Spoiler-free review and the positives:
I'll start by saying that I do think this game is better than it is bad, but I feel myself constantly listing things that could've made the game great. I'll say some things I loved first: I loved flying, I loved combat, and I thought fast-travel being floo powder was genius. It is a very good Harry Potter sandbox. A good Harry Potter RPG...? Not so much. A lot of the good is just description and speaks for itself. So... I'll let you enjoy it if you play the game. Maybe you'll enjoy it better than I did! But... here's the main stuff I want to say... here we go...
!!! MAJOR SPOILERS BELOW !!!
Ultimately, this game took a lot of shortcuts:
1. Everyone refers to you as "they/them" pronouns so they don't have to rerecord anything. I thought this was so lazy, and completely undermines the experience as a man or woman in Hogwarts, and leaves everything feeling very bland, stale, and hollow.
2. Having only one Hogwarts House quest, which is just a side-thought for the main story while Professor Fig goes to the Ministry, is just lazy. Everything else about the houses is generic and does not reward you for choosing any of them; for example: you feel as close to Sebastian and Ominis as a Gryffindor and a Slytherin. Their house and the house you choose mean absolutely nothing aside from like one line of dialogue that developers could easily paste into an empty and meaningless box. And the same thing goes for all other students and the houses you or they belong to (Poppy, Natty, Nellie, etc.).
3. The House Cup is so astoundingly underwhelming. They don't even say your house by name, Professor Weasley literally just says the same generic thing that equates to this: the player is the only student in the school that matters, he/she/they completed the main story, and 100 points make their house the winner.
4. EVERYONE IS WAY TOO NICE. Even Sebastian, who literally kills his uncle, is hardly ever mean to you. He is always more your friend than your enemy. Everyone in the school is just super nice, maybe just a little arrogant. And no matter how mean you are, you still wind up being the relationship characters' friends anyway, so it kinda sorta means absolutely nothing.
5. I'm sorry, but Professor Fig's death was almost entirely meaningless to me. I chose the good path entirely. And As kind as I was, his presence in the game just felt like a tutorial, not really a mentor. His death was the equivalent of a tutorial narrator dying. In fact, I'd probably be sadder if Bruce Campbell died in the Spider-Man Raimi games, and you don't even see him. It's literally just a voice-over.
6. The South Shore area doesn't even change seasons. 'Nuff said.
7. The Headmaster canceling Quidditch for the year was a copout because Portkey didn't want to develop it, and nothing will convince me it was because of anything else.
8. No sitting down or sleeping? Really? What's even the point of your common room?
9. And worst of all... How hollow the NPCs and companions felt. There is no romance in a school full of teenagers, which... yeah right. Admittedly, I can excuse the romance as something that would've just been a personal preference (even though it is kind of ridiculous), but... I feel an actual negative was the lack of followers and being able to customize them. I would have loved to have Poppy, Ominis, Sebastian, Nellie, Natty, and so many others while free-roaming the world. Heck, Professor Garlick is basically still a student herself (she's only 18), having her as a follower who kind of still feels like a student along with the experience as a professor would've been a super cool type of follower. And how special would it have been to fight Ranrok with your favorite follower? Maybe they could have implemented a friend-group system where the game calculates your favorite student companions and places them in your party when you beat the game. The game even makes it a point to tell you through its themes that friendship and loyalty are some of the most important things about Hogwarts, despite your house. And the game does nothing to let you immerse yourself in it. Skyrim, Mass Effect, and even KOTOR are all older than this game, but those still let you change the appearance, level, and connect deeper with followers. You could even play most of the story with the same follower. And the funny thing is... Harry Potter and the Wizarding World are supposed to be more about friendship than any of the franchises from those of the three games I just listed.
I'll start by saying that I do think this game is better than it is bad, but I feel myself constantly listing things that could've made the game great. I'll say some things I loved first: I loved flying, I loved combat, and I thought fast-travel being floo powder was genius. It is a very good Harry Potter sandbox. A good Harry Potter RPG...? Not so much. A lot of the good is just description and speaks for itself. So... I'll let you enjoy it if you play the game. Maybe you'll enjoy it better than I did! But... here's the main stuff I want to say... here we go...
!!! MAJOR SPOILERS BELOW !!!
Ultimately, this game took a lot of shortcuts:
1. Everyone refers to you as "they/them" pronouns so they don't have to rerecord anything. I thought this was so lazy, and completely undermines the experience as a man or woman in Hogwarts, and leaves everything feeling very bland, stale, and hollow.
2. Having only one Hogwarts House quest, which is just a side-thought for the main story while Professor Fig goes to the Ministry, is just lazy. Everything else about the houses is generic and does not reward you for choosing any of them; for example: you feel as close to Sebastian and Ominis as a Gryffindor and a Slytherin. Their house and the house you choose mean absolutely nothing aside from like one line of dialogue that developers could easily paste into an empty and meaningless box. And the same thing goes for all other students and the houses you or they belong to (Poppy, Natty, Nellie, etc.).
3. The House Cup is so astoundingly underwhelming. They don't even say your house by name, Professor Weasley literally just says the same generic thing that equates to this: the player is the only student in the school that matters, he/she/they completed the main story, and 100 points make their house the winner.
4. EVERYONE IS WAY TOO NICE. Even Sebastian, who literally kills his uncle, is hardly ever mean to you. He is always more your friend than your enemy. Everyone in the school is just super nice, maybe just a little arrogant. And no matter how mean you are, you still wind up being the relationship characters' friends anyway, so it kinda sorta means absolutely nothing.
5. I'm sorry, but Professor Fig's death was almost entirely meaningless to me. I chose the good path entirely. And As kind as I was, his presence in the game just felt like a tutorial, not really a mentor. His death was the equivalent of a tutorial narrator dying. In fact, I'd probably be sadder if Bruce Campbell died in the Spider-Man Raimi games, and you don't even see him. It's literally just a voice-over.
6. The South Shore area doesn't even change seasons. 'Nuff said.
7. The Headmaster canceling Quidditch for the year was a copout because Portkey didn't want to develop it, and nothing will convince me it was because of anything else.
8. No sitting down or sleeping? Really? What's even the point of your common room?
9. And worst of all... How hollow the NPCs and companions felt. There is no romance in a school full of teenagers, which... yeah right. Admittedly, I can excuse the romance as something that would've just been a personal preference (even though it is kind of ridiculous), but... I feel an actual negative was the lack of followers and being able to customize them. I would have loved to have Poppy, Ominis, Sebastian, Nellie, Natty, and so many others while free-roaming the world. Heck, Professor Garlick is basically still a student herself (she's only 18), having her as a follower who kind of still feels like a student along with the experience as a professor would've been a super cool type of follower. And how special would it have been to fight Ranrok with your favorite follower? Maybe they could have implemented a friend-group system where the game calculates your favorite student companions and places them in your party when you beat the game. The game even makes it a point to tell you through its themes that friendship and loyalty are some of the most important things about Hogwarts, despite your house. And the game does nothing to let you immerse yourself in it. Skyrim, Mass Effect, and even KOTOR are all older than this game, but those still let you change the appearance, level, and connect deeper with followers. You could even play most of the story with the same follower. And the funny thing is... Harry Potter and the Wizarding World are supposed to be more about friendship than any of the franchises from those of the three games I just listed.