And I thought Half-Blood Prince was bad...

User Rating: 3 | Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1 PC
By Voldy26 | Review Date:
There is so much wrong with this game that I don't even know where to begin. OK, let's start with the basics. The graphics are completely unimpressive, and everything has the same drab look as in the previous game. I swear, it's like the game artists have a grudge against beauty. For crying out loud, Oblivion came out in 2006, and it looks incomparably better. To make matters worse, a large chunk of the game takes place in some kind of abandoned power plant, which is as un-Harry Potter as it gets. It reminded me of Fallout 3, except Fallout 3 looks good. So if you were hoping for some magical atmosphere, forget it. The interface doesn't fare much better (worse, actually). This is basically a shooter, but there are no health and currently equipped spell indicators, which is HUGELY helpful. The only clue about your health is that the screen goes grey when you are badly hurt, which is INGENIOUS. It's not enough that I'm about to die, but now I'm half-blind as well. I know that this is a trick used in other games, but that doesn't make it any less retar… er, I mean, stupid, wouldn't want to OFFEND anyone. The spells are selected by scrolling the mouse wheel, and there are about a dozen of them. You can imagine how convenient that is in the heat of combat (hint: not at all). Oh, and don't let the words "heat of combat" encourage you. Combat in this game is nothing but a mindless click fest. Seriously, you'll be clicking away at your left mouse button like there is no tomorrow, and you'll often be doing it for several minutes at a time. Tactics? Forget about it. Just keep strafing and clicking. The only spell you are really going to need is Impedimenta/Stupefy (they are about the same in terms of effectiveness, as far as I could tell). There are stronger spells, but they require precise aim and a long charging time, which in most fights you won't be able to afford. Apart from combat, the game contains a half-assed stealth element, which is where you sneak around under your Invisibility Cloak. It actually came in handy during the final missions, where I just let Ron and Hermione do all the fighting (they can't die) and chilled under the cloak, but missions where you are actually supposed to be stealthy are just annoying. You switch to 1st person view when you put on the cloak, and obviously you can't look around using the mouse as quickly and efficiently as you do by turning your head, which means you sometimes won't see the enemy coming until it's too late.

Structurally, the game consists of two types of missions: story missions (that actually move the plot along) and challenges (that have nothing to do with the plot whatsoever). Checkpoints are few and far between, so if you spent the last 15 minutes rescuing muggleborns and got killed when there was only one left to go, then too bad for you, buddy, you're back to where you started. After all, it's not like your time is valuable or anything. Now, the division into main missions/side missions is nothing new, of course, but normally you do the side missions only if you want to. Not in this game. Here, you have to complete several challenges, like rescuing prisoners or escaping from a dragon's cave, before you can continue with the main missions. Needless to say, those pointless interruptions are very annoying. Of course, if they hadn't split the game in two parts, they wouldn't have to pad it out with mandatory side missions, but that just wouldn't be as profitable, would it? Well, my advice to you is, don't let them make any profit from this game. Rent it if you must, or procure it by other means, but don't buy it, thereby encouraging EA to make more crappy games.

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