Brace yourself: EA is making Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

by Justin McElroy on Apr 23rd 2008 10:30AM

Are you sitting down? Really? We don't mean that in the figurative internet sense, we mean it in the "please put your butt on a flat surface and brace yourself" sense. Ready? ... EA is making Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Don't worry, we'll give you a second to return your eyeballs to your head after they comically extend three inches from their sockets. Guess which systems it's coming out for. Did you guess everything from 360s and PS3s to microwave oven readouts and pocket watches? Then you're totally right. Did you suspect that the game would be released around the same time as the movie of the same name this November? Alright Professor Trelawney, where are you hiding that crystal ball?

Our one hope, and we know that this won't happen, is for the games to evolve in their maturity level and tone just like the books grew progressively darker. But we'll probably just end up waving our Wiimotes around using magic to make Hagrid a sandwich or something.

Tags: DS, ea, Electronic-Arts, harry-potter, harry-potter-and-the..., harrypotter, movies, PC, PS2, PS3, PSP, Wii, Xbox-360

Reader Comments (57)

GASP! NO..........WAY!

Ya Rly!

Yet some EA games based on Movies are great. The Two Towers, Return of the King and Battle for Middle Earth (1 and 2)for instance. Yeah, Im a Tolkien fan.

Because they had good source material for video games.

Where as harry potter, although a good book, makes not for a good game.

Wow, putting faith in EA for a good movie-liscence game? Personally I'd sooner fuck a cactus.

well break out the tweezer my friend....

So much for my bet, I wagered my house on Atlus making it as a PS2 exclusive.

I heard it was a going to be a modified .hack.

I just love the Harry Potter-looking font used in the image!

I bet that is the font Justin uses for all his e-mails and personal documents

I always pegged Justin to be a Comic Sans fan myself but I could be wrong.

God, Comic Sans is the worst font ever! Ha ha...

How dare you sir. I used Comic Sans exclusively for a good 5 years! Of course I was 14...

times new roman is not amused.

Will it draw material from the (probably) shitty movie script, or the relatively better book?
It's surprising how much HP fans are tolerant of bad flicks that make you read a book to actually understand what the hell is going on on-screen. Then again, since they're fans, they already know the story.

Alert, alert, jaded Potter nerd. I really dig the movies, and haven't read a single book.

I for one like the books, but thing (in my personal opinion) that the films decide to fling excrement at the books then proceed to take the books' mother out for a seafood dinner then never call them again.

I refuse to watch the new films after the previous massacre, although seeing as they are going to split one book into two films that may mean they won't skip out every 3rd importand plot detail.

I concur however that if you only watch the films without having read the book, then the films are good.

@ 4th Guy

I know right? Don't count me among them though. The Harry Potter Books are among the best if not best novel series in history and its an absolute shame how shitty the movies are.

I'm quite shocked that JK Rowling has just stood by and let them butcher her work like that...

This is how it is with every book to movie adaption. Your best bet is to read the book afterwards. The Harry Potter movies get a pass from me because, they are at least good movies.
Try watching Eragon. They really butchered that movie from how it was in the book.

I thought the LotR trilogy did the books a fair amount of justice.

Man, some of you guys are retarded...

"ThePremierAssassin
Apr 23rd 2008
11:23AM
I know right? Don't count me among them though. The Harry Potter Books are among the best if not best novel series in history..."

Can you please sell me the crack you smoked, cuz it seems REEEEAAALLLLY Good.

Tards.

Wow Dick, your username appears to be a true representation of your personality!

Think about whay you're doing. You're bashing other people's OPINIONS.

Whose the tard?

It is YOU Sir.

It is you.

Wow...not a GTAIV story!

I kid, I kid.

Odd site note, just reading on article on msn/hotmail page about the Potter actor. Thought I might get a nugget on when the new movie was coming out, but nope, nothing. Instead I am unfortunately led to see this in the last paragraph:

"In other Radcliffe news, the actor will soon make his body-baring Broadway debut in "Equus," and producers are apparently determined to make sure no one pounces on the opportunity to photograph his magic wand."

Man, Equus.

*shudder*

You haven't seen Radcliff's penis yet?

He's been waving it around the West End of London for the last six months, now. I heard it's rather impressive...

"In other Radcliffe news, he just got his AARP card and a craftmatic adjustable bed"

Dude is looking way old for his role

Not really. The books cover 7 years of time. He's not that old for the role.

AWESOME! I can't wait!

For GTA 4.

