Tag Archives: Magic

Golden Sun: Dark Dawn Review

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Golden Sun has always been a pretty great franchise and it’s nice to see that this game got a quick manga oneshot. It’s really just an adaption of the intro level so it’s not like it’s very long or anything but I’ll take what I can get.

The story starts with one of the kids trying to show off by proving he could pilot a flying device but didn’t realize that he needed wind powers for that. So naturally he crashes into a dangerous forest. The hero of the Golden Sun event, Isaac heads off to save him. Accompanying him is Matthew and the rest of the next generation. They end up having to fight some monsters though and it’s overall a dangerous mission but nothing will stop them from saving their friend. That is what it means to be a true hero!

Definitely a fun story. It’s also interesting how there are a lot of creative liberties from the game. For starters Isaac is the only adult here so his trusty sidekick is nowhere to be seen in this version. Additionally while in the game this was mostly all part of Isaac’s plan in terms of how to handle finding the lost kid, in the manga he’s caught more off guard. To the point where he actually loses to one of the monsters and ends up having to be saved. This change makes him look really weak so ultimately I don’t think that was the way to go. They should have just had him be in command of everything like normal.

The art was fairly decent. I wouldn’t call it top tier or anything like that but it works well enough to get the story of the oneshot across. Additionally the character cast is on point and this makes for a good adventure. The idea of course is to get you to buy the game and I like to think that maybe this would convince some people. I’ve always wondered just how effective a short promo like this could be but hey I’d say it’s as good an attempt as any. There were really no mistakes in this story. Ultimately I just wish they would have gone ahead and done a complete adaption. That would have been a lot of fun.

Because of the short length there is only so much you can write about for this one though. That’s why this review is fairly short. The characters don’t really have time for intros and there isn’t a lot going on beyond the quick fight because the page count wouldn’t really allow for that. So ultimately this is a pure teaser all the way through but it’s an effective one that will have your interest piqued.

Overall, Golden Sun makes for a good story. As the story in the games is always top notch it makes sense that the manga follows suit. It’s still a little too short to really get invested on this end but at the same time that does mean you can easily read this one at any point. It won’t take long to do after all and then you are all set. I’m currently playing through the actual video game for this story so I’ll have the full review up for that one pretty soon. You could say that I’m in the home stretch already!

Overall 6/10

Practical Magic Review

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It’s time for a film about magic and how a curse can really last for a very long amount of time. The film has its moments but the whole main romance is really just a big rebound so that does take some points without a doubt. Ultimately the movie goes by rather quickly and it’s an entertaining ride even if it won’t end up being one of the top titles.

The film starts off with a witch creating a curse that bad things will befall any guy who tries to get together with her descendants. The marriage will not be able to last and that has carried through to the present. Sally is our main character and she’s not going to let a curse stop her. She marries a guy named Michael and they had some kids but one day he is hit by a truck and she finally realizes that there is no way to beat the curse. She will not allow herself to love ever again but her sister isn’t ready to quit yet and has a ton of affairs. Unfortunately she has gone in with the wrong crowd now by getting together with a crazy guy named Jimmy. Sally will have to help her out before it’s too late but in the meantime what if she falls in love with one of the local authorities named Gary?

Of course that’s exactly what happens and so there is no way to get around this romance. Sally basically lost her husband to a curse and now she’s going to move on just like that? She probably should have just brought him back to life. Yes, the whole movie is a cautionary tale against doing such a thing but I think you can make it work. In a world where magic is real and it is actually possible to revive someone (albeit with some side effects) then you just have to spend your life perfecting the spell to make it work. I guarantee that it’s at least a possibility considering that we know the magic exits.

So the romance ends up being annoying as a result. Granted Gary’s not even a bad guy. He’s a good person trying to do the right thing and help out. It’s just that I’m not buying the romance. Particularly since Michael was also a good guy before he bought the farm early. The most annoying character has to be Gillian though because she’s the one dragging Sally into a whole lot of trouble. From what we’ve seen of Jimmy he wasn’t exactly a class act from the start so how did this relationship even start?

