Hogwarts Legacy gets great reviews

[fromorbit]

The Hogwarts Legacy reviews have dropped from major game review sites before release tomorrow and they are great:

Review ratings :
• PSU - 9.5
• IGN - 9
• JVCOM - 9
• Xbox Era - 9
• Power Up - 9
• Press Start - 9
• Well Played - 9
• Pushsquare - 8
• Gamerant - 4.5/5
• Screen Rant - 4.5/5
• VGC - 4/5
• Metacritic - 87

Typical review below is an example it has some of the usual anti JKR performative nonsense, but otherwise the review shows how good the game is and how close it ties into the magic of the books. :
metro.co.uk/2023/02/06/hogwarts-legacy-review-the-best-harry-potter-video-game-ever-made-18230040/

The massive failure of the campaign against Hogwarts Legacy is another example of TRA self sabotage. The game itself is good and is going to do more massive sales now it is out, and the controversy helped give it great name recognition. Better than that it demonstrates that "transphobia" is a meaningless term which people increasingly ignore. It means that the gender fanatics attempt to control how people think is collapsing more and more.

Their latest TRA ploy is to call for a boycott of Twitch because it is showing Hogwarts Legacy adverts which again is going to fail and will further alienate people:
www.thegamer.com/hogwarts-legacy-twitch-ads-boycott/

What makes this all more sweet is JKR is benefitting massively from this because TRAs are so bigoted and can't tolerate dissent. This is nothing to do with helping anyone "trans" this is just about "moral" purity. It is even more blatant now it has been revealed there is a "trans" charater in the game as well as there being no rules about whether you are a witch or wizard. Yes turns out a JKR based game doesn't care whether people call themselves witches or wizards or how they dress exactly as JKR states:
"Dress however you please.
Call yourself whatever you like."

Hogwarts Legacy "Trans" Character details
www.gamerevolution.com/news/934065-hogwarts-legacy-trans-character-transgender-sirona-ryan

Yes Hogwarts Legacy is more supportive of having an avatar which can gender non conform than most other games. Which makes sense because JKR doesn't care about that and the game reflects the universe she created.

The TRAs would never challenge the Call Of Duty franchise beloved by right wingers and where Activision the company behind it who have paid directly into Republican party coffers. No they only go after the game where a woman gets some of the profits, a woman who actively opposes the right and tried to stop Trump being elected in 2016.

If the TRAs hated the popularity of Hogwarts Legacy before it launched, they are really really going to hate how big it is going to be. They also can look forward Hogwarts {Rowling] Legacy 2 which their nonsense has helped make inevitable.

I watched quite a few videos of Rebecca Root last night

Rather you than me. Rebecca "wanting a female only DV refuge is like saying my mum who had a hysterectomy isn't a woman" Root.

The video of the actual studio debate seems to have been memory holed though.

twitter.com/amscanlon/status/970607014287114240?s=20&t=V8WtI2IQsV4D1TQJM-c7ww

Is Marg going to apologise for the transphobic attack on Rebecca Root? I won't hold my breath, but it's a bit rich, isn't it. I hope plenty of people have saved screenshots of that.

To echo a concern that has been raised a few times on here recently, I wonder how it makes Rebecca Root feel to read people online complaining that this character whose looks are based on and who is voiced by Rebecca Root is so ridiculously masculine as to be an offensive mockery of transwomen?

Grim.

It’s this absolute denial that female people are a category that cannot, by definition, contain male people that we terves object to.

If only transactivists (of both sexes, including the ones who identify as ‘cis’) could just be honest with themselves and admit that they don’t believe women should have anything solely for women we’d able to have a proper, grown up debate.

Instead it’s just our weary pragmatism versus their (irony alert!) magical thinking.

Oh no, I missed this: "I apologies if it came across as offensive as that wasn't the intent." The old sorry, didn't mean to be offensive, it wasn't meant that way.

But the game devs (obviously not JK Rowling) calling the character 'Sirona', despite that being an established feminine name, was definitely a deliberate insult?

And JK Rowling's intentions in every detail of the books or her personal politics should be twisted and interpreted in the most uncharitable way possible?

Sure.

