Half-Blood Prince game offers more depth, publisher says
NEW YORK – Harry Potter’s sixth adventure comes to video-game systems in “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince,” developed by EA.
John Fenno, senior product manager with EA for the Harry Potter franchise, said “Half-Blood Prince” builds from where the developer left off with “Order of the Phoenix.”
“With the last game, we built up this incredibly detailed Hogwarts,” Fenno said at the “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” press junket in New York City. “We’ve taken it to the next level; we’ve given you full camera control.”
“Half-Blood Prince” plays out the story of the film, with an opportunity to collect mini-crests along the way. Dueling, Quidditch and potions are three club levels built into the gameplay.
“Along the way, there are experiences that you have, whether it’s flying in Quidditch, where Harry is playing as the seeker, or dueling, where you can enter the club and take on characters like Malfoy and Snape, for example,” Fenno said. “Those experiences become more and more challenging as the game goes on. So, as you pick up experience, you’re facing off against more challenging opponents, until you get to the ultimate fight at the end.”
Fenno said more locations were added to the game this time around.
“Within Hogwarts, it’s the entire campus of the school. If you can name a location, it’s pretty much there,” he said. “New locations for this game include the astronomy tower, the burrow … the boathouse, I don’t think we had in the last game.”
Fenno said the goal of the development team is to provide authentic, fun gameplay for families.
“Our goal is to be as authentic to the movie as possible, to deliver as much fun and action from the movie as we can and play out that story and provide a really detailed Hogwarts for people to explore,” he said.
Fenno said the EA group has a great relationship with Warner Bros. and those making the movies, as well as with author J.K. Rowling. He said some shots from the films were planned based on environments created by EA. And the Harry Potter gaming fun isn’t expected to end with “Half-Blood Prince.”
“We haven’t made any announcements yet as far as upcoming titles, but we do have the license to make games based off the movies, so as those movies surface, we’ll be right there with them,” Fenno said.
By Matthew Price
From Friday’s The Oklahoman
If you enjoyed this post, please consider to leave a comment or subscribe to the feed and get future articles delivered to your feed reader.
Comments
Harry Potter has always been my favorite character whether its a move or a game a have a collection of all the games and movies of harry potter 
Whether you like this game or not but its my favorite.
Another thoughtful post, I like it. I have scanned your earlier posts you made and I liked what I saw. Cheers.
Admirable, thanks for sharing this information. Looks great on my iPhone, but on the Blackberry Pearl’s browser your site comes out a little irregular.. I’m currently working on Fishbone Diagram project.
hi i am a fan of harry potter. iv got 1,2,3,4and5.
i saw half blood prinve last night