Regardless he ends up causing a lot of trouble for the duration of the film. Naturally he takes the bulk of the blame since he’s the one going around breaking the law and basically trying to murder the heroines. It would just be nice if Gillian was more responsible since it doesn’t feel like she actually learns any lessons during the film. The aunts are also not without blame as they just run out midway through the film and vanish during the climax. It sure would have been nice to have had some adult supervision to back Sally up when she was in a tight spot.

The film feels pretty short and it’s entertaining enough. There are definitely some jokes that work well like the heroes murdering Jimmy multiple times. The plot is serious to an extent but there are always a lot of lighthearted moments thrown in to keep everything balanced. It also wasn’t too easy to snap the curse so the original witch’s power was definitely impressive. You’d think the main characters or at least the aunts could have worked a bit harder to blow up the curse but granted it seems like the aunts agreed with it to an extent. So they had no real reason to snap it.

The cast here is fairly small which isn’t a bad idea so you can focus on the characters but it’s just a problem that none of them are super likable. There aren’t any standouts here and as a result the film isn’t quite as lively or exciting as it could have been. You’ll never feel bored while watching it or anything like that but there also isn’t a ton of replay value here either. So it’s not bad but it’s not that good either and just winds up being in the middle. I will give the ending props for using the power of friendship though. Sally had been neglecting the other moms at school who were just trying to help and so by the end they all help each other out. It may be a bit cheesy but it was still a decent climax.

One thing the film could have done maybe was to lean into the curse a bit more. Have Sally actually try meeting tons of guys and each time something goes wrong. The main weakness of this strategy is it could make Sally look completely desperate so it should be played completely for laughs with lots of slapstick. Then you never do a serious romance and the plot of the film is more actively about ending the curse. I will say that the curse is slick to not activate until the descendant has had kids so this way the lineage will continue to grow.

Overall, Practical Magic is a decent movie but I feel like there’s so much more you could do with magic. I tend to feel this way for most slice of life/romance type movies that involve magic. Magic is one of the ultimate fantasies for any person to have. There are so many ways you can immediately enhance your life with it or even just show off for others. I’d like to see a main character just go wild with it for once. In this movie the power levels are a bit lower so it might have been harder but the magic feels like it’s only something on the side to keep the film fresh but it’s not as overpowering an element as you might expect. If the comedic/romance plot sounds good to you then you should check it out but the fact that it’s all a rebound hurts it just enough for me to not bump this to the next level.

Overall 5/10

Red Lights Review

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This review is of the edited TV-14 version of the film. All thoughts should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

Red Lights is a bit of a trippy film that has a lot of good ideas but the execution isn’t as good as it should have been. It gives you a lot to think about though and I like the concept. You’d probably never guess the actual story of the film just based on the title though, it’s not one of those titles that makes it obvious or anything. There aren’t a ton of magic films like this one out there either so that adds a little more reason to check this one out.

The movie starts off by introducing us to Margaret and her assistant Tom. Their job is to discredit people who call themselves magicians by uncovering their tips and tricks. They’re quite good at this and Margaret really commands the field. In her day she was only defeated once by the magician known as Simon who was the best of the best. He retired rather suddenly when one of his critics died during a performance. Well, now he’s back but for some reason Margaret refuses to go after him. She even tells Tom not to try because they are hopelessly outmatched and outgunned. Tom doesn’t listen though and wants to take this guy down as the ultimate triumph.

Red Lights shifts gears rather quickly so don’t expect this plot to remain static but right off the bat I like the premise here. The idea of a movie about people busting magicians is really interesting. Particularly if you don’t believe in magic then you’re rooting for them to claim the win. Margaret is also a very solid character with how confident and prepared she is. Of course she isn’t unbeatable and we get a flashback showing how she lost to Simon. It’s not easy to prove the others are a phony, particularly on the spot. Part of her regret though is that it should have been easy for her in that moment.

He claimed that her son’s ghost was around as if he was dead, but only Margaret knew that he was still alive. If she had called him out there then her career would have been perfect but ultimately she hesitated and just didn’t think of it in time. That’s her only loss in the film though. While Tom gives her a hard time during an interview later on, I wouldn’t say that she was actually losing that one. Personally I thought she did fine and I suppose it’s how you look at the interview but what did he really want her to say? I thought he was unreasonable the whole time.

