Netease’s latest game Harry Potter: Magic Awakened is set to release soon globally at the beginning of 2023. After conducting multiple closed beta tests for the North American region, players were quite surprised by the quality of the game. Featuring iconic characters from the Harry Potter universe such as Harry Potter, Ron Weasly, Hermione Granger, Voldemort, and more, the game is set to touch the hearts of the fans of the IP (Intellectual Property) who have been demanding a new Harry Potter game for ages. Working in a joint collaboration with Warner Bros. Games, Harry Potter: Magic Awakened is an officially licensed game and aims to be a “strategic and magical card RPG” according to the developers. Harry Potter: Magic Awakened will be available as a free-to-play game on both the Google Play Store and iOS App Store with in-game microtransactions enabled.

Harry Potter: Magic Awakened storyline will be set in Hogwarts, a magical academy for students and professors alike that is tasked with maintaining the order of magic. Just upon downloading the game, players will be tasked with choosing their gender, after which they will be given the title of either Wizard or Witch, depending on your chosen gender Male or Female, respectively. The game does a fair job of giving an in-depth tutorial that will explain all about the battle mechanics as well as provide you with your first set of cards that helps you to participate in battles. At the beginning of the game, you might find it hard to customize your characters as you will most likely have not unlocked the Diagon Alley which hosts a large number of costumes. Of course, each of them comes with a price tag to go along. Players can customize a host of features for their in-game sprite such as nose, hair, skin tone, freckles, glasses, hair color, eyebrow color, and more. Lastly, it will ask you to input a name for your character which will remain permanent, so choose carefully.

Gameplay Style of Harry Potter: Magic Awakened

The gameplay mechanics of Harry Potter: Magic Awakened are quite akin to existing real-time card battlers where players are supposed to build a deck of cards that they will bring in battle. On the first turn, players will only 5 cards picked randomly by the AI (Artificial Intelligence). Each turn, players can use their cards in hand to use their latent magic abilities. In short, the game revolves in a turn-based real-time manner where players are required to use their cards strategically in order to win the match. Each card can be considered as a unique ability that can damage opponents, replenish energy, or heal you. Cards can also be upgraded in order to get a better stat value while also increasing their abilities. The better the value of the card, the better the overall stats and utility of the card. By value, we mean the rarity of the card. Each card can be classified into 4 different rarities as far as we know – Common Card, Rare Card, Epic Card, and Legendary Cards. A different set of Light Cards and Dark Cards also exist which are much rarer to obtain. Each of them is better than the other in ascending order. Starting with Common Cards as the weakest quality of cards and ending with Legendary cards as the strongest quality of cards. Players can acquire more cards as they progress through the game in the form of rewards. Or else, players can also choose to open different card packs that offer these cards at different probabilities, much like a gacha system. 

The higher the rarity/quality of the card, the lesser probability of you acquiring it. Do not worry as the card packs also come with an in-built pity system where for each card pack you do not obtain a legendary card, the probability of the next card being a legendary one increases. This increase is converted into a guaranteed legendary card upon opening 30 card packs. This is a great deal for F2P players as the base drop rate without any bonus is only 0.042%. Players can obtain more card packs through different activities such as the House Pack and Yearbook. Players can also directly purchase them using their premium currency. Cards are further divided into 2 different types – Summoning Cards and Spell Cards. Summoning cards allow you to summon different types of monsters or pets to battle them out for you in their physical form. On the other hand, spell cards do not have a physical form that remains in the battle or has health. However, they do provide some extra utility such as shields, damage to enemies, crowd-control, and healing. Using the right combination of Summon Cards and Spell Cards in your deck is going to be the key to victory.

A Variety of PvP and PvE Game Modes

Harry Potter: Magic Awakened is going to be a multiplayer game that has both PvE (Player V/S Environment) and PvP (Player V/S Player) game modes. For the former, players can challenge multiple elemental dungeons in the Harry Potter universe such as the Quidditch cup, and complete the story stages in the Yearbook. Yearbook is a compilation or roadmap for new players to track their progress in the main storyline of the game. Players can repeat completed stages for extra resources. 

The more stages they complete in the Yearbook, the more progress they will show for the main storyline. Completing the yearbook should be your primary goal as the rewards are quite amazing – epic and legendary cards, gems, gold, and more. For PvP lovers, the game offers a ton of exciting game modes such as multiplayer 1v1 battles, 2v2 battles, and more. The developers are keen to introduce new mechanics and game modes to diversify the strategic aspect even further. 

Choosing your House

If you’re a Harry Potter fan, you must be aware of the distinct rivalry between the 4 different houses – Gryffindor, Slytherin, Ravenclaw, and Hufflepuff. Players are required to choose a house in Harry Potter: Magic Awakened as well where they will determine the progression of the story. Nothing really matters in terms of gameplay progression or the strength of your account if you choose a different house. It’s just a gimmick added to the game to give a true wizardly feel of you belonging in the Harry Potter universe.

A Usual Day in Harry Potter: Magic Awakened

Harry Potter: Magic Awakened is a fun-filled game with the battles only being part of the bigger picture. Players can do a lot of other activities such as learning more about magic, the very essence of the game in the library. Of course, they are rewarded for their efforts quite generously as well. A host of mini-games, ranging from Creature Care, History of Magic, and the Ball are also available to be played with friends or individually. A list of daily tasks is also pinned at the main menu of the game that details all the activities a player must do on a daily basis. Gold is given as part of the compensation for completing all the tasks. 

Each of these mini-games is open on a particular day and gives you different types of resources:

• Monday: Charms and Divination
• Tuesday: History of Magic and Defence Against the Dark Arts
• Wednesday: Charms and Creature Care
• Thursday: History of Magic and Creature Care
• Friday: Defence Against the Dark Arts and Divination
• Saturday: History of Magic and Defence Against the Dark Arts
• Sunday: Charms and Creature Care

Harry Potter: Magic Awakened is built on the newly released Unreal Engine 5 and makes use of next-generation graphics to provide the best possible experience to the players. Being a grindy card battler, players are required to have a flawless device to be able to enjoy the game at its maximum settings without experiencing any delays or lags. In fact, delays and lags can make you lose your games as Harry Potter: Magic Awakened features real-time multiplayer matches. It is recommended to play Harry Potter: Magic Awakened on a PC with BlueStacks using a keyboard and mouse.