'Harry Potter' game missing the magic

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By AIMEE GREEN / Lincoln Journal Star

If you’re not a “Harry Potter” fan, you can safely ignore this. You probably wouldn’t play the game based on “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” anyway.

If you are a fan, though, you should probably know that even though it’s “Harry Potter,” the game is not particularly magical.

As with most games based on movies, “Order of the Phoenix” doesn’t go much into the story. In fact, if you haven’t read the book or seen the movie, I have a feeling you’d have no clue what’s going on.

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Harry makes books float in the Gryffindor common room in "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix." (Electronic Arts)

Not that it really matters. Most of what happens in the game has little to do with the plot. As Harry, you’ll spend your time hoofing it up and down the long, long grand staircase at Hogwarts, running inane errands for lazy people or playing minigames such as gobstones (similar to marbles) or wizard chess.

Graphically, “Order of the Phoenix” doesn’t look too bad. The characters’ faces are spot-on, even if their hair doesn’t look the best. The cutscenes have issues, though, with characters jerking around like robots or appearing out of thin air.

The castle itself is huge and easy to get lost in, but it looks great.

I took issue with some of the voices. Many were done by the actual actors, but some, such as Hermione’s, aren’t even remotely similar. Harry’s, however, is nearly perfect.

As you’re running around the castle, you can hit a button and bring up the Marauder’s Map (which was introduced in “Prisoner of Azkaban”). The map lets you select a specific room from a list, and when you back out of the map you’ll see footprints leading you to that location. 

For the most part this works great, although it can be hard to see the footprints in darker rooms.

Each of the rooms in the castle has a number of things to “discover.” You can use magic spells to repair a pot, for example, which gives you discovery points that go toward unlockable content.

The magic spells, while limited in number, work pretty well mapped to the right thumbstick. Click forward twice to push an item away and click back twice to pull it to you. Swing back and forth a few times to levitate. It’s intuitive, and while it’s not always accurate, at least the moves are easy to remember.

Combat, meanwhile, is too thin. It doesn’t pop up very often, and when it does, it’s not very difficult or exciting.

My biggest problems with the game stem from the characters other than Harry. For one, there’s Ron and Hermione, who always — always — follow you around. Why? I don’t know. They’re almost never needed.

And they get in your way. I don’t know how many times I tried to reverse my course and ran into them standing behind me. Most of the time when that happens, if they move at all, they move so slowly that you find yourself yelling, “Get out of the way!” at the TV. That also happened frequently with the students roaming around Hogwarts.

Tasks also are an issue. While the map tells you who has a task for you, and even sometimes gives it a name, it doesn’t tell you exactly what you have to do. This is especially a problem when you’re in a multistep task or doing many tasks at once and can’t remember what you were supposed to do.

Still, the game isn’t entirely without enjoyment if you like the “Harry Potter” universe. If you’re willing to put up with the many annoyances and rather dull gameplay to discover everything in the castle, the many unlockables (including videos with cast members) are worth checking out.

If you want to play “Order of the Phoenix,” rent it. Don’t waste your money on it. It’s short enough that a rental should be more than enough. And if you’re not a “Potter” freak, don’t even bother.

Another movie-based game falls just as short. “Transformers: The Game” makes an attempt at re-creating the exciting battles between the Autobots and Decepticons, but in the end, its issues outweigh the fun.

Visually, “Transformers” isn’t too bad. The world is merely OK, but the Transformers themselves look pretty good, and the actual “transforming” looks cool.

Hidden items on each level — and there are a lot — unlock bonus items such as art, videos and generation one costumes. Fans will definitely like that part.

However, the combat system leaves much to be desired. There’s a target “lock-on,” but it only really locks on when you’re already looking in the right direction. Then there are the two weapon choices. You have primary and secondary weapons, but most of the time they don’t do any good against the enemies. You have to run up and punch them to break through their shields to do any damage.

Then there’s the driving. Yes, you can transform into vehicles, but will you want to? No. They’re too hard to control, and the slightest debris can bring you to a complete halt. Driving around was not fun.

“Transformers” is just not something I would recommend spending money on. If you really like the license, rent it. If you’re not a fan, skip it.

Reach Aimee Green at 473-7326 or Aimee.Green@lee.net.