Harry Potter Game 'Hogwarts Legacy' Headed For PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, PC

As part of Sony’s PlayStation 5 showcase event, Warner Bros. announced a new open-world game featuring the magical world of Harry Potter.

“Hogwarts Legacy” will be released next year on PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, and PC, The Verge reports. It will be set in the 1800s at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, so don’t expect Harry, Ron, or Hermione to appear.

The trailer released for the game developed by Avalanche Software under the Portkey Games publishing label gives the impression that players will create their own character while engaging in all manner of witch- and wizard-related activities.

Warner Bros. describes the game in a press release as an “open-world, single-player, action role-playing video game set in the 1800s wizarding world,” where “players will experience life as a student at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry like never before, as they live the unwritten and embark on a dangerous journey to uncover a hidden truth of the wizarding world.”

Following a massive leak in 2018, rumors of an open-world game set in the past of the “Harry Potter” universe spread across the internet in various shapes and forms. Warner Bros. has confirmed that “Hogwarts Legacy” will be released in 2021 and overseen by Portkey Games, the game development team formed to shepherd new game entries in the “Harry Potter” franchise.

“The Portkey Games label gave us a unique opportunity to return to Hogwarts during a different era. We are always asking ourselves how we can draw from the rich library of characters, creatures, and themes – and imagine how those details would influence the school more than a century before Harry Potter’s arrival,” writes Avalanche’s story head Adrian Ropp.

In an era where Albus Dumbledore had not yet become headmaster at Hogwarts and neither Tom Riddle nor Newt Scamander had become infamous or known, an older generation of magic wielders roamed the halls and had to wear the Sorting Hat to determine what house they belonged to.

Student life in Hogwarts must have been different then as different professors taught subjects like Potions, Defense Against the Dark Arts, Charms, and Herbology. The possibility to see hippogriffs, phoenixes, kelpies, or even other creatures not yet seen in the “Harry Potter” or “Fantastic Beasts” films is present as well.