That’s one of the weaker parts of the film since Tom is really the main character here and he’s just annoying all the time. He constantly loses his cool and falls into every trap imaginable. There’s a scene where he keeps on threatening the head researcher so that he can get in and the whole time I’m just thinking that they really shouldn’t let him in now. It’s clear that the guy isn’t stable at all and the film really goes out of its way to show this. He’s just way too obsessed with Silver.

Tom also just isn’t as talented as Margaret is. Intensity and youth can only get you so far, ultimately you also need the technique to go along with that. He’s also rather mean to one of the assistants. He doesn’t even let the guy talk and just keeps on brushing off the guy’s ideas. Tom’s girlfriend acts the same way towards the guy so you start to feel bad for him. He’s the one trying to help out and staying up late trying to crack the case too. He deserves a little more respect there.

During the film you’re also supposed to ask yourself the whole time if Simon’s powers are real as well. It’s a nice angle to the film since it gives you a reason to really think about each scene a lot. Fantastical things do seem to happen a lot when he’s on stage like lights breaking or people dying for seemingly no reason. Of course part of you will think that may be a little too easy in that case. Either way it should give you a lot to think about and Simon makes for a solid villain. He’s definitely not someone that the characters can really afford to take too lightly.

There is a big twist near the end of the film which answers all of the questions and should make or break the experience for you. The twist itself I’m fairly cool with although I wouldn’t say it’s handled super well. One scene is dragged out a bit too much which lowers the impact of the moment. I also feel like this raises some extra questions throughout the movie which don’t do it any favors. It also leads to a rather bad ending so in the end the film starts off a lot better than it ended. It had some good humor and a fun cast but it just made some really big mistakes in the second half that erase a lot of the good that the first half pulled in. I’ll jump into that now so skip the next two paragraphs if you haven’t seen the film yet.

All right so here we go into spoiler land. First off, Margaret gets bumped off early on which is a shame since she was the best character here. Tom isn’t able to fill in for her effectively at all. Then the other big twist is that Simon was a phony but Tom is a real psychic. Yes, all the crazy stuff that happened during the movie was his doing. It seems like he didn’t actually know he was doing this to himself. Towards the end of the film he says he regrets how he didn’t tell Margaret sooner so she could have some closure though.

So that means he knew he had powers but just didn’t know he was using it at those moments? It’s rather sloppy. His whole motivation seemed to be to find some other people like him with psychic powers and he had started giving up on this dream. It’s too bad he couldn’t have confided in her though or at least been less desperate about things. At least the movie didn’t cop out with powers not existing but it just should have been so much better. Also, at the end Tom takes Margaret’s son off of life support so he can die now but that was a very iffy way of ending things. He snuck in there without any consent and just turned it off? Even if it’s meant to be a helpful/hopeful kind of thing, it didn’t turn out that way.

Well that’s it for the spoilers. There’s also an action scene we get in the bathroom that really doesn’t go very well for Tom. The scene is super random and shows up out of nowhere though. On a plot level you get to piece it together real quick on how this happened but the ending of the fight felt really convenient. If you’re going to start a fight and take a huge risk on someone seeing you, then shouldn’t you make sure that the fight is won? Stopping at the end just doesn’t work and makes the whole thing futile.

Overall, Red Lights is a film with a lot of ups and downs for me. The concept is sound and there are some interesting visuals here. On the other hand the ending is no good and it felt like the movie should have trusted its own premise more. The more interesting scenes in the film where about the heroes trying to prove that the magicians are a fraud as opposed to Tom’s obsession. If we focused on that then this would have been pretty good.

Overall 5/10

Mashle: Magic and Muscles

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Mashle’s one of the next gen Shonen Jump titles and it’s definitely off to a good start. It’s essentially a Black Clover meets One Punch Man title so far. I can see a lot of potential here with great fight scenes and humor so hopefully this ends up being one of the really long running titles. I’ll have a review up for this one as soon as I have completed the series.

Overall 7/10

Magic Review

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This review is of the edited TV-14 version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

Magic is a film where the main character is acting really shady from the start but nobody ever notices the red flags until it’s too late. As a result the characters are really in a jam here. The puppets always make for interesting characters but with this film it feels like this is all a hallucination which takes away a bit from the supernatural factor. You could make the case that the whole thing is in his head which isn’t nearly as fun.

