: top of the year, right before Deathly Hollows Part two
• 1:17:40
  Speaker 2: came out, and I remember being really invested in saying,
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 2: this is what I wanted in the Harry Potter games.
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 2: We're going to town, like you said, we're going to
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 2: talk about it in the next couple episodes, but yeah,
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 2: like this was disappointing. Just to say, in my you know,
• 1:18:00
  Speaker 2: my opinion, my personal take, I actually did play the
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 2: Nintendo DS versions, and I think they're a lot more
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 2: worth playing. Instead, unlike the console releases, they move away
• 1:18:09
  Speaker 2: from the shooter inspired design and return to a more
• 1:18:12
  Speaker 2: traditional Harry Potter game play loop. So this means puzzles, exploration,
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 2: and light RPG elements, which I honestly think it's a
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 2: lot more fun and it's what I would have wanted
• 1:18:23
  Speaker 2: for the console and ple se versions to look like
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 2: and to feel like. So I think these games are
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 2: a good example of how strong mechanics and thoughtful design
• 1:18:34
  Speaker 2: matter more than graphical fidelity. So you can have top
• 1:18:39
  Speaker 2: of notch like graphics and you know, because it had
• 1:18:43
  Speaker 2: amazing graphics for its time, I think even nowadays it
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 2: holds up pretty well. But yeah, it was missing every
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 2: mechanic that they introduced. They hadn't seemed like they hadn't
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 2: learned their lesson because instead of like in you know,
• 1:18:58
  Speaker 2: kind of like putting emphasis and trying to just you know,
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 2: seeing what worked and just saying, Okay, we're going to
• 1:19:08
  Speaker 2: go full on with this because this has proven to
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 2: be a major you know, a major plot or thing
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 2: that people really enjoy. They're like, no, we're gonna go
• 1:19:18
  Speaker 2: with the trends again, just like they did with Goblet
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 2: of Fire. Again, terrible misstep. They say, I never played
• 1:19:24
  Speaker 2: Definitely Hollers Part two, so this is the only game
• 1:19:27
  Speaker 2: that I haven't played that they improved a little bit.
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 2: It's still a third person shooter, so it still has
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 2: that weird playability, but they say it's a little bit
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 2: better than Definitely Hollows Part one. But but yeah, I mean,
• 1:19:41
  Speaker 2: I think it would have been nice to like finish
• 1:19:44
  Speaker 2: off this series with, you know, an amazing game. And unfortunately,
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 2: I think also like licensed games like ty in games
• 1:19:51
  Speaker 2: to films were starting to kind of like fall between
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 2: the cracks a little bit, like they weren't as popular,
• 1:19:57
  Speaker 2: and nowadays we don't get any of it. We don't
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 2: get any Remember back in the day, we would have
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 2: a video game of every single movie that was released
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 2: for anything like Disney to Warner to everything had a game. Yes,
• 1:20:12
  Speaker 2: Hannah Montana had a guy like.
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 1: It was.
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 2: And now it's like, you know, that was like kind
• 1:20:18
  Speaker 2: of like the epitome of of of pop culture or
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 2: you know, like kind of like two thousands trends, and
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 2: now it's like, you know, it's very much I don't
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 2: I don't know, it's kind of like a lot more
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 2: rooted and just you know, games that are native to
• 1:20:34
  Speaker 2: Nintendo or to PlayStation, not licensed games, a lot.
• 1:20:38
  Speaker 1: More like originality and storyline and all of that exactly.
• 1:20:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so it's a little it's a little sad that
• 1:20:45
  Speaker 2: that happened, but yeah, I mean we did get it
• 1:20:49
  Speaker 2: was a fun ride, and there was a lot of
• 1:20:51
  Speaker 2: changes in the games, a lot more changes that in
• 1:20:53
  Speaker 2: the films themselves, and it's a great experience. Obviously, the
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 2: the core mainline Harry Potter games sold over thirty million
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 2: copies worldwide, so it made them one of the most
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 2: successful license game series of the early two thousands, even
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 2: though it was heavily criticized for the most part by
• 1:21:15
  Speaker 2: not so much by the fans, but for like for gamers,
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 2: probably this game wasn't these games weren't holding up that well,
• 1:21:23
  Speaker 2: or they weren't up to their expectations. They were kind
• 1:21:25
  Speaker 2: of like a little under polished or But for us
• 1:21:30
  Speaker 2: as fans just getting to explore Hogwarts, we didn't really
• 1:21:33
  Speaker 2: care that much about how good the graphics look. I mean,
• 1:21:36
  Speaker 2: of course it's something that really contributed, but it was
• 1:21:40
  Speaker 2: it wasn't something that we were like, you know, we
• 1:21:42
  Speaker 2: just wanted to go and grab and open chests and
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 2: you know, discover secret passageways and open up like you know,
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 2: secret doors, and that's what we wanted to do. And
• 1:21:53
  Speaker 2: just explore Hogwarts and just see the and just kind
• 1:21:56
  Speaker 2: of like feel like a student and go to classes
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 2: and do all this fun stuff.
