Game: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
Console: Game Boy Colour
Developer: Griptonite Games
Release Date: November 2001
While there were Xbox, PS2, Gamecube and PS1 games based on the first book/movie in the Harry Potter series, it's interesting to look at a handheld version. Although there was a release on the Game Boy Advance, I'll be looking at the Game Boy Colour version as that's the one I owned as a child. If my recollections are correct, not only was this the first game I ever bought with my own money but I also have a savefile with 67 hours of gameplay on it and Harry at level 99. That's not to say that this is an amazing game by any standards, it's more of an indication that I didn't have very many games to choose from as a child.
The story of the game is based on the events of the first book/film in the Harry Potter chronology with some slight changes so that certain game mechanics work better. The gameplay itself is in the style of an RPG with battles occuring regularly and 24 quests which guide Harry through the story to its conclusion. Although the set story makes for quite a linear experience, there's still room for some exploration of the fantasy world with collectables and secrets scattered around the map.
Quests are usually fairly simple and obvious when given to the player; not only will important characters tell them what needs to be achieved, the current objective appears on the start menu and NPC's will give hints as to what must be done. A lot of the gameplay involves travelling around Hogwarts and completing objectives by defeating bosses or retrieving items. In the 7 lesson based quests, the gameplay resembles that of a minigame with tests of memory, fetch quests and a broom flight minigame which appears a few times throughout the game.
Battles are conducted in typical RPG style save for the fact that the players appear on the right with the enemy on the left side of the screen. Harry is able to use spells as well as items and card combinations to defeat enemies, and levels up as he progresses through the game. Upon completion of the game, Harry retains his level and the enemies are pegged to his ability when a new game is started.
For an RPG the game is rather short and whole months pass between in-game events where a calendar is shown to signify the passing of time. While nothing happens plotwise in these periods it does rather feel as if the game is rushing you onwards toward completion. The money is somewhat incidental after a certain point in the game and there's not a whole lot of things to buy. There's a loose strength/weakness system with spells and enemies but it's never completely explained so it's up to players to guess as to what spells will work well.
Harry travels somewhat slowly on foot and this can be irritating when moving up and down the seven floors of Hogwarts (although there are secret passages which can be used as shortcuts). Enemy battles appear as blue creatures which move about on screen; when Harry touches these then a battle is initiated. Sometimes these appear fairly unexpectedly in your path and slow your progress down.
Graphically the game somewhat resembles NES era RPG games with basic sprites and animations. Buildings and interiors look good and even accurate to the books at times. There's never any difficulty in telling character sprites from one another; in fact the only time I had a hard time seeing things was in the night time quests as the Game Boy Colour screen isn't particularly bright. Musically there's a variety of themes and sound effects used in the game, which are generally of good quality.
Overall this is a somewhat simple RPG style Game Boy Colour game which works well to incorporate the story of the first Harry Potter book. Battles are easy to understand and there's not many times where grinding is necessary. It's a shame that party members aren't allowed to battle alongside you at any point in the game however. I'd recommend this to hardcore fans of the Harry Potter series as an interesting relic, but it falls a little short as a game in a general sense.
Rating: 73/100
Grade: C
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