@MargaritaPie
All your accusations against JKR really say far more about you than they do about JKR. I don't think you realise this at all. When you have to twist things to to make them fit the narrative you want to portray the fact that you need to twist them shows that they didn't fit in the first place.
Each time a point you try to make gets skewered you have to fall back on "but what about this other thing over here". Then that gets skewered and you need to reach for another. The whole house of cards has blown over. Maybe it wasn't as solid as you thought in the first place.
JKR is not a bad person and she's not tranphobic. She's standing up for her rights and the rights of other women. She does have a problem with the way some of the more over the top extremist trans activism is affecting women but she does not have a problem with trans people. I know to you that might sound like two things that are exactly the same, but they are not. If you can sit down and think about why from someone else's point of view these two things are not the same I think it will help you a lot. The whole cultural conflict over trans arises out of this one issue, that someone can be both understanding and supportive to trans people but object to what/how trans activism is doing. I myself worry that what is being done to kids now will hurt many ( but not all ) of them when they realise later in life that it hasn't worked out the way they thought. This is not a hatred of those kids, it is concern for their welfare and their futures. A proper debate would allow society to talk about ths openly an honestly, and arrive at the best course of action for all concerned. But it's not up for debate is it? And so the war started. A war the TRAs are losing.
A cousin of mine fully medically transitioned many years ago, before all this current nonsense. The full medical transition and unconditional acceptance by family was not enough to stop them taking their own life a few years down the line. Clearly for my cousin medical transition was not enough to help them deal with their issues. It calls into question was medical transition, or even transition at all, the right way to help them?
I also think you would benefit from stepping back from the internet for a while.

The HP book series is one of the most analysed, dissected and fan-fic'd series out there.

I find it really hard to understand how NO ONE noticed all this blatant anti- semitism, racism, etc. that's supposedly in the books until fairly recently.

Of course we know the real answer is that the MRAs and their acolytes are just casting around for any reason to spew vitriol at a woman.

But you have to wonder...

Either it was noticed but none of the blue hair brigade actually gave a shit or it wasn't noticed - and if its so blatant then that begs the question why they didn't notice.

None if which paints them in a particularly good light.
But as we know this movement doesn't really hide its racism, homophobia, transphobia and misogyny.

I agree @VitaminX there is no way that this could’ve been approached with accusations of transphobia:

No trans characters? TRANSPHOBIA!

Trans character? TRANSPHOBIA!

Played by a female actor? TRANSPHOBIA!

Played by a transgender actor who looks convincingly female? ‘passing privilege!’ ‘cast by cishets so other cishets aren’t uncomfortable!’ TRANSPHOBIA!

Played by an actor who is visibly transgender? ‘Too masc looking/sounding!’ ‘Why didn’t they magic this person into passing?’ TRANSPHOBIA!

see also: complaints from wokewhitebluehairz about lack of (non player) black characters, when the character creation function allows YOU, the literal star of your own game playing experience, unprecedented options for how the main character looks.

Sadly @lechiffre55, the few really solid statistics that exist re: transgender people and suicide (separate from suicide ideation) indicate that the risk goes up post medical and surgical transition.
Obviously suicide is a sensitive and complex issue that cannot be reduced to one factor, but transition itself certainly doesn’t resolve those myriad factors.

Words are useless at acknowledging bereavement, everything I could type on a message board just seems inadequate and/or trite

I honestly wouldn't have noticed the "sir" of sirona without seeing TRAs point it out. Isn't the name from a Goddess of healing?
I also don't think there's anything controversial about the surname Ryan as many women have that surname? It's weird some people are making such a big deal about it. Also the developers said JKR hasn't been involved with the game so no way did she name the character

I bought the deluxe version for my DS ( he asked for it for Christmas so he's had to wait a while) so he could download it onto his PS5 early with the extra bonus things it comes with

It such a brilliant game. I love watching him play it between his A Level homework whilst I'm working on my laptop

The game is vast

We had the JKR trans conversation yesterday and we're both on the same page.

Safe spaces for women and we are therefore in agreement with Scotland placing prisoners in a prison of their birth gender. It is a minefield though as there is so much to pick apart which I'm not going to do.

I never game but I've asked if he can set me up as a character so I can give it a go because it looks absolutely brilliant and I'm a huge HP fan

Thanks for your sensitive words @ShireWifeofNigelFarage
My cousin lived on a different continent, and their branch of the family wasn't close to our branch of the family. No ill feelings, just different families are different. It's not had a large impact on my life, but I can't help but wonder if things had worked out differently for them that they may still be with us.
I'm thankful that their life and problems occured outside of current times. I think what's going on right now is far more damaging to young people who need help. I worry that people who do have issues now are growing up in a time when what appears on the surface to be positive can have a deeply negative impact on their lives. The very last thing they need. I do think that people who promote this stuff believe they are doing what's right to help, and that their intentions are good. Just that they don't have the mental capacity and reasoning to understand why good intentions are not on their own enough and can have negative consequences. I think ego is also a part of it. Just because you feel good about doing something doesn't mean it is having a good effect on others. Especially if you can't be bothered to watch what effect it's having because you are too busy feeling warm and fuzzy inside over how virtuous you are. The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

I think it does actually.

