Everybody knows of Harry Potter. Everybody. It’s become a revolution for children – books are popular again, as is being a nerd. The franchise has now spawned toys, clothes, Easter eggs and other confectionary, stationary, two films (with a third, Prisoner of Azkaban released this summer) and, of course, a series of licensed videogames. With Electronic Arts having bagged the rights to produce games based on the series, at first a range of half-baked, so-so, Mario/Spyro/Sonic-inspired games was originally predicted. What followed was rather pleasing, with many of the first titles at least having a stab at doing something new.

But we aren’t hear to discuss the Harry Potter story, we’re here to talk about the GameCube’s Christmas 2002 release, Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, the first of the series to appear on the system. The title obviously is obviously aimed at children and takes inspiration from The Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time from the word go and, as the game progresses, often tries a little too hard to recreate that “Zelda buzz”. The spells and items collected can be placed on the B, Y and X buttons, with A being the main action button. L locks onto a target, which is often incredibly unpredictable and quite pointless, as the only attack I found was the default spell, Flippendo, which has an auto-lock feature.

            The title is set with a beginning “training level”, which, surprisingly, doesn’t really offer you any training and instead is more to set the story and, requiring you to complete a couple of very basic tasks in order to proceed to Hogwarts. Once you have arrived, you will be presented with a few outdoor areas, a main hall and, most importantly, a grand staircase. This acts as the “hub” for the game, with all but two of the dungeons set around collecting the spells. A clever, albeit rather inefficient element of the title is the “End of Day” feature. Certain tasks must be completed each day. You are free to interact and explore prior to and after these events, but to advance through the game you have a checklist to complete. This feature would have much more appealing had it used the GameCube’s internal clock, or been developed even more similar to its inspiration, Ocarina Of Time. Exploration of Hogwarts will allow you to find some of the elusive Witches and Wizards cards you have to collect throughout, and will let you perfect your Quidditch and flying skills. The bosses are often pleasingly brutal, but more often than not boil down to rapidly bouncing their spells back at them in an easy-style-tennis ala Ganondorf in Ocarina Of Time, again.

Being an Electronic Arts multi-format release, as many other multi-format titles are, the update-game was designed for the PlayStation2, and merely converted to the Xbox and GameCube formats, as opposed to titles such as Soul Calibur II and Burnout 2, which were built from the ground-up as individual projects for each system. Due to this it’s reasonable to expect certain aspects of the game to be of slightly lower quality than is usually present on the GameCube. The camera, however, is more than often inexcusable. Even with the use of the C-Stick to align the view correctly, the camera will often spring back to its original position just as you’re about to make that desperate leap, or attack a boss. The L trigger’s lock-on feature takes so long to focus correctly in these instances, that you may get bored fiddling between the C-Stick, Control Stick and L trigger just to get a better view. Also, the camera can occasionally spasm erratically, or even commandeer any movement on the C-Stick at all.

The graphics are pleasant. Brightly coloured and passable as an early release title, but don’t expect them to compare to any first or second party software from the same year. There are minimal bugs graphics-wise, with only occasional polygon pop-up and a few invisible walls. The interior lighting should have been real-time though guys, really. The sound is, as to be expected, adequate… Potter squeals pleasantly in pain… heh heh heh…

The title does include some Game Boy Advance link-up features, but without Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets for the Game Boy Advance itself, the only option available is a series of puzzles, the ones where you have to slide around the pieces to make a picture with one piece missing… you know what I mean, right? Anyway, this is, to be honest, not what I had in mind when Nintendo announced their revolutionary new concept of console link capability, and I’ve played better features on countless other titles.

I see the title as a rather easy, short, Ocarina Of Time rip-off, and it should be treated as such. If you love RPG’s and have finished The Wind Waker, Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles, Evolution Worlds, Skies Of Arcadia and The Legend Of Zelda Collector’s Edition disc then it’s probably worth a look. If you love Harry and the gang, then, yup, it’s for you. However, you should all be warned. The title is short-lived, and high-expectations will only lead to disappointment.