Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Xbox)

Taking its visual and audio cues from the movies but sticking closer to the book than a two-hour film ever could, the PS2 game begins as Harry starts his second year at Hogwarts despite an ominous warning from Dobby the House Elf. At its heart Chamber of Secrets is a 3-D platform game, similar to Super Mario or Jak & Daxter, with the same basic controls being used for the majority of the game. However, the nature of the story means the game is peppered with various mini-games and side quests, including Quidditch and Wizard duels.

In between the major quests you get a chance to explore Hogwarts, which is impressively massive and filled with hidden secrets--the collecting of Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans being of particular importance since they can then be traded with Ron's brother for everything from Famous Witches and Wizards Cards to upgrades for your Quidditch kit.

If the game has only one fault it's the extremely long and unusually frequent loading screens that keep popping up, and which you soon get very tired of seeing. It's not nearly enough to ruin the game though, which must go down as one of the best book/movie conversions of all time. --David Jenkins

I found that the environmental graphics were reasonably good, but that the appearances of the people were not particularly good. The xbox is capable of very good graphics, but EA didn't quite fulfil an xbox gamers expectations.

There are some very dull levels of this game. There is no jump button, so some challenges that should take a minute or so end up being a huge hassle, because Harry often doesn't grab onto the ledge properly. Duelling can be quite hard as there is a delayed reaction when Harry does his shield charm. This can be extremely annoying. I think that collecting Bertie Botts beans is a pain, as whenever Harry gets harmed he drops several. You end up having to fly around the grounds and going through hoops for about half an hour to collect them, which is extremely boring because Harry is so slow. However, if you don't bother collecting Bertie Botts beans and wizard cards, it is a far better game (but shorter).

Quidditch is reasonable, though slightly annoying at times. If you bump into an object, you get automatically sent very far behind the Snitch, and you have to build up speed again.

The music does get rather repetetive after a while, but there are some nice pieces. It doesn't create atmosphere very well. The voiceovers are of varying quality. Harry and Hermione sound completely wrong, but the teachers sound like the actors in the films.

Overall scores:
Gameplay: 7 / 10
Graphics: 6.5 / 10
Sound: 6 / 10

I would personally give this game 3.5 stars, but that isn't possible, and 3 doesn't do it justice. It is worth buying, and can now be found at extremely cheap prices from amazon marketplace and second hand game shops.


Seems to have been designed to utterly frustrate   October 9, 2003
 5 out of 13 found this review helpful

Other reviews on this page are spot on and I can only concur: the game is visually impressive and will appeal to Harry Potter fans (of which do not count myself) BUT the game falls down utterly on several crucial counts.

The underlying storyline of the game simply does not hang together: at no point did I really get the feel that what I was doing: defeating a character, searching for a spellbook, was working towards some ultimate end. The game was just a series of very disjointed tasks, which is surprising since the game was based on a book (albeit a very shallow and over hyped book in my opinion).

The tasks themselves were repetitive, not really as logically challenging as Tomb Raider and ultimately just a frustrating procession.

Finally and most infuriating were the camera angles and control method. The controls are 'intuitive' - in that there are no jump, climb or other controls assigned specifically to buttons. Instead these actions are carried out on your behalf automatically dictated by the environment. So that when you get close to, say, a stone block, Harry will climb onto it. Or, sprint at the edge of a ledge and Harry will leap off and grab the next ledge. There are two problems with this:

1. The Xbox is doing most of the work for you...and it's RUBBISH AT IT! It will leap a gap and miss the ledge it's trying for...or just fall off stuff far too readily with the least provocation from your control pad.

2. The camera angles change 'intuitively' as you move around the environment and, I assume, they are supposed to enhance the game. In fact they change at the most inappropriate and crucial times, and the angle they change to is the most unhelpful view possible, obscuring at the last second things you need to see in order to succeed/survive.

To understand how infuriating this flaw is, imagine playing Tomb Raider with one gamepad, whilst a friend beside you has a gamepad with which they can alter the camera angle of the game at will. Imagine that at the most critical parts of the game, just as your Lara is about to make a crucial jump...your 'friend' then maliciously changes the camera angle so you can no longer even see the ledge you're aiming for....IT'S THAT BAD.


Kinda like the film...but!   June 9, 2003
 2 out of 4 found this review helpful

Well the animation is good, the storyline is almost to the book so you'd think it would be quite good, but it's not really. As a Harry Potter fan i thought that there would be no way that i'd be disappointed but unfortunately i was.

You start with the introduction at The burrow where you learn the basics of magic that you will require. Battle a washing machine and de-gnome the garden to master these basics. After you have completed this move on to diagon alley with the task of finding Ginny's missing things...could be completed quickly if it wasn't for the anooying animation bits that you can't zip through.

Arrive at Hogwarts to fight the whomping willow to rescue Ron then enter the school where you expect the best bits. You'd be wrong it doesn't get better. Every room is essentialy the same as the last, collect beans along the way, lose beans by getting hit...blah blah blah.

Basically this game is pants, it's repetitive, boring and no where near the quality of the books or even the films. Might be better if you buy it for a kid to play on i suppose but if your older than 14 i wouldn't bother. JK probably hates the game , but then she will get alot of money for the copyrights!!!


Good game but.....   January 22, 2003
 9 out of 10 found this review helpful

This IS a good game for the Xbox, graphics are nice, ambience is good, backgrounds excellent. Gameplay ok, puzzles are not too bad to solve but here is the but! THE CAMERA ANGLES STINK! I bought this for my daughter and she has given up in disgust, there is no jump control you just jump automatically when needed, usually this happens when you are not directly following Harry and you miss the target of your jump, this can be extremely frustrating when you have to do the same puzzle so many times when the reason for you having to repeat the task is completely out of your control.


An excellent action adventure/platform game   January 2, 2003
 4 out of 4 found this review helpful

This is an action adventure in the Tomb Raider/Indiana Jones mould albeit based on the Harry Potter book/film.

My wife and I have not seen the films or read the books yet though this game has prompted us to read the books and no doubt we will watch the films too.

I have been playing computer games for about 20 years wheras my wife has not played for many years and is very much a novice. Nevertheless we have both been captivated by this game. It is not a hugely difficult game although there are some demanding parts,

The graphics are excellent as is the atmospheric music & effects.

It isn't perfect (there are few games which are). The camera angles can be a bit disorientating sometimes especially when you are frantically shooting spells at poisonous spiders! Also the save points are few and far between which in some ways is good because you are not able to save every few seconds (which is very lazy gaming indeed!) but on the other hand there is a long way to go before you can turn your x-box off!! Having said that, if you do get killed, you only get put back to the start of the particular room you are in, not the last save, and also anything you achieved before you were killed remains done.

A splendid family game and the best and most enjoyable movie tie in I have seen since Ghostbusters!