The movie starts off with Corky messing up at another comedy show gig with his crude puppet Fats. His mentor Merlin just tells him to keep on trying and he will get it. Eventually Corky does become a star and he is super close to making it into the big leagues. Unfortunately in order to secure his TV gig he has to go through a medical checkup and since Corky knows that he is insane, he declines. His agent Ben wants to help Corky get past this but Corky runs off to a very remote area where he meets his old crush Peggy. He figures this place will be good to hide and maybe he can win over Peggy even though she is already married. Will his insanity prevent Corky from having a happy life?

Even if Corky wasn’t crazy I would still have to root against him though because Peggy is already married. I get that he likes her but once someone is married you really have to let them go. Nothing good will come from trying to go after someone who is already married. Corky’s just not a likable character though. Look at how quickly he blows up at his agent Ben despite the guy doing his best to try and get him on the show anyway. Ben even called in all of his lawyers and they did their best. Ben was the only one who really had Corky’s best interests at heart the entire time yet Corky just didn’t care.

Additionally, Corky wasn’t even nice to Peggy early on. When he messes up on one of his early tricks he starts threatening her and you almost think he was ready to murder her there if the trick didn’t go over well. Corky is really the main villain of the film and it’s always tricky when you have the lead as the villain since you can’t exactly root for him. This doesn’t end up working out here and the only way he may have even stood a slight chance is if Fats was definitely a separate entity. I wouldn’t say that the film really plays it out that way though so in the end you have to blame him for everything going on.

Even if Fats was a real character I wouldn’t have liked him much though. The guy is always being really crude which is really the extent of his character. He will always be making cracks to get some easy laughs which the characters always find funny. Fats is always egging Corky on but doesn’t help much. I suppose he does get one stab in near the end. He’s certainly no Chucky or Talking Tina in terms of the scare factor.

The best character by far was Ben here. I’ll give him major points for at least trying to help Corky out the whole time. He never turned his back on the guy and through to the end he was going to go and look for some help. You knew he was doomed in the film but the whole time you were hoping he would somehow pull off the escape and get out of there. Now that would have definitely been amazing. All things considered, the guy did put up a pretty good fight even though he was taken by surprise and in a weakened state.

As the main heroine I can’t say that Peggy was particularly good either. She should not have entertained Corky from the start and cheating is never the right move. Duke may not have been a great guy so in that case split up first but don’t start another affair in the meantime. I also didn’t think she picked up on a lot of the red flags like with Corky threatening her early on. You’d think that would have been a dealbreaker but it didn’t really seem to leave a big impact on her at all.

Finally you have Duke who is definitely a bad guy from the start. He acts all tough when it’s a fight that he can win but at no point in the film do you feel sympathetic to him at all. He’s just not a good person and any scene with him in it is another one where you are rooting for the guy’s scene to end already. The film certainly doesn’t have the strongest cast since I would say only one character here is good.

Naturally I wouldn’t say the writing is great either. The characters don’t tend to act very realistically as described above. The only scene where I would give some good props is the stare down with Corky and Ben where corky had to try and make it 5 minutes without talking. I thought that was handled really well at least. The scene did a good job of showing how Corky just couldn’t keep it together by this point and how serious the whole thing was.

Overall, Magic is a film you can safely skip. It sort of defeats the purpose of its own story by not having Fats actually move around and cause damage. Having Corky be insane instead isn’t nearly as interesting and of course it does mean that the lead is no fun to follow around. I would have preferred to have at least seen more of the comedy acts even if I didn’t find him to be all that funny. I do think comedy shows in general are tough since you have to try and make people laugh but how often are the audiences going to be super engaged? When you’re trying to be funny is often the hardest time to get people to laugh. Ironically a little more magic could have helped this film.

Overall 3/10

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire Review

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So far the Harry Potter games had actually been pretty decent. Unfortunately this one definitely broke the trend. This was just a bad game to be honest. The worst decision the developers made was to make this a forced collectathon game where you have to go back to the same levels over and over to collect more shields. Not only is the gameplay not all that much fun but the story is also the weakest in the franchise. When you mix that all together you definitely don’t have a winning formula at the ready.

