Harry Potter: Quidditch Champions review: Quibbles and Quaffles

It’s been more than 20 years since the fictional sport of Quidditch got the video game treatment with Quidditch World Cup. Now, a spiritual successor has arrived with Harry Potter: Quidditch Champions. This is undoubtedly the definitive way to enjoy the high-flying sport, even if it leaves a little to be desired from a content standpoint.

Seekers

Harry Potter fans already know the ropes when it comes to Quidditch. Still, Quidditch Champions does a solid job onboarding new players through its role-based tutorial, which covers each on-field position and the gameplay mechanics. There are a few rule tweaks (catching the Golden Snitch is no longer an automatic victory) to keep the game fun and competitive, and I didn’t mind any of the adjustments from Unbroken Studios.

Instead of having a single character to control, Quidditch Champions asks you to create one for every position on the field. Each character can be fully customized and upgraded, and they’ll play together during the game’s career mode.

Quidditch Champions nails the high-octane action and chaos of a Quidditch Match. Playing as a Chaser, it felt like I was playing a scene right out of the movies as other players zipped by me, I dodged attacks from Beaters, and the wind roared in my ears as I sped towards my opponent’s goal. The scoring celebrations and commentary are neat presentation touches.

Of course, Quidditch is a team sport, and coordinating with allies is the key to winning any match. Visual cues in the UI will inform you when an open teammate is in your line of sight, or when someone is passing the ball to you.

Like in Rocket League, you can hold a button to lock your camera to the Quaffle so that you don’t lose track of the action. While this is a mighty helpful feature, I still found Quidditch Champions’ camera to be a bit frustrating. It’s particularly an issue when trying to play the ball in close-quarters engagements. The camera whips around frantically and it’s easy to get disoriented. I kept wishing I could zoom out or slow down my camera speed.

I also disliked the process of switching players on the fly. If you’re looking at an ally controlled by an NPC, you can quickly tap a button to switch to them. If you’re trying to switch to an ally not in your line of sight, you have to pull up a shortcut menu and select which position. It’s simply one too many button presses to be doing in the middle of a fast-paced sports game. I’d love it if Quidditch Champions took a nod from traditional sports sims that allow you to quickly rotate through every player with a single button.

Bludgeoned

In Quidditch Champions’ Career mode, you fight through a series of teams with the ultimate goal of reaching the Triwizard Cup. During this journey, you’ll face off against multiple iconic characters from the Harry Potter series like Draco Malfoy and Ron Weasley. You’ll also play matches at wizarding schools outside of Hogwarts, including Beauxbatons Academy and Durmstrang Institute. They’re fun details for fans of the series, and it’s dope seeing these schools realized in a video game.

While the initial chase of the Quidditch Cup was a fun draw, I felt less compelled to play Quidditch Champions as my time with the game went on. The Career mode is neat, but grows stale once the initial novelty wears off. The NPC teams never pose the largest challenge, and running consecutive matches simply becomes monotonous at a point.

It felt similar when playing online, too. I liked upgrading my players’ attributes and unlocking new abilities, but there wasn’t much motivating me to try and be better than the players I was matchmaking against. A ranked mode that incentivized competitiveness would have been great here. Perhaps some cool rewards tied to stats or performance, too.

Points to your house

Harry Potter: Quidditch Champions is niche in the fact that Harry Potter fans, specifically those with fond memories of 2003’s Quidditch World Cup, will adore it. It knows exactly who its audience is, and makes sure to serve up Harry Potter references and nostalgia berries on a silver platter. The gameplay foundation is solid, but there just isn’t much done on top of it. The available modes grow generic and the lack of variety or unique challenge caused me to put the broom down and walk away much faster than I was expecting.

This review is based on a Steam code provided by the publisher. Harry Potter: Quidditch Champions is available now for PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, and PC.

Donovan Erskine

News Editor

Donovan is a journalist from Maryland. His oldest gaming memory is playing Pajama Sam on his mom's desktop during weekends. Pokémon Emerald, Halo 2, and the original Star Wars Battlefront 2 were some of the most influential titles in awakening his love for video games. After interning for Shacknews throughout college, Donovan graduated from Bowie State University in 2020 with a major in broadcast journalism and joined the team full-time. He is a huge film fanatic and will talk with you about movies and games all day. You can follow him on twitter @Donimals_