A Hogwarts Legacy Sequel is on the Horizon
Warner Bros. has made it perfectly clear they’re in the Harry Potter business, with the recent return to the Wizarding World craze spearheaded by Hogwarts Legacy. The video game developed by Avalanche Software, which is set in the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry during the Victorian era, was a massive success, one of the best-selling games of all time, with over 30 million copies sold at this point. When David Zaslav took over Warner Bros. after his company, Discovery, acquired it, he announced in an investor call that the troubled studio would focus on the franchises to which it owns the movie/TV/video game rights, with Harry Potter specifically named. And they’re certainly fulfilling that promise, with a TV series adaptation of the Harry Potter novels written by J.K. Rowling on the way and Harry Potter: Quidditch Champions, a video game based on the magical sport played by Hogwarts students that followed Hogwarts Legacy, currently available. (There’s also a Harry Potter section of the new Universal theme park, Epic Universe; Warner Bros. isn’t behind that, but I’ll bet they’re glad it’s happening.)
Now, Warner Bros. is going back to the well with a direct sequel to Hogwarts Legacy. According to Warner Bros. Discovery CFO Gunnar Wiedenfels (via Variety), the Hogwarts Legacy sequel is not yet in development, with Wiedenfels giving the vague time frame of “a couple of years down the road.” He also says that Hogwarts Legacy is still exceedingly popular, with gamers playing through the campaign again and again, choosing different houses and having new experiences. This is probably part of why they’re holding off on beginning development of the sequel; if it remains that popular, maybe it’s better to let gamers sit with Hogwarts Legacy for a while until they get tired of it. Wiendenfel doesn’t offer any further information, like a plot or any gameplay changes, which makes sense because this is really just an idea at the moment, but it seems clear Warner Bros. is determined to make a Hogwarts Legacy sequel.
And is that really a surprise? Aside from the success of Hogwarts Legacy, which has generated over $1 billion in revenue, Warner Bros. hasn’t had much success with its video games of late. Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League was an embarrassment, not only tanking on its own but effectively destroying the beloved Batman: Arkham game franchise (the new game, Batman: Arkham Shadow, is only available on the Meta Quest 3; good luck with that) and leaving developer Rocksteady teetering on the brink of closure after a string of layoffs. And their first Hogwarts Legacy follow-up, Harry Potter: Quidditch Champions, debuted strong but lost almost half of its players in its second week, which means it probably wasn’t all that well-liked. That seems likely; when Hogwarts Legacy came out, you heard about it non-stop, but Quidditch Champions is basically invisible now, and it’s not even two months old.
As for the game itself, I don’t know because I never played Hogwarts Legacy; I took a leap and assumed it wasn’t for me. I’ve heard very mixed things from people who have played it, though, both in terms of gameplay, story, and its fidelity to Harry Potter lore. (If you want a good idea of what the game is like, check out the Blabbering Collector’s livestreams, in which she plays through the full game and entertains because Blabs is funny.) I was amused by the fake controversy surrounding the game, where people outraged at J.K. Rowling’s views on gender madness boycotted the game, and upon release, it exceeded everyone’s sales expectations. I wonder if Warner Bros. will ask Rowling to make some new “controversial” statement when the sequel is about to hit shelves for a little free publicity. After the year they’ve had, they could use a hit, which makes a Hogwarts Legacy sequel something beyond inevitable. (Not that anything is beyond inevitable, but let’s be real; there’s no way this game wasn’t going to happen.)
Let us know what you think of Hogwarts Legacy getting a sequel in the comments!
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