You would have absolutely no idea what the story is if you just go through the game though. All you have for the plot here are some disjointed story cutscenes and that’s it. Roughly you’re finding an egg, completing 3 challenges and then taking on Voldemort. It’s too bad because otherwise you could have built up to the big battle gradually. It’s just hard to believe that the game has fallen so far compared to the previous ones. Still, at this point you get that I preferred the originals so I won’t compare them much going forward. Lets just talk about the Goblet of Fire on its own.

The gameplay is 3D style as you go through the levels and have to obtain Shields. A Shield is either hidden behind some obstacles or awarded after defeating a boss. Each level has a certain amount of shields but the game doesn’t tell you how many, nor does the level itself give you an indication of how many are left. There are 10 mini shields in each level as well and once you grab all 10 then you will be able to get another full sized shield. Another thing worth mentioning here is that you won’t be able to get all of the shields initially since you don’t learn the tree spell until later. So get ready to have to revisit the levels again.

There’s only around 10 levels but there are 38 shields so you have to replay each level quite a few times. I completed the game with 29 shields so you don’t need all of them but the game does make sure you at least have most of them. You have two main attack spells to deal with the enemies that show up. Pressing the A button will launch your offensive spell which works on just about everyone. Then you have your levitation spell with the B Button that you can use to raise your opponents while your teammates blast them or you can move obstacles out of the way in the game.

I haven’t mentioned yet but this game is a team styled game much like Sonic Heroes. There are always 3 of you running around in the game and the other two are controlled by A.I. if you are playing solo. They aren’t the brightest A.I. though and often times they will get stuck so you have to find them or just run far enough and they’ll magically catch up. A lot of obstacles require at least two people to levitate so you have to hope that they get the picture pretty quick.

While I wouldn’t say the gameplay itself is very bad, the computers do drain on you after a while. Additionally some of the level designs aren’t great so it feels tedious going through the same rooms over and over again. A lot of the enemy spawns never actually end so your best bet is to find an opening to run forward but often times this just means you are going to have to eat a whole lot of hits before you can actually get to safety which isn’t exactly fun. The bosses don’t give you much direction either but I won’t say much against them because part of me was impressed that there were bosses and you can still figure it out before long since there aren’t a lot of controls.

Get ready to hear the characters talking a lot though. While not as constant as in How to Train Your Dragon 2, they do repeat the same lines over and over again as the game goes on which can get old pretty quickly. You wish they would have a little more restraint with that. The graphics are okay although the cutscenes aren’t as sharp as the older games. The soundtrack is surprisingly good so that’s one positive I can give the game. It has a Star Wars vibe and at least puts some real soul into the tunes. It definitely beats the alternative of having a more robotic feel or uninspiring music. This way you can at least listen to good tunes.

There isn’t much replay value to be found here but I suppose finding all of the shields will have to do. You can also try to unlock extra cards by finding other collectibles and mastering your spells. I ended up getting most of the cards naturally so I don’t think this will take you very long at all. The toughest part about 100% completing this game is probably going to be getting the shields on the challenge levels. Those levels definitely don’t allow for many mistakes so you will really have to master the style.

Overall, It’s not often that I give a game a score under a 5 because most games are enjoyable in their own way. It takes a lot to be what I consider a “bad’ game but this one would fit the bill. The gameplay just isn’t fun. The levels lose any enjoyment they might have had when you have to play them over and over again. The obstacles don’t save either so you have to keep on performing the same actions each time you enter the level. There was no effort put into the story so the whole experience just isn’t satisfying. The biggest flaw of the game was the collectathon angle but without it, you would have just had a super short game that wasn’t memorable. It would have been preferable to this, but either way this wasn’t close to being a great game. I’m hoping that the next Harry Potter game steps its game up.

Overall 4/10

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban Review

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Now it’s time to look at the Prisoner of Azkaban. This Harry Potter game changes things up quite a bit from the first two. For starters the animation has changed entirely. The same is true for the voices and even the gameplay is a bit different. This one is going for more of a teamwork angle sort of like Sonic Heroes. Unfortunately this is easily the weakest Harry Potter game. It feels the last story based as the game spams you with dungeons and the gameplay isn’t nearly as smooth. Still, a decent game but not on the same level as the others.

