Hogwarts Legacy is a game that epitomizes the Harry Potter experience that many fans of the franchise have been craving for a long time. Whether the exact experiences they were looking for have appeared in the game, there are a lot of exciting options available to players.
Hogwarts Legacy gives players the chance to explore an open world in and around Hogwarts Castle. From Hogsmeade to hamlets far from the Hogwarts grounds, there are hugely exciting opportunities to experience life as a Hogwarts student in a way far more immersive than ever before.
6 Going To Classes
For many Hogwarts Legacy players who had to grow up going to math and history classes, most of the classes from the Harry Potter franchise seemed like an exciting dream come true. The mixture of going to classes and being sent on assignments by Hogwarts professors is a thrilling, original experience.
Harry Potter fans have been clamoring for a game that would actually allow them to go to classes in the castle. While this experience is still somewhat limited throughout Hogwarts Legacy, it is more than enough to have fans loving actual schoolwork for once. From sneaking into Professor Sharp’s office during Potions class to watching Professor Weasley turn an owl into a book in Transfiguration, the classes are the best experience for making it feel like the player is attending an actual school.
5 Flying A Broom
Despite some minor improvements which could still be made to flying in Hogwarts Legacy, flying a broom around the world of Hogwarts has been something that players have been hugely enjoying since the game was released. There may not be any Quidditch available for players to sink their teeth into thus far, but they are definitely enjoying just having a broom.
The mount aspect of Hogwarts Legacy has been criticized somewhat for not being different enough to flying a broom, although Graphorns solve that problem late in the game. But flying, along with trial missions and free rein around the Highlands to call a broom and take off into the skies at will, has been praised as a hugely fun experience.
4 Solving Hogwarts Secrets
Hogwarts in the Harry Potter movies has always been represented as a vast world of secrets and hidden treasures. Hogwarts Legacy lays into this aspect of the castle’s intrigue heavily, hiding treasure chests, secret rooms, and unusual puzzles all around the length and breadth of the castle.
But beyond this, there are three Hogwarts Secrets that are part of the exploration challenges for players to complete. These secrets are hidden, sometimes in plain sight, but always in lesser visited areas of the castle. To find and solve them, players will have to put on their best puzzle hats and get to work. While many aspects of Hogwarts Legacy are exciting, the hidden depths that can be discovered in the castle itself are one of the most familiar to fans of the Harry Potter franchise.
3 Visiting Hogsmeade
Hogsmeade was written in the Harry Potter books to seem like a real treat for students of the castle. It always seemed like an ideal dreamland filled with fun tricks, jokes, and sweets, and though the Harry Potter movies never made it seem quite so wondrous, the idea of actually getting to visit it was still a hugely exciting experience for many players.
Players of Hogwarts Legacy are actually able to go into a variety of shops and buy clothes, get their wand from Ollivander, experience what magical sweets and toys can do, and more. Hogsmeade is filled with its own secrets, side quests, and flying field guide pages, making it a fascinating zone filled with music, life, and butter beer.
2 Getting Sorted
Fans of the Harry Potter franchise have been asking each other one question over the last twenty years above all others: which house are you in? It has become the Harry Potter equivalent of asking for a person’s zodiac sign, and fans of the franchise finally get their opportunity, albeit in a strange fashion as a fifth-year student, to be sorted into their Hogwarts house.
The best part of getting sorted into a house in Hogwarts Legacy is that it also provides players with unique experiences in their own house. Some missions in the game are different for different houses, the common rooms change and have their own vibe to them, and the reward for finding all the house crests in the Daedalian key mission is different and beautiful for each house.
1 Combat
There are a lot of experiences that Hogwarts Legacy players were looking forward to when the game was first released. This included getting to cast spells and dig into how wizarding combat would work on a regular basis against many types of foes. But nothing could have prepared them for the incredible experience which Hogwarts Legacy provides in combat terms.
The combat system, the magical combinations, and the way different types of spells work together are impeccable. The ways that certain spells can make different types of enemies far easier to defeat and the damage system are all fantastically put together and have had Hogwarts Legacy players raving about the combat from the very beginning as an undoubtedly fantastic Harry Potter world experience.
Hogwarts Legacy was released on February 10th, 2023, and is available on Windows PC, PlayStation 4 & 5, Xbox Series X & S, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch.
