Set in the late 1800s, Avalanche Software and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment's Hogwarts Legacy will let players explore the Wizarding World as they've never seen it before. Set in an open world, the action RPG will follow a student as they start at Hogwarts and come to grips with spells, enchantments, potions, and more. Hogwarts Legacy will feature fan-favorite locations like Hogsmeade Village and the Forbidden Forest, as well as the familiar and unfamiliar areas of the famous school for players to explore. A recent extended gameplay trailer shown at Sony's State of Play gave players a more in-depth look at some of these environments, as well as new aspects of Hogwarts Legacy.
One of the features discussed as part of Hogwarts Legacy's presentation was the inclusion of companions. While only a handful were introduced in the gameplay trailer, there will no doubt be many more characters for players to get to know during their Hogwarts Legacy playthrough. It seems as if companions will have more than a few functions, and players will be keen to find out all the impacts these NPCs will have on their game experience. When it comes to crafting the best kinds of companions, Hogwarts Legacy should look to games like BioWare's Mass Effect series, which handles the humorous and heartfelt to perfection.
Introducing Hogwarts Legacy's Companions
As players start their time at Hogwarts, they'll have a lot of catching up to do with their fellow students. They'll begin the game as a fresh-faced fifth year, making them something of a celebrity and a curiosity among the pupils. After surviving some kind of mysterious event (which the developer was keen not to provide too many details of), the protagonist finds their way to the School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in a way that is strangely reminiscent of Harry Potter himself. Their slightly unusual entrance should create some interesting interactions between the player character and their classmates, and making friends will be an intriguing exercise.
Players will get to know the other Hogwarts students in their respective house common rooms, throughout the twisting corridors, and in other communal areas like the Great Hall, school grounds, and a variety of classrooms. Whether players develop rivalries with other NPCs or recruit them as friends is up to them, but befriending other students has its advantages. Once relationships begin to form, classmates will teach the player spells to improve their arsenal of abilities and will also be available as companions to take on missions outside the castle walls.
Befriending other students will reveal their stories, as each NPC has their own tale to tell and background to unravel. Hogwarts Legacy may be a single-player-focused open-world game, but the ability to bring along companions throughout their journey opens up interesting story and combat possibilities. It's not only students that can help players complete their quests; other characters outside Hogwarts can also play a part in the player's adventure, as well as a friendly house-elf called Deek who helps the player come to grips with the Room of Requirement.
The Hogwarts Legacy Characters and Companions Revealed So Far
Once players are done creating their own Hogwarts Legacy protagonist, they'll be launched into a world full of magic and mayhem. Some of the available companions were introduced in the gameplay trailer, like the adventurous Gryffindor Natsai Onai, creature-crazy Hufflepuff Poppy Sweeting, and charismatic Slytherin Sebastian Sallow.
In addition to some of their student companions, players will be aided by the enigmatic Professor Eleazar Fig, who will help them get to the bottom of the rumors of a goblin rebellion. Acting as a mentor, Fig guides players through the mystery at the heart of the game, as well as helping them get a handle on the strange ancient magic that only the player can wield. There will be a whole new cast of characters for players to meet, including a roster of different Hogwarts teachers. Some familiar faces will inevitably crop up, like the ghosts that haunt to halls of Hogwarts, and there are even rumors that players may come across a Weasley or two.
What Hogwarts Legacy Could Learn From Mass Effect
BioWare may be known for its successful RPG series, but its games are also famous for their companions and their relationships with the protagonist. Arguably, one of the best BioWare games for this was Mass Effect 2, which saw Shepard rebuilding their team and recruiting both new faces and old to take on the Collectors. Each companion had their own initial recruitment mission and a loyalty mission, all of which made up the majority of the gameplay. These missions were not only fun, but they served as ways to get to know the characters better or build on the emotional bonds established in the first game with returning companions.
Hogwarts Legacy probably won't feature missions where players need to go and actively recruit companions from all over the in-game world (as most Hogwarts companions appear to just be found inside the school), but there could still be a similar element. Players could have to prove themselves to their future companions in quests and challenges that help to reveal more about the Hogwarts Legacy NPCs and also tighten the bonds between the characters.
The way that characters interact with each other in the Mass Effect series is a key part of what makes the companions so brilliant. Whether it's their entertaining mission banter or more emotional scenes where friendships are tested and explored, the writing and voice acting are integral to making the relationships feel authentic and heartfelt. How the Hogwarts Legacy protagonist talks to and gets to know their companions will either make or break the feature, and the developer would do well to try and emulate how Mass Effect pulls this off.
Hogwarts Legacy is coming Holiday 2022 to PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.