• 1:22:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, definitely, Yeah. I think. Yeah, if I was
• 1:22:08
  Speaker 1: just like a gamer coming.
• 1:22:09
  Speaker 3: Into this, I'd be like what is this m But yeah,
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 3: to us, it was like it was fun and it
• 1:22:16
  Speaker 3: was like cozy and like just something fun to do
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 3: on like a day staying in.
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, And I do recommend anyone who is now
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 2: probably if I piqued your curiosity by now, like yeah
• 1:22:30
  Speaker 2: I would, I would encourage you to give it a go.
• 1:22:33
  Speaker 2: Start with the early games and see how they evolved,
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 2: because it's also really nice to see the evolution of
• 1:22:37
  Speaker 2: the games and how it went, like from very basic
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 2: graphics to something a lot more advanced and to something
• 1:22:42
  Speaker 2: a lot more polished, and how did the mechanics changed,
• 1:22:46
  Speaker 2: some for the better, some for the worst. But just
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 2: you know, I feel it's a great way to relift
• 1:22:53
  Speaker 2: the films and relift the books and just kind of
• 1:22:56
  Speaker 2: like have free will a little bit and just get
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 2: to explore and it's a lot of fun. If you're
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 2: a Harry Potter fan, like I have no doubt that
• 1:23:04
  Speaker 2: you will enjoy at least two or three of these games. Yeah,
• 1:23:08
  Speaker 2: so I would strongly suggest that you give it a go.
• 1:23:10
  Speaker 2: And yeah, and if you ever do, let us know
• 1:23:14
  Speaker 2: what you think of them.
• 1:23:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:23:18
  Speaker 2: So yeah, that wraps up our main discussion.
• 1:23:22
  Speaker 1: Loom Most Solemn. All right, So for our rotating segment,
• 1:23:39
  Speaker 1: we're doing Loomis Solem, which we don't get to do
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 1: this one that often, so I'm excited about this. But basically,
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 1: the idea is to highlight some positive or heartwarming news
• 1:23:52
  Speaker 1: or events going on within the fandom. So when I
• 1:23:55
  Speaker 1: saw this happen, that kind of fit the category for me.
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 1: So this is sort of bittersweet news for fans who
• 1:24:04
  Speaker 1: were excited to see Harry Potter and the Curse Child
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 1: on January twenty fifth in New York. But I thought
• 1:24:12
  Speaker 1: it had a nice ending, so therefore it counts as
• 1:24:16
  Speaker 1: Louis Salim in my book. As I'm sure our listeners
• 1:24:21
  Speaker 1: are aware, much of the US had pretty awful weather
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 1: on January twenty fifth. The South got slammed with ice
• 1:24:30
  Speaker 1: storms and we had tons of snow in the North.
• 1:24:36
  Speaker 1: A state of emergency was declared in New York, so
• 1:24:39
  Speaker 1: a bunch of Broadway shows canceled their evening performances, including
• 1:24:44
  Speaker 1: Curse Child. But here's where the light part comes in.
• 1:24:49
  Speaker 1: Even though the show was canceled, they had done their
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 1: afternoon matinee performance and Tom Felton came outside of the
• 1:24:58
  Speaker 1: theater before heading home, and he actually spent quite a
• 1:25:02
  Speaker 1: bit of time with the fans who were outside the theater,
• 1:25:05
  Speaker 1: just talking with them, and he was handing out hand
• 1:25:08
  Speaker 1: warmers that he had signed the packages of the hand warmers.
