“Follow the story,” said Hagrid.
Hogwarts Mystery opens with a cutscene narrated by the legendary Maggie Smith, who reprises her role as Professor Minerva McGonagall. Accompanying her familiar voice telling you that you’re accepted to Hogwarts, the mystical music of the Harry Potter film franchise begins to play. This experience is very clearly crafted for fans of the Harry Potter series; the game even makes a point of showing you your acceptance letter, with your name delicately written at the top. There are references to the movies—including Fantastic Beasts—and the game includes details from the books that weren’t present in the films. Your character constantly comments about how unbelievable their experiences are: they can’t believe they’re stood in Ollivander’s, nor that they’re going to Hogwarts, nor that they’re learning spells. Though it’s understandable for a magical child to live in anticipation of these things, which are a rite of passage in the wizarding world, it feels as though this is meant to communicate the feelings of the player. Many people playing this game will have grown up with Harry Potter, and lived in disappointment ever since they didn’t receive their invitation to Hogwarts. Hogwarts Mystery is all about giving those fans the experience of Hogwarts life that they’ve always wanted to have.
But, in the midst of all that Potter-based wonderment, the game forgets it’s a game. The majority of what you do is tapping actions (the rest is tapping choices in conversation). Each action costs you 1 energy bolt. Though the game is quite generous with these in the beginning, as with all free-to-play games, it suddenly and viciously turns on you. Many players have ended up stuck at the exact same point—their character being choked out by Devil’s Snare while they watch on hopelessly. You regain 1 energy bolt every four minutes, but many actions need to be tapped more than once, which means you’ll likely be waiting a while before you can do anything. That’d be okay, if there were anything else to do in Hogwarts Mystery, but there isn’t. There’s nothing else to do besides follow the narrative and maybe stare at the students and objects dotted around Hogwarts that act as little more than scenery. The game is less of a game and more an interactive story. In fact, I feel it would have been much better off as Telltale adventure. Combat is limited, talking is a priority, and you even make choices that affect how the story plays out. Instead of making it free-to-play, it could have been a paid experience, with each year having its own episode. There are enough Harry Potter fans out there that would have jumped at the chance to play through their own story, even if it wasn’t free.
Struggling will only make it kill you faster!
But—and here’s Hogwarts Mystery’s other major flaw—it’s not really your story. Hogwarts Mystery isn’t about you, but your brother, Jacob [insert your character’s last name here]. Jacob, it appears, is a bit of a rotten egg. He was an excellent student at Hogwarts, but suddenly went off his rocker and broke school rules by searching for the school’s Cursed Vaults. To be fair to him, an institute of learning shouldn’t really have vaults, let alone cursed ones, but anyway: Jacob’s behaviour gets him expelled, and he promptly disappears. This is the ‘mystery’ of the title: where is your brother and why was he so keen on those vaults? With a whole seven years of Hogwarts life to get through, it’s clear it’ll take you a while to find out, but in the meantime, no one misses an opportunity to remind you of your brother’s infamy. In true Harry Potter fashion, most people assume you are tainted by association, and treat you accordingly (read: badly). Though this is quite intriguing as a story, and will no doubt please Harry Potter fans simply due to its being more content from the wizarding world, it’s not the story fans were (and as such still are) hoping for. It seems no one can go one conversation without reminding you of your brother, resulting in some rather forced reminders, and it’s not hard to guess why. Due to its free-to-play mechanics, Hogwarts Mystery’s story unfolds at a very slow pace, so reminding you of your end goal is, at best, an incentive to keep you playing. At worst, it’s the game’s way of manipulating you to spend money on it. And, considering just how much Hogwarts Mystery tries to stall your progression, I fear it’s the latter. The game doesn’t just drastically deplete your energy at key moments or pad time with pointless tasks: it even goes so far as to lock off your next story mission unless you wait an hour or—you guessed it—pay money.
Oh brother, not this again.
This may simply sound like yet another rant against the manipulative world of free-to-play games, but that’s because Hogwarts Mystery is a paradigm example. Claiming to be free, then demanding money in exchange for very little. As a paid, episodic adventure game, Hogwarts Mystery could have been something special. As a free-to-play mobile game, though, it’s an infuriating cash-grab. You don’t have to drop any money on this game, of course, but it takes a lot of patience to do it without. There are some redeeming qualities that keep drawing me back, though, like the charming characters who will gladly help you get up to mischief around Hogwarts, which itself has been nicely recreated in the game’s cute and cartoony style. Even when you’re stuck in a location, waiting for your energy to return, at least it’s not abhorrent to look at. The animations of your avatar as they idle in a situation are well done, too—although it definitely feels as if someone knew you were going to end up sitting in Potions for ten minutes waiting to regain the energy needed to glare at your mortal enemy.
Rowan is the kind of best friend everyone needs.
Is this the experience of Hogwarts life that Potter fans have always wanted to have? No. I think we all expected as much as soon as it turned out to be a mobile game. Don’t get me wrong, mobile games can be brilliant, but the perfect Hogwarts experience is not a mobile game. What we all want (and need) is a game where we make our own student, attend an open-world Hogwarts, choose our friends, excel in our lessons, and make our own adventure. Hogwarts Mystery is not that game. The character creator is limited by purchasable cosmetics, Hogwarts is a series of loading screens, your friends are the people the story prescribes you, success in lessons depends on your ability to tap actions and draw shapes, and the linear adventure has already been laid out for you by your brother before you’ve even received your invitational owl. That said, this adventure may be worth a try if you’ve got the patience for it—or, even better, a spell to grant you free energy.
Don't Blow On Cartridges 