Because you are making all sorts of claims where you think the character should be based on stereotypes.

The very fact you mocked Rebecca Root's voice makes it pretty clear that you are again way off base.

I see we can add this transphobia to 'Marg dismisses violence against women'.

yet you continue to post in a way that attempts to position yourself as having moral superiority. I don't think I have ever seen you engage productively on a thread yet. Why is that?

And JK Rowling's intentions in every detail of the books or her personal politics should be twisted and interpreted in the most uncharitable way possible?

Yes

That's all they've got. So they're going to milk that nonsense good and hard.

I feel like a dissertation needs to be done on the absolute insanity of this.

No. Just no.

You DID mean it to be offensive. This is you. This is your standard MO. I think you just realised that you again went too far. But seriously, you fucked up again.

You are lying about your intent. Your intent was to portray Joanne Rowling as transphobic and you resorted to your own transphobia to do so. There was no 'it wasn't meant to be offensive'. You are apologising because you got caught out again. Just like you tried to fob off the threads where you dismissed violence against women.

Own it. Maybe for once you will actually start to engage properly but stop with the lies.

I think now that we're seeing what publications are refusing to review the game how out-of-touch they are with the readership. I predict a push to get the game to be reader's game of the year.

Eurogamer, for instance has their very own OJ, a white male who has taken it upon himself to be a spokesman for minority groups (whilst making sure that he maintains his own privilege) and has probably had a big say in banning talk of the game. The site is now deleting comments that reference the boycott.

The game is top of the charts and these sites are looking a bit stupid trying to appease a very vocal small group.

There was a very positive review on the bbc 2 news earlier which referenced the controversy between some trans peoples views and JKR. They attempted to give both sides and actually said JKR supports trans people but thinks that women should be allowed single sex spaces when necessary. The online report by their gaming correspondent actually used JKRs words. Actual quotes! Not fully balanced but a positive move I felt.

A good article in the Telegraph too: web.archive.org/web/20230210103030/www.telegraph.co.uk/books/what-to-read/hogwarts-legacy-boycott-harry-potter-video-game-controversy/

Did JKR even name the characters?

The game is top of the charts and these sites are looking a bit stupid trying to appease a very vocal small group.

The hilarious thing is that the tiny vocal group is actually impossible to appease. The game developers obviously DID try pretty hard to appease them. A trans character cameo voiced by and modelled on a genuine trans actor. And the character creation allows you to make your character trans, freely mixing and matching body types, voice types and witch/wizard identities.

Didn't work did it?

Transphobic poster MargharitaPIE said:

“I still stand by my views this non-playable character (who barely appears) could have been implemented better.”

1. How do you know the character “barely appears”? Have you played the game?

2. Do enlighten us as to how this NPC could have been implemented better. I’d love to hear it.

No, of course not.

I haven't played it yet but I know there are a few names that come from the books. Phineas Nigellus, ancestor of Sirius Black and bit part in the books, is the headmaster. One of the professors is a Weasley, obviously supposed to be an ancestor of the book Weasleys, and I think there's a Rookwood as well (Death Eater surname). There might well be more surnames used that originally came from the books.

But most of the characters are completely made up by the game developers and the story itself is not by JKR at all, though I suppose it probably extrapolates from mentions of goblin rebellions in the books. I think Phineas Nigellus is the only actual character from the books that appears. Could be wrong there as I haven't had a go yet!

Anyway, it's a spin-off, not a JKR creation. I'm sure she's got better things to do than naming NPCs.

Jeremy Vine on BBC radio 2 will be discussing young people boycotting this game because of JKR's comments about trans people. Or phrased something like that.

Programme is on now until 2pm.

If you can bear to listen.

I reckon JKR is pretty fed up with the wizarding world and is probably happy to have minimal involvement in it because a large portion of the fanbase are fucking lunatics.

I’ve yet to see any of the same level of crazy fandom with regards to the Strike books, despite the fact they are also very successful. Probably because fans of detective fiction are grown ups.

The idea that the sales of a game that was always going to be a major global success (because it's Harry Potter) somehow demonstrates support in either direction, for or against trans rights, is delusional.

Nobody is saying that though. We're just pleased that TRAS' bullying tactics are being ignored for once.