• 1:25:14
  Speaker 1: It was cute. He had this little box of handwarmers
• 1:25:17
  Speaker 1: and he was good around giving them all out. Yeah,
• 1:25:21
  Speaker 1: So obviously, while it was disappointing for people who had
• 1:25:25
  Speaker 1: tickets for that night, it was really nice to see.
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 1: It looked like a very relaxed kind of atmosphere, which
• 1:25:35
  Speaker 1: from the chaos of the stage door that we have
• 1:25:37
  Speaker 1: been seeing, it was really nice to see Tom just
• 1:25:41
  Speaker 1: kind of, you know, relaxed and able to share this
• 1:25:45
  Speaker 1: genuine moment with the people who were there at the theater. So, yeah,
• 1:25:51
  Speaker 1: those who did have tickets for that night's performance were
• 1:25:54
  Speaker 1: instructed to contact their point of purchase for refunds and exchanges.
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 1: So hopefully I'm hoping a lot of people were able to,
• 1:26:03
  Speaker 1: you know, still see the show another date. But yeah,
• 1:26:07
  Speaker 1: but it was a nice moment to see.
• 1:26:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah go Tom.
• 1:26:13
  Speaker 1: So nice. Okay, So last episode, we asked what would
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 1: you most be interested in learning about the Hogwarts founders,
• 1:26:25
  Speaker 1: and we got an email from Jerry. Jerry says, I
• 1:26:30
  Speaker 1: think what I would most like to learn is more
• 1:26:32
  Speaker 1: about Helga Hufflepuff. Jerry says, I'm biased as a Hufflepuff myself. Yeah,
• 1:26:41
  Speaker 1: I would like to know where she comes from, what
• 1:26:44
  Speaker 1: her favorite recipe or food type is, if she liked badgers,
• 1:26:48
  Speaker 1: did she have a spouse or children, how did she
• 1:26:51
  Speaker 1: meet the other four founders in more. However, thinking about
• 1:26:55
  Speaker 1: the possibility of having a Hogwarts founder's spin off on
• 1:26:58
  Speaker 1: HBO slash Netflix, I am afraid that I can't be
• 1:27:02
  Speaker 1: enthusiastic about it happening in real life. We have seen
• 1:27:05
  Speaker 1: the continuity issues that came up with Fantastic Beasts, and
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 1: I'm afraid that it would be more of the same
• 1:27:11
  Speaker 1: with a Founders or even Marauders show. And fans would
• 1:27:16
  Speaker 1: complain about the continuity errors and things would get messy,
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 1: which had me thinking about one consequence of a Netflix
• 1:27:25
  Speaker 1: buyo of the intellectual property that includes Harry Potter and
• 1:27:29
  Speaker 1: Fantastic Bees and the upcoming TV show. Netflix has a
• 1:27:33
  Speaker 1: tendency to limit release of their exclusive programming on DVD
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 1: or Blu Ray. I like to own my favorite shows
• 1:27:40
  Speaker 1: in physical format. I own all but one of the
• 1:27:43
  Speaker 1: HP movies, all of the Fantastic Beast movies, etc. But
• 1:27:48
  Speaker 1: I know of several movies made for Netflix that have
• 1:27:51
  Speaker 1: not been released on discs, like Chicken Run, Revenge of
• 1:27:55
  Speaker 1: the Nugget Wallace, and Grommet Vengeance, Most Fouwel or title
• 1:28:00
  Speaker 1: like those. I own all of those series of Ardment
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 1: animations that have never even been able to see those
• 1:28:09
  Speaker 1: two since they are Netflix and streaming options are limited
• 1:28:12
  Speaker 1: in this rural area at times, Yeah, that I feel
• 1:28:23
  Speaker 1: like I don't know that we would ever see a
• 1:28:27
  Speaker 1: DVD of the HBO show.
• 1:28:32
  Speaker 2: I mean I think we would because Wednesday has DVD
• 1:28:38
  Speaker 2: Blu rays. Really yeah, I mean it's Netflix. And then
• 1:28:43
  Speaker 2: I think, if I'm not wrong, House of Dragon has
• 1:28:48
  Speaker 2: also it's very limited, like there's Yeah, one box set
• 1:28:52
  Speaker 2: and that's it. Like, it's not going to be like,
• 1:28:55
  Speaker 2: it's not going to be massively distributed in terms of
• 1:28:58
  Speaker 2: like having you know, to disspecial like we have with
• 1:29:02
  Speaker 2: the films, because obviously it's two different mediums, and they
• 1:29:05
  Speaker 2: obviously want to emphasize on streaming and they want to
• 1:29:10
  Speaker 2: have a lot of subscribers.
