Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets

Sure, Harry Potter, but Bernie Botts her ... if you know what I mean.

The magic wizard boy who's all the rave with the kids is returning for another wand-waving adventure on the PC. Gamers who are familiar with the last PC Harry Potter will feel right at home with the sequel -- it's the same game engine and designers working on the second project. However, the sequel (which will sell a zillion copies whether it's good or not) is packing in some new gameplay that charmed us Potter fans eager for the second movie. The game also charmed IGNPC's Dan Adams, who's not a Potter fan -- just a common nerd.

If you're not familiar with the original PC game, Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets works out the way you'd imagine a first-person shooter would if your character was on screen. Harry can shoot magic at enemies, at wand-locks, and everywhere else in the stage. The mouse-look will show you the game's expansive worlds (although still squarish -- the PC game environments didn't leap to visual greatness the way the cartoonish console games did, although the game did have some lighting effects blaring in through windows), and Harry will hop and run about the stages on an adventure quest.

Differences between the PC game and the much-covered console games are numerous -- if you've read about the console games and likes what you saw, you should probably go ahead and settle with yourself to buying both games. The PC game is an adventure -- described as a "murder mystery without so much murder". How this works with the film's storyline (which is a mystery, but set in a few different realms) wasn't clear, but we did see some of the game's overall structure in the PC demo. Harry will take test challenges from his teachers, and that's where many of the platforming action sequences set themselves off (many of the other stages will likely have Harry wandering around Hogwarts collecting items and progressing through the game.)

Two stages were playable in the PC version of Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets. One was an instructor's test and had Harry bouncing on jump pads as part of the Spongify Stage Challenge. He'll use the Spongify spell (though there wasn't much to see as far as spells, we do know that there will be lots more in the game, including the Diffindo Spell) to turn magic carpets into spongy bounce pads that will propel him through the cavernous stage. Along the way, some block puzzles will obstruct your path, and one particular puzzle had an interesting diversion where the stage floor suddenly sunk down into a spider's pit that Harry has to scramble and defeat before moving on. The second stage shown was the encounter with the Whomping Willow -- as you're flying your Ford Angler through soupy clouds in the air, a surprising encounter with a jet plane sends the boys crashing down into the Willow. Showing the difference between the console versions and this PC game, the battle is an entirely different challenge -- the console games had a standard boss battle to save your friend Ron Weasely, but the PC game instead has a platforming challenge where Harry must climb the wicked Willow and reach Ron stranded at the very top while it writhes about and attempts to whomp you with its branches.

Unfortunately, there's not much to show you on the game -- Warner Bros is playing close to the vest with everything concerning the second Harry Potter movie, and that includes media of the game (wouldn't want to spoil the movie for anybody, you know ... oh, by the way, don't read the zillion-selling book that it's based on or you'll ruin the surprise.) We will instead have more for you on this game in the near future, so keep an eye out for Hedwig to deliver more info soon.