“Hogwarts Legacy” was released February 10^th, and since the game was announced back in September 2020, it was a highly anticipated release. Though many people have started to boycott or refuse to buy anything Harry Potter-related due to the creator’s problematic nature, fans were excited for the game because it was allegedly not affiliated with Rowling at all. Even so, after its release many people began to notice that the game itself may be problematic as well, causing a huge debate that is still on going.  

The Harry Potter franchise has taken the world by storm since the first book was published back in the late 90’s. Over 500 million copies of the books have been sold worldwide and each movie on its own has accumulated nearly a billion dollars. Though this franchise id loved dearly by people from around the world, the creator of this series has been under fire for the past couple of years for her problematic characters and for being a “TERF” (trans-exclusionary radical feminist). This has caused several people to boycott anything Harry Potter related, including the movies, books, and merchandise. 

Since this game was announced people have been skeptical about the morality of buying it, though this was not something that was really discussed until more recently. The game is not directly affiliated with Rowling, so lots of people felt that it would be okay to purchase the game and were very excited to play it. There were also people on the other side of this argument saying that even though it is not affiliated with Rowling that she will still receive money from it because it is taking place in her franchise. 

All of this was before the game came out, when it eventually was released, many people claimed that the besides being affiliated with the franchise the actual story and characters are problematic. Many people have pointed out that the goblin characters design and actions are based off of antisemitic stereotypes. The main conflict of the game is about the goblins wanting to revolt against the wizarding world, which is then crushed by the player. Many people feel that this was a strange choice, especially looking at the way the goblins are shown in the game. It is all just in very poor taste for many people, especially because this is almost exactly identical to how Rowling portrayed them in her series.  

Another issue people have with the contents of the game is the name of a canonically trans character. The name of this character is Sirona Ryan, she is the first trans character to be introduced in the franchise. This has sparked many debates among fans, some are saying that the name is mocking the fact that the character is trans, but others are defending it saying that it was just a popular name or the time the game is set in. though this would not be the first time an offensive name is given to a character, in the actual book series the only Asian character is named “Cho Chang” and one of the only black characters name is “Kingsley Shaklebolt”.  

The internet as a whole seems to be very split on weather or not it is okay to purchase this game. On one hand people are saying that to boycott the game is harming the developers who may have had no choice in making it or in the story, on the other hand people are saying that buying this game is harmful to minority groups it is stereotyping. People who are opposed to the game have even gone as far as making a website that targets Twitch streamers who are streaming themselves playing the game. The website was called “have they streamed that wizard game?”, how it works is you would type in the name of a streamer and it would tell you if they have streamed the game or not. This would then lead to loads of people flooding their chat with hate, mass reporting, and unsubscribing from their channels. 

The Harry Potter series is beloved by many people who are a part of older generations and it is impossible to talk about the series without talking about how much it has shaped a whole subculture of people. It is difficult for people who have been long time fans of the series to understand and realize how problematic it is because they have identified with it so much, and many fans are a part of minoritized groups themselves. Talking about the problems within the Harry Potter franchise is always going to be a polarizing issue because of this, whether its about Hogwarts Legacy or the original series people are going to be very split.  

Article by Sophie Meek