• 1:29:11
  Speaker 1: And pay for that subscription.
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah. So I mean, I'm sure it will get a
• 1:29:17
  Speaker 2: physical release, but yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'd be surprised
• 1:29:24
  Speaker 2: if if they didn't push for that, to be honest.
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, I don't really know, like as far as
• 1:29:33
  Speaker 1: HBO goes, I don't know what they usually put out.
• 1:29:37
  Speaker 1: But yeah, I guess that's just one of those wait
• 1:29:43
  Speaker 1: and see things.
• 1:29:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, there's a lot of things we have to
• 1:29:49
  Speaker 2: wait and see. But yeah, we're gonna have to see
• 1:29:52
  Speaker 2: how that pans out. And I'm also I was interested
• 1:29:56
  Speaker 2: in the comment about Badgers. Can you imagine if she
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 2: was afraid of Badgers, the irony like that.
• 1:30:01
  Speaker 1: Would bele Yeah. I just this is the first time
• 1:30:08
  Speaker 1: in so long that I've seen someone talk about the
• 1:30:11
  Speaker 1: film Chicken Run though, So thank you for that, Jerry.
• 1:30:15
  Speaker 2: I love that film.
• 1:30:18
  Speaker 1: I remember going to the theater to see that Little Kid.
• 1:30:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and Revenge of the Nugget is the sequel, and
• 1:30:25
  Speaker 2: Wallace and Grommit. I love it too. They're so good,
• 1:30:30
  Speaker 2: they're so funny.
• 1:30:31
  Speaker 1: I told Jerry this does exist out there on DVD
• 1:30:35
  Speaker 1: because I have a copy. So just I guess you
• 1:30:39
  Speaker 1: gotta just look.
• 1:30:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, or we can rip it and just send Jerry
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 2: a digital copy.
• 1:30:51
  Speaker 1: Piracy.
• 1:30:53
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I don't computers don't even have built
• 1:30:55
  Speaker 2: in burners anymore, like you have to buy those portable
• 1:30:58
  Speaker 2: burners ils. Yeah, oh go. So for our discussion question,
• 1:31:06
  Speaker 2: we'd like to know if you have a favorite Harry
• 1:31:08
  Speaker 2: Potter video game. This could be a favorite game, favorite moment,
• 1:31:13
  Speaker 2: any recollections of playing the games when you were younger.
• 1:31:18
  Speaker 2: So please let us know. We would love to hear
• 1:31:20
  Speaker 2: from you. Drop us an email at revalio podcast staff
• 1:31:24
  Speaker 2: at gmail dot com, or reach us on social media
• 1:31:27
  Speaker 2: that is Facebook at Facebook dot com, Backslash Revalue Cast,
• 1:31:31
  Speaker 2: Instagram and TikTok at Revalue podcast, Twitter and YouTube at
• 1:31:36
  Speaker 2: Revalue Underscore podcast. And you can support the show on
• 1:31:40
  Speaker 2: Patreon at Patreon dot com. Backslash Revalue Podcast.
• 1:31:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so we all know Tom loves mini series. So Tom,
• 1:31:53
  Speaker 1: what are we discussing next episode?
• 1:31:57
  Speaker 2: So we're going to dive into the Lego video games. Yes,
• 1:32:03
  Speaker 2: So that's going to be exciting because I think we've
• 1:32:05
  Speaker 2: all played those and it's a fan favorite too. I
• 1:32:09
  Speaker 2: cannot you know, I've never heard of anyone who says
• 1:32:12
  Speaker 2: I hate those games. Many people say they're better than
• 1:32:15
  Speaker 2: the you know, than the eight Harry Potter games. So yeah,
• 1:32:21
  Speaker 2: I'm excited to tap into it.
• 1:32:25
  Speaker 1: They're so fun. Yeah, alright, So until next time, I'm Amy.
• 1:32:31
  Speaker 2: And I'm Tom. It's just ma