LEGO: Harry Potter Years 1-4, while buggy at times, was fun. The game follows the first four books and movies, beginning with Professors McGonagall and Dumbledore dropping an infant Harry off at his uncle's house and ending in a duel to with a risen Voldemort in the graveyard.
The Hub is the Leaky Cauldren and Diagon Ally, where you can access the three shops: Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions, where you purchase characters you've unlocked and customize characters; Wizeacre's Wizarding Equipment, where you enter passwords and useless but fun spells; Eeylops Owl Emporium, for purchasing red bricks you've unlocked and gold bricks; and finally, Gringott's Wizarding Bank, where you play the tutorial and bonus levels. You can even go to Knockturn Alley, and also Borgin and Burkes from Diagon Alley, once you gain Reducto in year 4.
Finally, the main part of the game is Hogwarts. This is where you collect red bricks, learn new spells, and run around following ghosts to your next story event.
I like the game, not just because I'm a Harry Potter fan, not just because I'm a Lego series fan, but because of its RPG and exploration elements. As you unlock more spells and purchase characters, you open more areas of Hogwarts. For example, to go to the past in an area of Hogwarts, you need Hermione's "Time Turner" ability she gets in year 3. To get into the Hufflepuff house common room you need a Hufflepuff character.
Still, a problem Lego fans might have is that it's an entirely linear game. While you can play pretty much any movie you want from start to finish after completing the first level in most Lego games, this one forces you to play year 1 before year 2.
A problem I had with the game was the bugs. Sometimes I'd go to target something and shoot my partner instead. Other times, the AI was unreliable. I'd be standing on something, waiting for my CPU partner to levitate it so I could get higher but he doesn't do it. To force it to happen, I'd use a second controller.
The camera angles weren't all that great either. I missed a couple gold bricks and a Student in Peril (was with the former) because they were high off the camera.
The controls could give even a Lego series veteran a headache. The way it's set up, you press and hold triangle to choose a spell. However, the four top buttons - L1, L2, R1 and R2 - will let you cycle through your spells during the story, in Hogwarts and at the Leaky Cauldren, Diagon Alley, Knockturn Alley, and Borgin & Burkes. However, once you go to Free Play mode, L1 and R1 switch to cycling through characters. If you're used to using L1 and R1 to cycly through spells, it can be confusing because you keep wanting to use them to cycle through your spells.
I did enjoy searching for the various collectibles though, even at the end when I was searching endlessly for an hour for that last gold brick and laughing when I saw that was floating in the last place I'd think to look.
All the music from the movies was in the game, and the sounds were what you'd expect from the Lego games.
Despite its bugs, it's still a great game. I give it a 9 out of 10.