Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - PC

This is my favorite Harry Potter video game, and I've played all of them. Every time I play it I feel like i'm inside the Harry Potter world. You get to walk in Hogwarts as if you were a students there! You talk to professors, do homework for them, take tests, talk with other students, interact with main characters, and play mini "magical" games if you want. The castle is full of hidden treasures and secrets. There are secret rooms, house ghosts, and talking portraits! There is no way I can faithfully describe how amazing this game is, but all i can say is that you HAVE to play it if you're a Harry Potter fan! It will take you to a whole different world.

Package arrived and went to install the game, first thing it asked for is the code, the code can be found on the back of the booklet. No booklet, no code, waste of money. Quality control at the smallest level should have caught something so stupid as not including the code for a resale pc game. Its like you are dealing with idiots that just push stuff out the door without checking.

I love the game. It's very fun.

Magic! After the lackluster HP 4 game (GOF), EA has offered us a fresh new Hogwarts (yes!!!), a new spell set, and the rest i will get to in this positive, MAGICAL review that will open your eyes and senses to this wonderful game! :D 1. PRESENTATION - ~~~~Story = Well... I wouldnt call the first few tutorial parts very fun... It feels like youre a little Harry in the first year again! It was terrible! And as you progress at Hogwarts you learn spells again and it feels very basic... The story between the exploring and doing everything is barely visible... but it gets better! ~~~~Idea = This game, out of the other 4 previous, was really a test of how a HP game was supposed to be... This is the BEST formula of how to make this kind of game work, and in the games after this they perfect it, and this game has some new things to make it a great game on its own - moving this review onto the next points! 2. THE GAME STATS - ~~~~Graphics = Well.... Im gonna have to go to points with this cuz its all different ** Hogwarts ; Hogwarts in this game has been recreated in all of its glory, and i must say it is AMAZING! EA tried to really make you feel like you were at school and walking around in Harrys life and it does a GREAT job of making Hogwarts grounds come to life ** Characters ; Hmm... Not the best... Theyre a bit robotic at times, and Hermione and Ron following you all the time can be kinda annoying, but they can be helpful too... Sometimes you just want to levitate a rock and knock them with it a few times... OH WAIT; you can! Sweet! :) ~~~~Spells = The spells in this game are not the BEST set we couldve asked for, but they get better in the newer HP games, and its fine for this game; ~~~~Description on Amazon = This description is mostly what you will be able to do! Check that out for some clarification if needed ; you DO get to play for Sirius and Dumbledore (only for like a few minutes though...), and advanced magic can be used with them, but not as advanced as it seems... Theyre just your spells for Harry except upgraded... Uhh ok? But its still kinda fun! 3. MISSIONS - Well... Lots of milkruns... You will go BACK and FORTH across Hogwarts grounds finding people and doing strictly CHORES for them, just to get them to go to a meeting or something simple like that; you will soon be exhausted just watching Harry go across the beautiful scenery which will become a curse rather than an interesting addition after a while! Pros = Faithfully-created Hogwarts, fun dueling bits, minigames are fun for a while, Exploring is in full force, and can appeal to any age for a while Cons = Cutscenes are pretty bad, missions are nothing more than milk runs, low level of difficulty OK so, im being critical because thats what a review can be about; Its not THAT much fun, but its a good game and they put time into it, so EA has to be commended. Its good for a while, but you might really only want to come back after you finished the game maybe once? Maybe just to explore Hogwarts after a long break from the tedious chores and ugly character models? Ehh maybe - A great game, but it seems misunderstood by all it has going on and it really can be a good game if you dont let it take you over and just let it be.

I have been a fan of the Harry Potter game series since the beginning. While I quite enjoyed the first three games, the last two have been a let down. Firstly the biggest complaint I see is that the controls are awkward. I agree with this but when you are involved in the game it is easily looked over. The thing that really bothers me is the fact that if you are a person who has not read the book or seen the movie you will have no idea at all what is going on. Most times when an event happens it is assumed you already know the story. Nothing at all is explained and most things are left open-ended. There was no effort put into making the game understandable to those who have not read the book. Also in this version there are no classes to go to or mini-courses to complete, you just have a few O.W.L. challanges. If you are a fan, by all means buy this game, but if you have not followed the series, don't waste your money.

There's no getting around the fact that this game has one of the worst player control systems I've ever seen. It's a shame because this really isn't that bad of a game. Of course, it's not nearly as enjoyable as Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets or even Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, but it's worlds better than Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. This installment of the game franchise saw a return to the player's ability to explore Hogwarts and to follow the storyline at his/her own pace, which restored a needed element of fun to gameplay. You do spend a good bit of time walking/running from one area to another, which can get rather annoying (especially when you're having to traipse up and down all those darned moving staircases), but the fact of the matter is that Hogwarts is a big place. It would be nice to be able to hop on a broom and fly from place to place, but I guess that's not allowed at Hogwarts. The visuals of the game are quite good. For the first time, you get a real sense of the sprawling size and grandeur of Hogwarts, and all of the important characters look a great deal like the actors portraying the characters in the movie. Some important segments of the story take place in cut scenes, but you still have plenty to do exploring the castle grounds, learning spells, and seeking bonus opportunities to increase your spell power. You get bonus points for finding secrets and for taking advantage of opportunities to use your spells; practically speaking, it's really not all that exciting, as you'll spend most of your time lighting torches with and opening curtains. You can unlock a number of extras by completing a range of achievements, but these largely consist of short interviews with the movie actors and the like rather than actual bonus game features. The designers did come up with a decent way to navigate the Hogwarts grounds; using the Marauder's Map, you can select where you want to go and follow magic little footsteps all the way there. Another good thing about this game is the spellcasting. To cast any given spell, you must move your mouse in the specific way designated for that spell. Not only does this make perfect sense, it makes wizard duels much more exciting. Unfortunately, assigning spell casting to the mouse is probably what led to this game's bloody awful control system. You have to use the WASD keys to move and hold down the Shift key to run. Ron, Hermione, and other students have a nasty habit of getting in your way, and the camera angles make a bad thing even worse. Let's say you are moving south; the camera angle will swing around up to 180 degrees as you move, which means you'll end up using three different movement keys just to keep moving in a straight line. If that isn't annoying enough, sometimes your character will decide to turn around for no apparent reason. Character movement is a constant source of frustration and annoyance in this game. Even when you get the hang of it, you still run into problems at times. The game has other issues. For one thing, it feels like most of your time is spent rounding up members of the D.A. for training. The process introduces a number of other quests, but it takes forever to get 24 different students up to the Room of Requirement. The final confrontation with Voldemort also disappoints. After a little bit of excitement fighting the Dark Lord as Dumbledore, you end up putting Harry's occlumency lessons to use, and this unfortunately means that the final confrontation of the game is ridiculously easy and therefore no fun at all. I also found it impossible to get rid of large plants with the Incindeo spell using the mouse; on these occasions, I had to go in to the options and transfer the spellcasting controls to the keyboard, then transfer them back once I was done. Not good. There is fun to be had in this game, but you have to be patient and just accept all of the gameplay frustrations in order to really enjoy yourself. I've actually played through the game twice now and enjoyed myself more the second time around, but I'm afraid this game's glaring problems may force many a casual player to just give up on the game before he/she can really get into it.

This game hit me with a wave of nostalgia, it runs better than I could have imagined it would. Disc and case arrived in pristine condition. I absolutely recommend this product.

I gave 5 starts because I am sure it is fine. I put in my collection and did not open. I wanted a game from each movie and I think I did. Amazing the difference of $'s from one to another.

REALLY GOOd