I solemnly swear I am up to no good.
Anyone who comes on this site often knows my opinion on movie tie-ins. As in, death to all of them, never buy any, waste of money, etc.
For the purposes of this review, forget everything I’ve said about movie tie-ins before. I mean it.
Because this game….. wins.
I have, of course, read all the Harry Potter books, though I can’t claim to be an ultra fan. I sort of enjoyed them, though I wasn’t camping outisde bookshops waiting for the last one. But yeah, not bad, not bad. This game, however, is definitely on my top 10 for the Wii. Maybe in my top 3. I’ll consider it.
Let’s take it apart, piece by piece.
Gameplay – The main bulk of the game consists of several different minigames – flying, duelling, and potion making. At first glance, they are fun, but nothing special – though it is nice to note that each of them uses the Wii motion detecting systems to their full potential – casting spells requires you to pull back your wand- ahem, Wiimote, and let loose some Stupefy spells, flying requires you to direct Potter’s broomstick through the air by pointing, and potion making – well, potion making is really something else. I’ll go into depth on that in a minute.
But the thing about the minigames is that as you go through the game, new tricks and techniques are constantly added. Duelling begins with three options – dodge, Stupefy (basic damage spell) and Expelliamus (which knocks them over backwards and deals more damage). But as you go along, you learn to charge your spells to do more damage, and create a sort of shield which can bounce attacks back at the enemy. It’s great fun.
Now, potion making. To begin with, you need to follow glowing instructions that tell you to select a bottle of, let’s say, mucus (bleugh) and pour it into the cauldron. You select it, lift it by raising the Wiimote, and tip the Wiimote (and your mucus) into the mix. It’s amazingly fun and suits the motion sensors to a tee. My only complaint on this regard is the occasional problem where the cursor flicks randomly around the screen, seemingly ignoring where you point the Wiimote. I suspect this might be solved with WiiMotion, but I don’t have it, so I’ll have to live with my crappy system. But as the game goes on, you have to do more things – shaking the bottles, dropping in solid ingredients, heating the mixture, stirring it…. it begins to get complicated, and becomes a real challenge, thus making it fun.
Graphics – The visuals in this game are stunning, especially for the Wii. I mean, it’s not Far Cry standard, but the characters are believably human (helped tremendously by the voice acting, which for the most part is very good) and when flying around on a broomstick, it’s a wonder to see Hogwarts unfold before you with all its spires and towers.
Plot - Well, it’s Harry Potter. it would be lying to say it isn’t a good plot, but it was originally just a plot, so that’s kind of cheating.
But seriously, this is a great game. It’s very easy to get lost in the huge terrain, and thankfully they’ve put in Nearly Headless Nick as a guidance system with amusing contextual lines as a bonus.
Mischief managed.
Nometet.com says: 
+Great use of the Wii’s motion sensing
+Variety
+Plot just like the book
+Huge world to run around in
+Great graphics
-Sometimes jumps around in the plot without explaining it
-With the potion making, it can somtimes be hard to tell what they want you to use next
