Hogwarts Legacy’s monstrous debut did more than shake up the gaming industry. According to Variety’s time with David Haddad, president of Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, its success only added fuel to the fire of a Harry Potter franchise revival. Now, future video games are poised to take up a much more prominent position in the connected universe, starting with Hogwarts Legacy 2.
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Haddad highlighted that overarching story beats for the upcoming game are being developed with a direct connection to the upcoming Harry Potter HBO TV show, crediting the game for piquing the interest for all of Warner Bros.
Variety writes: “Haddad says the games team has been coordinating some of the big-picture storytelling elements in the “Hogwarts Legacy” sequel with the storylines that will play out in the “Harry Potter” HBO series coming from Warner Bros. Television. He notes that the success of “Hogwarts Legacy” helped stoke confidence that the time was right to make a major Potter push: ‘The rest of the company was very curious about what we helped to unlock with ‘Hogwarts Legacy’ last year.’”
RELATED: Hogwarts Legacy 2 Deemed “One of the Biggest Priorities” for WB Games
Back in May 2023, Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav told investors “Hogwarts Legacy has amassed more than $1 billion in retail sales and over 15 million units sold worldwide to date,” and that was before the game arrived on PS4 and Xbox One. No matter how you slice it, Avalance Software and Portkey Games delivered a smash-hit.
That’s no small success in a time when the Harry Potter franchise is comparatively dormant compared to its ’00s explosion. Comparing the game’s staggering heights to the most recent HP-spinoff film produces eye-popping differences. Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore generated less than half-a-million dollars during its theatrical run, for starters. It’s also plain to see fans are standing on their heads in wait for Hogwarts Legacy 2, while the Eddie Redmayne-led films may be on a permanent hiatus (according to Jude Law.)
This shift towards prioritizing videogame inclusion isn’t new for the Warner Bros. property. The Previous Harry Potter games evolved a lot from Harry Potter and The Sorcerer’s Stone (2001), but those releases played things by the book – direct adaptations of the films, LEGO crossovers, and a small army of Mobile games made up the vast array of what was on offer. That’s a far cry from Legacy’s bold, AAA open-world approach.
Set 100 years before The Chosen One’s story, fans are able to explore Hogwarts through a different lens while embarking on an involved 25-30 hour storyline about a budding Goblin rebellion. In our review, we said: “While it doesn’t do everything perfectly, Hogwarts Legacy stimulates the imagination with a rich world to explore and gameplay that empowers and thrills the player.”
The cookie cutter formula of the past served its purpose. Now, WB is in a position to push the franchise forward through gaming, opening up a whole new (wizarding) world of possibilities – ones that might just bring players into the heart of the narrative in a totally new way.
