Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows P1 Video Game Review
Editors Note: This review was completed by a guest writer, Dominic Olivier, who is Alex's brother. Many thanks to him!
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 takes the role of Harry, Ron and Hermione fighting through the first half of Deathly Hallows with beautiful visuals and easily recognisable scenes such as the Weasley household and the Ministry of Magic, gameplay is simple with easy access to different spells and other amenities such as an added spell to help you get to your objective. Unfortunately with this game the negatives outweigh the positives and it is hard to ignore the repetitive nature of the game and the confusing story line.
The Good
Comparable to other Harry Potter games The Deathly Hallows is a vast improvement in both gameplay and graphics. Multiple spells have different effects on opponents which can either make the game easier or harder and can help you adjust the game to your own specific style of play. A new destructible cover system has been included which creates flowing and action packed combat with little time to stop and rest, combat itself is engaging with the visual display of the spells and casting a masterpiece, watch as Harry elegantly flicks his wrist to fire a ball of florescent light towards his opponent and hit them right in the head all in one fluid motion, these can create some of the most exciting fight scenes in a video game and can make you feel truly in the middle of a mystical and magical duel.
Without a doubt this is one of the most difficult games I've played all year and is constantly enticing me to try to replay and see if I can beat one level after another. One tiny feature I have been impressed with is the lack of any experience or health bars and am personally glad to see the back of them, your characters health is displayed with the colour of the screen, if you are at full health the screen will be in full colour but as you get weaker and weaker the screen will slowly become less colourful and eventually become black and white. Little features like these show the detail put into the game such as the sides of your screen freezing over when a dementor is near. Deathly Hallows pt1 takes the format of closed world missions (open world being that you can go anywhere at any time) which will lead you to your objective with no option to go anywhere else, but I do not think that this subtracts from the feel of the game as within each level you can move freely about without any annoying invisible walls.
The Not So Good
Game adaptations of films are never truly great, and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Pt1 is no exception, the games repetitive nature is hard to ignore with almost all the missions consisting of 'go there and fight them' as their main objectives with some other unimaginative side missions which involve 'fight them and save them' or 'defend them while fighting them'. The people you are fighting are almost always your simple character clones called 'Snatchers', these simple AI badies put up a fair fight but can be knocked out with one or two spells to the chest. Camera positioning can be one of the most frustrating things in this game as you are forced to adopt an over the shoulder view of the battlefield which can half blind you with half the screen covered in the back of Harry's shirt.
The true story of Harry Potter is completely over looked and instead replaced with a over complex and confusing version which has little of the charm or character development of the original story. Almost no attempt has been made to give us the true emotion of the books or films and the voice acting does not help that. Yes they sound like Harry, Ron and Hermione but they fail to deliver the story in the detail and emotion that the gamer wants, I found myself turning on the subtitles almost 20 minutes into the game with the only thing that getting me through the cut scenes being the skip button.
Summary
In conclusion I found Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows a game which should be avoided by any hardcore Potter fans who want to relive the story in game form but should be considered by any gamer who likes games based on spells and magic as it will not only fulfil these criteria but will also look great in the process. The only thing holding this game back from becoming a great game and bucking the trend of cheap movie adaptations is its lack of structured story and emotional delivery.
