With the recent announcement that the hotly anticipated Hogwarts Legacy 2 is officially in the works, fans have been left to wonder what exactly the sequel could bring to the table. The first game has already been lauded as the definitive Hogwarts experience, offering everything from magic classes, to exploring Hogsmeade, to mastering the unforgivable curses, and more.
And while the original Hogwarts Legacy currently stands head and shoulders above other games when it comes to an immersive Wizarding World experience, there’s one feature that could go a long way towards making a sequel even more immersive and more congruent with the series’ most enduring overarching theme: friendship.
Hogwarts Legacy 2 Needs to Make Common Rooms a More Centralized Hub
Common Rooms Offered a First Look at How Other Houses Live
The original game received a ton of praise on launch for its ingenious incorporation of each Hogwarts house’s unique common room. Griffyndor’s is a pretty close facsimile to the common area seen in the Harry Potter films, while the Slytherin, Ravenclaw, and Hufflepuff common rooms offered fresh new looks at how the other ¾ of the Hogwarts student body lives. From Slytherin’s brooding dungeon under the lake, to Ravenclaw’s regal tower of academic study, to Hufflepuff’s cozy little corner of the castle next to the kitchens, each common room is beautifully representative of their respective houses. But that’s about the extent of their functionality on a gameplay level.
The common rooms are fantastic for lorehounds and serious Potterheads, but as locations in a game, they’re fairly mundane liminal spaces; the type of place players just sprint through on the way to another more consequential location. This is a shame because the common rooms are wonderfully characterized locations in Hogwarts Legacy and represent a major location in the life of any Hogwarts student. To that end, a sequel can, and should, make common rooms a more central hub.
Giving Important NPCs Places in Their Respective Common Rooms for Post-Quest Conversations
In Hogwarts Legacy, each house has three named NPC companions that the player character grows to interact with and eventually befriend. These are some of the best written characters in the game and provide some of the most heartfelt moments in the entire title. But they pretty much disappear after their respective quest lines end. Sure, they can be randomly found wandering the castle, but it’s hard to track an individual down and even if the player manages, the characters don’t have an awful lot interesting to say anymore. It’s like they have become a shell of their former, well-written selves.
The answer is simple: give these NPCs permanent homes in their respective common room where they can be regularly found and interacted with. Marvel: Midnight Suns does an excellent job with its companions by way of relationship building. That game features a huge, expansive cast of beloved Marvel characters to bring into fights, but die-hard fans will find some of the most valuable content in the game from those quiet conversations possible in between the bouts of more on the nose gameplay.
Case in point is the game's take on Eddie Brock/Venom. Midnight Suns might just have the best adaptation of Venom out there, and fans only get a chance to explore that relationship by taking the time in between missions to sit down and speak with Eddie. Players can bond with Eddie and Venom through these conversations, and it’s the type of thing Hogwarts Legacy’s sequel could really use to help the player’s fellow students feel more like real people they’re going to school with.
It’s no secret at this point that a more in-depth follower system was in the works for the original Hogwarts Legacy but was cut for time concerns. Hopefully, the developers can incorporate it into the sequel, using the common rooms as a kind of hub for all these NPCs to hang out and wait for the player to come pick them up for another adventure.
Hogwarts Legacy
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OpenCritic Reviews
- Top Critic Avg: 84 /100 Critics Rec: 88%
- Released
- February 10, 2023
- ESRB
- T For Teen Due To Blood, Fantasy Violence, Mild Language, Use of Alcohol
- Developer(s)
- Avalanche Software
- Publisher(s)
- Warner Bros. Games
- Engine
- Unreal Engine 4
- Cross-Platform Play
- Hogwarts Legacy doesn't have crossplay or crossplatform support
- Cross Save
- you can freely use your saved data between each console as long as you are connected to the internet and signed into the same account where the saved data was created
WHERE TO PLAY
Hogwarts Legacy is an immersive, open-world action RPG set in the world first introduced in the Harry Potter books. For the first time, experience Hogwarts in the 1800s. Your character is a student who holds the key to an ancient secret that threatens to tear the wizarding world apart. Now you can take control of the action and be at the center of your own adventure in the wizarding world. Your legacy is what you make of it.
Explore an Open World
The wizarding world awaits you. Freely roam Hogwarts, Hogsmeade, the Forbidden Forest, and the surrounding Overland area.
Be the Witch or Wizard You Want to be
Learn spells, brew potions, grow plants, and tend to magical beasts along your journey. Get sorted into your house, forge relationships, and master skills to become the witch or wizard you want to be Experience a New Wizarding World Adventure
Experience the wizarding world in an unexplored era to uncover a hidden truth from its past. Battle against trolls, Dark Wizards, goblins, and more as you face a dangerous villain threatening the fate of the wizarding world.
- Franchise
- Harry Potter
- Steam Deck Compatibility
- Verified
- Platform(s)
- PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch 2, Nintendo Switch, PC
- How Long To Beat
- 26 Hours
- X|S Optimized
- yes
- PS Plus Availability
- Extra & Premium
- OpenCritic Rating
- Mighty