Harry is back in Hogwarts and he is determined to have a good time. He’s an expert Quidditch player after all and his friend Hagrid is finally getting to teach a class. Everything is going well until Draco spreads word around that Hagrid’s pet is dangerous. Now the pet is slated to be executed and there doesn’t seem to be a way to stop this. Harry and his friends will have to think fast in order to stop this. Meanwhile they have to go through a bunch of dungeons in order to earn new spells.

The game is absolutely not playing when it comes to the dungeons. They’re just everywhere and around every corner. No matter where you look there are more dungeons at the ready. Each one has a bunch of puzzles so the game was really trying to channel its inner Legend of Zelda. It’s certainly a worthy attempt I will grant them that. The puzzles aren’t all that bad but it just feels like the game is stalling quite a lot. You go large portions of the game without a lot of big story developments and then suddenly the narrator will show up and fast forward the story for you. A lot of it is told through exposition instead of your actually getting to experience it. In my mind this is definitely a mistake.

Unfortunately the controls are back to being very sluggish again as well. They don’t respond to you very well. In particular turning can be quite the challenge. You just don’t go where you want to go which is pretty tough. It’s often easier to run off into the distance and then return because a simple turn is just that broken. Likewise with aiming as you’ll often shoot straight into the dirt instead of at an enemy. Additionally when you defeat an enemy instead of locking onto the next one as you would expect, the character just loses the lock entirely which is pretty unfortunate.

The graphics are a big step down as noted with the animation change earlier. The character designs just aren’t on point now and the whole thing looks pretty low quality. In general this game just feels like it’s a true tie-in as opposed to being a classic platformer that just happens to be based on the movie. There’s a world of difference between the two styles. At the same time it’s not enough for me to call this a bad game. It’s just inconvenient a lot of the time but not bad.

For example, this is the first game where you can play as Hermione and Ron as well. The issue is that doing all 3 characters can still only equip 2 spells and they all know around 4. Most of the spells are unique to each character as well so there’s a lot of switching and pausing going around which means double the interruptions from gameplay. There should be a much more intuitive way to switch out spells than by going through all of these steps. It just doesn’t feel quite right.

The game also adds a lot of new stealth levels to the mix. I think the developers were likely proud of how well it came out with how frequently they appear but it’s not a good match with the dicey gameplay. If the trolls or prefects see you then unlike the last game where you start from the beginning of the room, you’re actually booted out entirely so you have to enter again. Have I mentioned that whenever you enter a room there is a long loading sequence? Each room has to be loaded for some reason. The stealth levels could have been a little better if not for that but it definitely ended up hurting the experience.

In terms of length I would say this game is also around 6-7 hours long. I’m sure you could beat it quicker if you put your mind to it though. For replay value there are some cards to grab I suppose. I think if you get enough of them you may get some extra health but it’s not like it’ll be very useful to you by then since you’ll have already beaten the game. I’ll give this one kudos for actually coming up with a fishing minigame as well. It’s not very fun or anything like that but the more content the better. The team mechanics also could have been fun if they had been smoother. Perhaps upgrading the A.I. so the partners actually follow you without you having to call them at times. Sometimes you have to wait way too long for them to arrive. I got stuck/lost in the courtyard for a super long amount of time before the gang finally caught up to me.

Overall, The Prisoner of Azkaban is more interested in throwing you into long dungeons than actually following the story. The whole thing is really glossed over by the end. Even all of the Quidditch matches are played off screen. I miss being able to just jump on my broom and start giving opponents the work. In this game I’m not able to do so and it just feels like a missed opportunity. I think this game would fare a little better if I didn’t play it immediately after the other two which really highlights how it couldn’t match up. It just really paled in comparison to the last two. They had a lot of heart and great gameplay mechanics at their disposal. This one never really felt natural like that. We’ll see how the Goblet of Fire performs since its turn is quickly closing in.