As someone who has mild interest in the Potter series (I read the books and saw some of the movies), I almost bought the Wii version of Order of the Phoenix. IGN was quite complimentary and made the game sound pretty good. As the games in the series have been getting steadily better (according to reviews), perhaps we have on our hands the potential for a truly respectable movie game?

It wasn't that bad really, for a movie based game. I wouldn't put it on a top 20 list or anything, but its mildly entertaining to play. The school is well modeled.

Justin, this post made me crack up so much. So great indeed!

And yes, what a surprise.

*Spoilers.

Snape killed... the radio star!
Snape killed... your mom!
Snape killed... Padmé!
Snape killed... My father...PREPARE TO DIE!

Snape kills Dumbledore!!

You asshole...

No U

Just kidding...you know that right?

Well sorta...I hate spoiling really good literature for people. But thats just me.

Although by this time if you haven't read HP you're either:
1) INSANE
2) Way to scared by your religion...

ESC you bum. Thanks a pantload.

Although by this time if you haven't read HP you're either:
1) INSANE
2) Way to scared by your religion...
---------------------------------------------.

Obvious Troll is obvious…lol.

If you ask me Harry Potter is nothing new, Half the story has been taken from other famous books and the School for Wizards and Witches thingy has been OVER NINE THOUSAND Times in British Literature.

Yet the obscene amounts of publicity the book has are just astonishing, too bad is just mediocre literature for kids and people who think they are smart for touching a book. I have met Harry Potter fans and all of them are more pretentious than the people that order the wine of the house out loud in the Olive Garden.

I simply don’t like it also that for Fantasy Stories I believe books such Fifth Dawn or Forgotten Kingdoms are a lot better.

When this book came out my friends and I went to the store the night it came out and skimmed through to find out who died. Then we walked around the store at the launch and kept talking about how dumbledore died and everyone was getting really pissed at us. Then the next day while we were driving places we would roll down the window and yell out to people that dumbledore dies in Harry Potter 6. It was truly awesome.

Ahhh gimme a break ESC, really

"Although by this time if you haven't read HP you're either:
1) INSANE
2) Way to scared by your religion..."

Or you're not a Potter nerd, but can enjoy the movies.

"Although by this time if you haven't read HP you're either:
1) INSANE
2) Way to scared by your religion..."

You know I didn't wrote that right Markez?

It was the Pot/ter fan.

I feel like this game is going to be another big disappointment. While the previous iterations are kinda cool, they in no way stand up next to real games, GTA IV, Bioshock, Portal, COD IV, Skate, Etc Etc...By real games I mean games made by developers that are passionate about what they do, and because of this they come up with amazing new game play and have a degree of polish and art in their games that gives them the 90+ reviews that they have received.

Point is, with EA doing Harry Potter, this will never happen. I kinda wish it would though. Give the Harry Potter property to a developer that could make it great. Imagine if it was worked on for a few years. It could be a pretty good RPG, or maybe an MMO. Instead, we get glitchy graphics, lame physics, and simple child like game play.

One day they will realize this maybe. Until then, I'll just play some other games.

The books are pretty good... never played a game, but the story is good enough to make a good game.

But we are talking about EA, so, no.

Raistlin Majere pwns all.

Aww fek, that was supposed to be a reply to your 'Dumbledore vs Gandalf' question.

Ah well.

Raistlin Majere still pwns all :)

By the way: Gandalf or Dumbledore?

That battle againts Voldemor was pretty intense... Dumbledore uses magic better than Gandalf (in the books), but Gandalf knows how to ride and use swords.

Gandalf would just say "YOU SHALL NOT PASS" and then Dumbledore would die.

I'm gonna go with Dumbledore... he sure can do a lot magic.

With the Elder Wand, the Resurrection Stone and the Invisibility Cloak, Gandalf has not a chance.

And while saying the incantation, Dumbledore gets run through with Gandalf's sword. The thing is, Gandalf keeps alot of his magic hidden, so it's hard to tell. I just find that character-wise, I prefer Gandalf. but in a fight, fanboyism aside, it's hard to tell.

They should make a HP vs. LOTR game. It would be awesome. The playable characters would be Gandalf, Dumbledore, Aragorn, Legolas, Harry, Ron, Hermione, Snape, Gimli, and all the other professors from hoggys and all the other characters in LOTR.

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Brace yourself: EA is making Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Reader Comments (57)

Posted: Apr 23rd 2008 10:36AM RKN said

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