Gameboy Advance - Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

Format
Gameboy Advance
Publisher
Electronic Arts
Developer
KnowWonder Digital Mediaworks
Country of origin
US
Genre
3rd person adventure

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (Philosopher’s Stone)

By David Rasmussen
30th Dec 05

It comes but once a year… more or less. And for some once a year is more than enough.
No I don’t mean Christmas, New Year’s, or even St. Patrick’s Day. I mean a new Harry Potter game release, mainly Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire which is the game of 2005, the halfway point of the Harry Potter trilogy. And to celebrate, more or less, we’re talking Potter this time out with a fistful of reviews. Two for the GBA, and one for the consoles (in this case the PS2).
For the GBA it’s Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (Year 1) and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Year 4), while for the PS2 we have the last Harry Potter game prior to this new one (Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban). This is Sorcerer’s Stone (aka Philosopher’s Stone), 1st game of the series

It’s Year 1, the beginning. It all begins with The Boy Who Lived, Harry Potter, as he grows of age and enrolls into the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Of course it can’t just be a nice quiet first year since that would be rather boring. So besides your first year classes you’ll also have to struggle with a bully (Malfoy and his goons) and a mystery concerning a mysterious rock called the Sorcerer’s Stone (aka the Philosopher’s Stone in the UK version).
The rest you know. Either you read the book, or seen the movie, or played the original PSOne version of the game, one of these. So instead of talking up the game let’s talk about what makes the GBA version of the game different from the PSOne version.

- The first thing you’ll note is that the game has no freeroaming aspect, which is how the new Goblet of Fire game for the major consoles is supposed to play (from what I heard). The world of the game is Hogwarts, which consists of a small school grounds with a few spots to visit, and a tall “tower” of a castle with seven floors and a dungeon level. With all that you’d think there’d be freeroaming, right? Well all roaming is controlled by locked doors, insuring that you only access certain areas when the game says you can access them. Considering this is a hand held that isn’t much of a hardship, especially since most of the game looks alike in anycase.

- The whole thrust of the game can be summed up in two words. Stealth & Mazes.
Part of the game is stealth, where you wandering through dark corridors trying to avoid being spotted by students and teachers to do a variety of things. Meet Malfoy for a duel, steal something from Snape’s storeroom, etc. By the way this part of the game really requires use of a GameBoy Advance SP since you’ll need the game’s lit screen to see what the heck you’re doing on these levels… either that or you’ll need to sit in a well lit (and I do mean well lit) room. One or the other.

The other part is mazes, as you’ll have to go through maze after maze working platformer style action sequence in order to “earn” new spells. First you do the standard rhythm and roll of motion games (follow the control motions of the person teaching the spell three times in order to master the spell), then you have to collect stuff in order to prove you have mastered the spell.

This pattern doesn’t happen all the time. Sometimes you don’t have to gather stuff to master the spell (for instance after Hermione teaches you a door unlocking spell you “master” it by sneaking downstairs through dark corridors to meet Malfoy), and sometimes you don’t have to do a memory game (sometimes you have to go through mazes for other things, like potion ingredients).

- Flying, believe it or not, is easier on “Advanced” mode. Trust me, it’s easier. Otherwise it’s the Spyhunter of flying (overhead view). If you didn’t think the “art” of playing Quidditch could be any harder? This game makes it harder.

- You have things to gather, but not the same way you do in the PSOne version.
You collect Bertie Botts’ Every Flavor Beans, but not as “currency” to buy things! Instead they’re just to restore your health (and that’s it). You have items to collect during the game, a few things but you have things to collect. Collecting chocolate frogs this time won’t replenish health, instead it’s used to reward Witches and Wizard cards which goes into your card folio (search everything for chocolate frogs which yield cards).

Just because this is a shrinky dink does that mean the game is worse than the PSOne version?
Hmm… I’m going to go out on a limb and say that it depends on you. Mind you the fact this game depends abit too much of mazes and stealth “missions” you might not like this as much as the PSOne version (which doesn’t dip so much into that). But it’s a shrinky little version of the game so they tried the best they could.
The breakdown will sum it up.

Harry Potter and the Breakdown of GBA Year 1
What’s Hot?
Well it is a shrinky Harry Potter game, and you really will have to be a Harry Potter fan to be hot on this version. I guess the game won’t appeal for a wider range of players until the recent Prisoner of Azkaban GBA game but I still have to review that before I say more. It’s not a completely horrible game, and if you are a Potter fan you might be hot for it… and right now you should be able to find it for under $20 since it’s been out since 2001, so for a low cost Potter game it might be worth your while to check out.

What’s Not?
If you are not a major fan of the stealth or maze thing then you might not like this, that and the game is abit repetitive in gameplay. Learn a spell, walk a maze. Sneak about, walk a maze. Do a rhythm game, walk a maze… basically the same things over and over again for the most part.
If you are a Harry Potter fan you might be hot for this little handheld version, if not you might not be so enamored with this no matter how little it cost to buy.

Moments to Remember?
Hummm… ahhh… nothing much, sorry. Basically it’s a portable and it could have been better, but it’ll fill the small need for Harry Potter, like if you were (for instance) waiting in line for Goblet of Fire tickets or sitting in the theater waiting for the movie to begin. This game would do you well to fill that small gap while you wait to see the latest Potter, for instance. Nothing memorable, but it’ll round out your collection and you could do worse than Sorcerer’s Stone (Quidditch World Cup for the GBA for instance).

What to Ignore?
If you thought the recent games strayed far from the original material then you haven’t seen anything yet! This game has several moments completely rewritten from the original to justify the game’s “levels”. For instance Hermione is crying in the girl’s bathroom NOT because Ron mouthed off at her, but maybe because Harry “broke” his promise about the spell she taught him… maybe.
That and the game seems to think you need to hear Harry comment on every single Bertie Botts’ Every Flavour Bean he swallows (even if you hear the same comments over and over again).

Overall?
Straight 50/50 here. Harry Potter fans will be checking this out, while anti-Potter resistors will probably pan this faster than you can say “Chocolate Frog Burping Noise Making Undead Female Nurse Zombies from Silent Hill 4 : The Room”… though why you’d want to say such a thing… never mind.
It’s not a horrible game, but it’s not the best Potter. Somehow I think the 3rd game might fare better in rating… though it would be nice if the 2nd game is the best since I said in the past how good the 2nd game is.
Guess we’ll find out soon, if I can find a copy somewhere… anywhere. Oh, well.

-- David Rasmussen 30th Dec 05

Gameboy Advance Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone Images