Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

"You could read the book in the time the game is loading..."

Movie/book games aren't always such a bad deal...this one was. Let's just skip to the ratings, shall we?

Graphics: 7
They were decent, but not great. All of the classrooms looked alike, but other than that, they did a good job of recreating Hogwarts almost exactly as it was in the movie.

Music/Sound: 5
The music was bland and not very memorable. The actor's voices were okay, but it sounded as if one person had done all of the voices, just in different tones of his or her voice.

Fun: 2
Parts of this game were either too easy, or way too hard. The basilisk was a piece of cake, but I'll be darned if I could get around those prefects. There was the prospect of casting spells at the teachers, and also collecting the Witches and Wizards cards, but one thing ruined it for me: the loading screens. Every time you walked into any room, no matter how small, a loading screen popped up. And the game loaded...and loaded...and loaded...and then they read my eulogy... Seriously, this game's loading time were too long. As I said in my tagline, you could read the book in the time the game loads.

Story: 1
They ruined a very good story. The plot is barely there. The game mostly consists of you running around doing meaningless jobs for meaningless people. Example: Neville gets stuck behind a tapestry, so you have to go learn a spell to rescue him. How hard is it to move the tapestry out of the way with your hands? But NO, you have to spend 45 minutes (loading times included) rescuing that buffoon. Also, you have no Invisibility Cloak, which would have helped you to get around those darn prefects. They ruined this story. Good job, guys!

Replayability: 3
All you can do is collect the Witches and Wizards cards. Yippee.

Verdict: 4
This game took too long to load, and the story was pretty messed up. Who cares if that idiot is stuck behind a tapestry? He deserves to stay there. The broom racing was also fun, but not enough to bring up the game's rating.
RENT or BUY?: Don't touch this game, unless you like loading screens.

Reviewer's Score: 4/10, Originally Posted: 12/28/04