I really feel sorry for poor Harry. He had such a promising title in "The Order of the Phoenix" videogame. There are many innovations and good ideas that EA manage to include into the game. But we will see in the next lines why some small key elements make the playing experience of this game only mediocre.
I am really "disarmed" by the whole concept: EA UK manage to evolve this game from a simple adventure to a complex world. Hogwarts is a living breathing school of magic where the player can now explore freely, in search for those "strange new spots". Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger can now "go boldly" in a hand of a human player, "where no one has gone before".
Unfortunately, you won't be able to play with Hermione and Ron - but they will follow you all the way and assist in your quests, with good (or bad) advice and their wands.
You can however play briefly with Dumbledore, Fred, Weasley and Sirius Black as you progress through the game.
66 missions can be completed within the school that has been recreated by combining the movie blueprints and J.K. Rowling's drawings and books together. The missions include gathering Dumbledore's army by talking with kids around Hogwarts to join your cause and learn defense magic, fighting against Slytherin bullies to protect students, finding herbs to create special alchemy potions and many more.
Wingardium Leviosa!
Along with The Order of the Phoenix videogame, the developers introduced a brand new spell casting system. Instead of pushing combos or choosing from a list of spells, Harry can now finally use wand gestures. Now this really brings the player into the story, and is reproduced more or less accurate on each console type.
On the Xbox 360 and PS 3 you can perform these actions with your controller stick. Of course, it's only natural to cast spells with your mouse on the PC you say. Well, it is and it isn't...
Why? Well because for some reason it doesn't always work. You do it as you are told, and you even check that you have the right target (which can be a pain to get due to bad camera and controls again) - and still nothing. You cast faster, you cast slower, yet still - nothing happens. Finally when you lose all hope... *poof!*. And if you're lucky, he even casts the right spell!
You can't customize your controls either; the only thing you can customize is walking with W, S, A, D and casting/targeting with the directional arrows or casting with your mouse and walking /targeting with the keyboard.
In fact, casting accuracy is so bad it only works 50% of the time from the mouse. That is if you don't break it first. So I had to switch to keyboard casting...
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Reducto!
Back to spells now, there are two categories. Combat/dueling spells and non-combat spells. You unlock them as you get stronger and play more.
Non-Combat Spells
Reparo, a repairing spell.
Wingardium Leviosa, used to lift objects.
Depulso, used to push away objects.
Accio, used to pull objects.
Reducto, used to destroy objects.
Incendio, used to burn objects.
Combat/Dueling Spells
Expelliarmus, used to disarm an opponent.
Stupefy, a slow, powerful stunning spell.
Protego, used to deflect spells coming.
Rictusempra, another stunning spell that is faster than Stupefy but weaker.
Petrificus Totalus, paralyzes the opponent.
Levicorpus, levitates the opponent.
Spells can also be used to discover small secrets around Hogwarts. The Push or Pull spells or the Lift Objects spell for example, once cast on special objects give you "Discovery Points". These points work like experience in a RPG. Once you reach a certain number, you become more powerful, and you also unlock bonus features in your secret room, as the lovely (??!!) Moaning Myrtle will tell you each time this happens. Bonus features include developer diaries or interviews with the actors among others.
Rictusempra!
So the spells are as they are, duels work a bit better... Hmm really annoying most of the time... Let's see a bit about the other aspects of the game:
Petrificus Totalus!
...aka "Something is rotten in Denmark" or "It's not all peachy" if you like.
As many games based on a big budget movie, "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" suffers from some problems. The causes usually are the big budget investment in buying the brand, and the short time the developers have if they want to launch it as close to the movie launch date as possible. There is also the whole "runs on every console available on earth... EVER!" aspect. As you can see: HP and the OOTP is available on a lot of platforms with very different configurations.
The result? Really really bad controls and camera for the PC! It gets a lot worse if you want to run while you steer, because you have to press more than three keys at a time. Most of the current keyboards don't support that. And *bang* comes the wall...
Even with every detail to the max the graphics aren't remarkable (for sure to keep it compatible with lower systems like the Wii), and I really see no reason why I have over 100 frames per second, but every camera motion and animation are choppy.
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Levicorpus!
Gameplay: 71
The controls and the graphics make it almost unplayable unfortunately. Too bad - just when Hogwarts became a living-breathing world and the spells are so "real" to cast. The Wii version could be really enjoyable...
Graphics: 65
Nothing revolutionary, nothing even average for a game made in 2007. And what is with the choppy animations and bad camera angles anyway?
Multiplayer: N/A
Harry doesn't know how to...
Sound: 82
Except the annoying bird sounds, the background sounds are very real with the addition of "Walla". Casual "NPC" conversations are varied and the music is inspired from the movie. Hermione is witty and Ron is... Ron... funny, loud, silly, shy and emotional... (I know...).
Hardware: 61
It doesn't have big hardware requirements, but it still move real choppy at over 100 frames, so I don't think a high-end system will help you a lot here unfortunately... Also you can't say the game is really "optimized" for the PC.