Overall 6/10

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets Review

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We continue our Harry Potter marathon with the next game in the series. Chamber of Secrets really takes a lot of what made the first game good and then improves on them. So that’s exactly what you could have hoped for from a sequel. There aren’t any really weak parts to the game although at the same time I wouldn’t say it’s great or anything like that. It’s just a fun follow up to the original. The hub world isn’t quite as large as the first game but is still quite large.

The game starts with Harry having a good time in town as he gets some shopping done before heading back to Hogwarts. As much as things change they also stay the same. Draco Malfoy and the gang keep picking on the weaker mages. The stakes are a little higher this time around as a fabled Chamber of Secrets is somewhere in the school. Harry needs to track it down because in the meantime a monster is on the loose and it may end up murdering a bunch of the students if it isn’t taken care of and fast. Harry will need all of his skills if he is to take this guy down.

It’s a pretty solid story here. The Potter games have been consistent with giving a lot of cutscenes throughout. Just from the games I can quickly remember how much fun Snape is. He certainly gets a bad rap but at least the guy is always around unlike Dumbledore who vanishes when things get tough. The whole twist about Tom Riddle is pretty interesting and he makes for a pretty great character. The guy’s just a lot of fun. Meanwhile Harry and the crew are pretty solid although Ron never tends to grow on me as much as the other two. He needs a little more skill to back up his confidence.

Gameplay-wise this one is pretty basic. You have a few different spells at your disposal and use them in order to take the opponents down or to solve various puzzles. The spells are largely the same as in the first game. You are still only able to equip two at once so get ready to have to pause the game a lot. The save feature is also still manual so just try to remember to save every now and again or you may have to replay large chunks of the game. It’s pretty impressive just how similar to the first game this one is. Even the menus all look very similar. Same with the levels but that makes sense since it is still the same school.

The graphics aren’t bad and look pretty similar to the first game. I’d be hard pressed to tell you which one was better. Th soundtrack is also decent. None of the tunes will stand out in particular but I wouldn’t say they hold the game back either. They have just the right amount of pep to add to the fights. I feel like that describes the game pretty well as a whole. It’s a very standard game that feels like you’re picking up right where the first game left off. There are some improvements like labels on the map so you know where you’re going and the controls themselves are a lot smoother. Those are the two main improvements here and I would have to say that they are fairly key.

The gameplay one alone is really nice to have. In the first game it wasn’t uncommon for you to just fall off of a box or something because the character refused to move in the right direction. That should not happen here. The game isn’t all that long though. You should have it conquered within around 6-7 hours I’d say. Of course if you aim to grab all of the cards then that will probably take you a little longer. There are a bunch of them scattered all throughout the place. The toughest part is that you have no way of knowing which ones you have already collected which naturally makes things pretty tough. Still, it would definitely add a few hours to your overall play time.

Chamber of Secrets does end up hitting you with an extremely easy final boss though. The way to beat it is pretty simple, you just dodge the attacks by moving side to side for a bit, knock it with your main weapon and you’re good to go. Rinse and repeat around 6 times until you claim victory. The main thing that makes this fight pretty easy is just the fact that the way to dodge the boss’ attacks is simply to move from side to side. You don’t even need a true strategy to beat him, that’s really what is pretty crazy about all of this.

The game is fairly light with bosses though. Another fight has you go up against a giant spider but it’s not so much a direct boss as it’s more about you running around to burn all the webbing. That allows you to gain the upper hand and escape. It’s a pretty nice level set up I’d say. The game stays quick paced at all times except for when you have to find some potion ingredients for Professor Snape. That’s when things can get a little tedious as you figure out how to do this. In the third game you would eventually be given pillars of light so you can see the ingredients once you’re within range but there’s nothing like that for this game.

Overall, The Chamber of Secrets is a pretty fun follow up to the first game. It’s been pretty nice to see the old Harry Potter adventures in video game format. You can’t help but feel that the points system is pretty rigged though. No matter what you do you always end up in first place when it comes to total points. That doesn’t seem totally fair or balanced if you think about it. You feel bad for the other groups because it feels like Dumbledore is determined to pick Griffindor no matter what. I suppose our class is the best one though. If you want to play a fun little game on the GCube then this is a good one to check out.

Overall 7/10