Avalanche Software has released a lot of information on their highly anticipated game, Hogwarts Legacy, with critics and gamers alike quickly digesting all the released details. The game appears to have a lot of moving parts from learning spells, brewing potions, exploring the castle, and broomstick riding. As for the story, it has been revealed that the protagonist will be putting a stop to a Goblin Rebellion.

This villain reveal has a lot of gamers uneasy, as Harry Potter's goblins have been a controversial subject for a while now as anti-Semitic symbols. While the books had them described with hooked noses and being secretive bankers, the films pushed the controversy further by making the goblins nearly identical to Jewish characters in Nazi propaganda. This controversy is not old, though it got most people's attention when Jon Stewart mentioned it. For Hogwarts Legacy to choose these characters to take the role of villain is a strange and tone-deaf move for a game already trying to overcome much of J.K. Rowling's controversy.

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The Goblins Of The Wizarding World, Explained

Newspaper with Goblin Rebellion headline.

J.K. Rowling did not invent goblins, but she made them something entirely different from how goblins work in folklore. In folklore, goblins are chaotic and range from tricksters to evil. They did not really become their own fantasy race until J.R.R. Tolkien wrote his books. Rowling made the goblins her own by making them highly intelligent as well as creators and overseers of wizard economy with no alignment to chaos.

They are a little alike to house-elves in that they are subservient to wizards and are forbidden from having wands of their own. In the 1400s, there were even wizards that got kicks out of killing goblins, such as the famous Yardley Platt, goblin serial killer. Hogwarts Legacy takes place during goblin rebellions, particularly one led by a goblin named Ranrok, and his people ally with dark wizards.

What Gamers Are Saying About The Goblin Villains

Goblins in hallway.

While the choice of goblin villains is already in poor taste due to their antisemitic controversy, fans also find goblin antagonists to be bad for other reasons. Particularly, they see the goblins as the faction in the right and the wizards in the wrong in this case. After all, if they are like house elves, they have every right to rebel. Just because they aren't human does not mean they should be treated as subservient. On Reddit, one fan wrote, "Hogwarts Legacy will have you fighting goblins who want civil rights," and got over seven hundred up-votes. Hundreds of fans are also upvoting the mentions that the writers seemed to throw in dark wizards just because they realized their goblins were too sympathetic. In all likelihood, Ranrok will be written as an extremist whose desire for equal rights will be buried under wrongdoings.

There are some fans who have that hopes that the RPG will give players the choice to side with the goblins, especially considering how much Hogwarts Legacy's selling point is in-game choices. Others are more cynical, especially considering this game takes place in the past and the present of the Wizarding world has goblins as still subservient to humans and still not being allowed the same education or right to have a wand. In that sense, a lot of fans are saying that this choice by the game developers is on-brand for J.K. Rowling's universe, which tends to side with the status quo.

Another hope players have mentioned is the possibility of the goblins and dark wizards having a falling out, which then sees the goblins side with the player. It is possible that the rebellion as the main focus of the story is a red herring. However, even if this did happen in the game, there is still the question as to whether the goblins will get the freedoms and rights they ask for. They likely won't, because fans already know what their position in the future is thanks to the Harry Potter books. So Hogwarts Legacy, no matter what, is drawing an awkward amount of attention to one of the book's controversial segments - that a lot of races in the Wizarding world are actually quite oppressed and have no sign of getting rights in the future.

Hogwarts Legacy is coming Holiday 2022 to Nintendo Switch, PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.

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