PC | PS5 | SWITCH | XBOX SERIES
HOW I PLAYED: Received for free as a part of my PlayStation Plus Essential Subscription. I played on PS5 with 20% of my time being on the PS Portal.
Possible Bias - I am a long term Harry Potter Book Fan.
STORY 16/20
INTRO
Quidditch Champions starts you off at the Weasleys house, The Burrow, after picking your first character for your team. You go through a rather quick tutorial of each of the 4 positions in Quidditch. As you progress the tutorial, you learn more positions and you get to make more characters for your team. Instead of asking you to design a whole team of 6 at once, they spread it out, great decision.
Traditionally in Quidditch the game ends when a seeker catches the Golden Snitch. But in Quidditch Champions the game ends when either team gets to 100 points or if the match timer runs out. Catching the Snitch grants gives 30 points (usually 150 points) and the snitch can be caught multiple times.
CUTSCENES
They keep these short but do a good job to build a bit of excitement before and after the match. Many games miss terribly on the length of cutscenes and way over do it. Very glad that these were kept short but were still able to provide a lot of fan service.
WORLD BUILDING
Slam dunk for Harry Potter fans and anyone who came out of Hogwarts Legacy wanting some more meaningful broomstick flight. Quidditch Champions has a bunch of familiar faces from the books, but there are no lore points or information to be gained anywhere. However, the game is full of nods to Harry Potter fans.
OVERALL STORY
The story is just a campaign of three levels of tournaments. The Hogwarts Cup, Triwizard Cup and the World Cup. Nothing other than matches to be played. This game feels designed specifically for Harry Potter fans.
GRAPHICS - 11/15
CHARACTER MODELS
Quidditch Champions has a cartoony art style, but it is very polished and does suit the game well. At first, the character models seem a bit too "square" but it does seem to suit characters who are meant to be competitive and the style makes them look more determined. Once I realised this it made sense.
LOCATIONS
The developers decided to make the start of the game a familiar, fun, place to learn to play Quidditch at The Burrow. They made it, and all other locations look great. There is a good amount of detail in these, but I would of liked the ability to customise some of the stands and back drops.
SPECIAL FX
Flashes and rings are all on par with the graphic fidelity. Nothing mind blowing here though. They are all quite similar and basic, but this is what a faster sports game will want, to limit the chance of confusion during matches.AUDIO - 10/15
AMBIENCE
You don't really hear much during matches and one of the commentators, Lee Jordan, got old and repetitive really fast with his terrible jokes. The crowds cheers helped alleviate the dead times during matches, but I really feel like the game needed some more oomph in its in match music!
MUSIC
Music is serviceable but has and no big hits from the movies. Likely due to cost, but it is a letdown regardless. The main menu music is good, but not much time is spent there.
SOUND DESIGN
The sound design is great and elevates the gameplay and gives a sense of speed and impact to the broom flight and collisions. PERFORMANCE - 6/10
FRAME RATE
I had a lot of small dips (54fps) during gameplay. However, it didn't harm my experience.
STABILITY
I had a lot drop outs of internet connectivity which lost my match progress, but worse were the 3 game crashes I had. Not great at all.GAMEPLAY - 28/40
CONTROLS
Overall the flying took some getting used to, especially for the hard turns at the ends of the pitch when playing as the seeker. Also, the controls were we a bit weird for the seeker as the game wanted me to push on the right stick and press Triangle at the same time to nudge the opposing seeker. Furthermore, I had to change my stick sensitivity right down to 10 (from 80...) to really enjoy the flying; but this may just be me.
MECHANICS
Once I got the hang of each position, from how the Keeper controls functioned, to the Chasers ability to steal the ball and timing goal shooting right, the game felt great and matches flowed really well. The game does not allow for team tactics to be employed, like flying in formation in AI games, but of course this would be pointless in PVP matches. So I can understand the lack of options for this.
As you level up, you gain ability points to level up each of your 6 team members. This system is great as it allows for more depth of gameplay choices and you must decide which player position to level up and what to level on that position, as you cannot pick everything. Then there are also brooms to choose from, with different stats granting strengths/weaknesses.
PACING
Flying through the season pass felt like I was on a Clean Sweep, not a Firebolt. That is, progression was quite slow. But slow progression with no way to pay to skip the grind is a lot better than having a Micro-transaction (MTX) sitting there temping you to skip the grind.
UI/UE
Everything is clean and tidy. Menus are good to navigate but it was a little tedious to go into the career challenges and navigate there.
BALANCING
Each level of skill felt really good and fair. The AI team didn't feel like they were breaking rules but they definitely got better as the difficulty increased. There are different play styles for the AI teams but there is not a lot of difference between them.
TEAM VARIETY
While you do have a choice of where to allocate your ability points to each of your 6 players as you level up I would of liked to see either actual abilities or passives that changed the players strengths in some way. This would make the game be more like a "hero" sports game, so I guess that makes sense that it wasn't there, but this is a game for Witches and Wizards... who wield Magic. So it would suit to have those kinds of abilities; to be honest.
GAME MODE VARIETY
There is not a lot of variety, just online PVP, or the Campaign vs Bots in 3 different Cup events. No challenge modes to attempt, such as a set scenario to fly through rings in a certain time or score shots in small holes while dodging loads of beaters smacking a bunch of bludgers at you... Just a couple of ideas to start the devs off for later updates I guess?...
REPLAYABILITY
The games way of padding the single player Campaign is by asking you to use your team, as is, but enter the same event as a "different team". These teams are not any different, its just your team putting on a different jersey... Not exactly my idea of "more content". I wish there was at least some kind of passives each Hogwarts house gained if you played as them. When you play against certain teams they have their own "play style", mentioned at the start of the match, but these do not do anything when you play as them. However, for PVP there is a lot of challenges to grind for. Something I can see big fans striving to unlock. One final point, as I mentioned earlier, the commentators got quite old, fast and if people are going to be playing this long term we shouldn't be hearing the same cringey joke from Lee Jordan over and over.
BONUS 2/4
I love that most of the controls are able to be completely remapped. There is also multiple colourblind options too.
OVERALL - 73/100
GOOD
Harry Potter: Quidditch Champions took a bit of getting used to but once it all clicked I really enjoyed it! It just doesn't have enough to keep me playing long term, but it definitely nails what I hoped a Quidditch game would offer. I also want to point out that the developers said they will not be doing MTX in Quidditch Champions. This I feel is respectable in 2024. Side note, this did not feel the best on the small PS Portal screen.
TL;DR 73/100 (GOOD) - If you are a sports gamer, love the thrill of flying or are a Harry Potter fan give Quidditch Champions a look.
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