An Honest Review of 'Hogwarts: A Mystery'

I grew up with Harry Potter. I made sure my children knew his name practically before they knew their own. So when I heard that there would be a game I could download on my phone to re-live my "glory years?" I was hooked.

I gave up everything I had planned the day this game was released. I was that excited (and let's face it, everyone deserves a break from real life now and then). What I expected was this beautiful alternate reality where I could take myself (or my long-used, heavily fleshed out RPG character) and finally go home to Hogwarts. What I got was a severely lacking, money grabbing spit in my face.

Let me begin by saying if I had known this game would have been this big of a let down when I started playing it, I would have more screenshots for you.

As it stands, when you first begin, there are very few customization choices.

But you know what, it's a supposedly free app for my phone, so I can't really complain about that, nor can I complain about the limited non-school uniform outfits.

Although, I mean honestly?

I can overlook all of that. I can overlook the fact that this is not some variation of The Sims. I can overlook the fact that I can't completely make my avatar look 100 percent different from someone else's. I am OK with that. What I have trouble overlooking?

Is the fact that I literally CANNOT even choose my own name.

But OK, I can choose my own house (Slytherin, obviously), so that should be a plus right? Except my dear friend (who decided to join Gryffindor) had the same bloody experience. Even when choosing a different "path" in the supposed "choose your own adventure" aspect.

And let's just say for one moment you expected the storylines to be the same. Sure, I would agree with you. Except when given multiple options on how my character reacts... why is only one the "correct" one? Shouldn't there be multiple outcomes?

If you are still willing to overlook this hot mess like I was, you come to the biggest and most problematic issue. This is really a pay to play kind of game. Yes, I know that is how they make most of their money, but when you give a time-frame for when a multi-click event must be completed and then you make people wait to earn the energy needed to complete the mission? Yeah, no.

Ultimately, I'm pretty sure without some major changes, this game is going to fail before it really takes off. Speaking from one "on a budget" player to another, even if I was rich, I would not pay to advance in this game. Not only is it not worth it, but it is not the game they hyped it up to be.