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Here are the reasons why Warner Bros. Games’ action RPG Hogwarts Legacy sequel with a live-service model can fail.
Warner Bros. Games’ action RPG Hogwarts Legacy is one of the biggest hits of 2023 and surpassed the sales of Call of Duty. Hogwarts Legacy sold 12 million copies within the first two weeks and surpassed over 30 million copies overall. It has been officially confirmed by Warner Bros. that the hit game is getting a sequel and it is their biggest priority in the coming years. Although the fans of the fantasy game were delighted to hear about the sequel, on the other hand, they fret about another announcement made by Warner Bros.
J.B. Perrette, the CEO and President of Global Streaming and Games for Warner Bros. Discovery, stated that Warner Bros. has made some changes to their plans, shifting the focus from “One-and-Done” story-oriented titles to “Live Service” games. This sparked a huge debate among the community that the Hogwarts Legacy sequel is going to be a live-service model instead of a single-player game like the original. Here are the reasons why the sequel to Hogwarts Legacy with a live-service model can fail and not prevail like its predecessor.
Related: 4 Features Players Would Love To See in Hogwarts Legacy 2
1) Hogwarts Legacy Became a Hit for Its Story-Driven, Single-Player Experience
Hogwarts Legacy, released in 2023, was a huge success for Warner Bros., especially when compared to their recent projects. Since its launch, the game has been widely celebrated for its immersive single-player experience. The fantasy action RPG won the hearts of fans, particularly for its story narration and character development within Hogwarts.
Hogwarts Legacy offers a full-and-full wizarding experience, featuring a story-driven narration, exploring Hogwarts’s surroundings, interacting with characters, and mastering spells and magic. These features are the reason why players purchased Hogwarts Legacy in the first place.
A live-service sequel might lack these elements, potentially disappointing the fans of the original Hogwarts Legacy and not establishing a connection with them. It will not be considered a proper sequel and will instead turn out to be a completely new game.
2) Live Service Will Dilute the Magical Wizarding World Experience
Hogwarts Legacy, set in the Wizarding World franchise, is a fantasy-action RPG. The game takes place in the 1800s and narrates a plot 100 years before the Harry Potter series. The Wizarding World is all about magical fantasy worlds filled with various mysteries and creatures. Hogwarts Legacy exactly fulfills how it should fit and justify the universe.
The original Hogwarts Legacy game focuses on the adventure of a Hogwarts student and his journey of becoming a wizard, where you need to make allies and battle dark forces. A live-service approach will disrupt this experience and force players into microtransactions and constant grinding. Such a model may involve battle passes and online events, which likely wouldn’t suit the tone of a sequel.
Moreover, turning Hogwarts into a multiplayer arena with a large number of players could dilute the original experience. Requiring players to stay always online to participate in events for rewards and cosmetics may disappoint fans who appreciated the game’s more focused and immersive narrative.
3) Online Multiplayer Are Not What Fans Are Expecting
A live-service game will get new additional content periodically over time, which is exactly contrary to the “One and Done” kind of game. The latter focuses on delivering a completed game at once. However, it may require updates for bug fixes or additional features such as DLC in some cases. That is exactly what Hogwarts Legacy players wanted in the first place.
They like to get a DLC featuring new content such as mounts, spells, or side quests. As a free summer update, they got the Haunted Hogsmeade quest, which included Photo Mode and Talent Resets. Although the update disappointed some players, adding these kinds of new content makes the gameplay fresh and increases longevity. However, most live-service models focus on multiplayer and time-based events, which is not what most of the fans expect to see.
It leads to microtransactions and forceful grinding, perhaps. As these are against the expectations of fans, they have started an online petition against the Hogwarts Legacy live-service model, and it is going viral. If the Hogwarts Legacy sequel is made without considering the fans’ requests and expectations, that would probably lead to the fall of the game.
4) Diverging From the Original Universe Gameplay Style
Warner Bros. lost a significant portion of their revenue in recent years due to mediocre projects such as Gotham Knights, Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League and MultiVersus. They are now relying entirely on Hogwarts Legacy’s sequel to recover what was lost.
One of the reasons behind the underperformance of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League and Gotham Knights is their departure from the original gameplay style of the universe. Rooted in the Batman: Arkham games, these titles lack the immersive single-player narration of the Batman: Arkham games.
Instead, they focused on the multiplayer aspects with limited RPG and forced grinding mechanisms with repeated objectives. Now, they are following the same approach with Hogwarts Legacy’s sequel, stepping away from the original essence of Hogwarts Legacy and implementing a new live-service approach.
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