USAopoly - Harry Potter: Hogwarts Battle - The Charms and Potions Expansion - Board Game

Love this game. Instructions not always clear, especially when playing for the first time. But totally addictive. Fav. HP characters all in there! Bought the extensions as well a month after.

The instructions are relatively easy to follow. However, it lacks proper gameplay examples to understand the flow. While reading the instructions, you feel that there are things that doesn't make sense or you are not sure what is its purpose. Other than that, really good game with increasing levels of difficulty!

I'm big into deck building games and have a few favourites but this has catapulted to the top of them. It is a great game for families, couples, friends or if you prefer there is a solo player mode.I'm not a big Harry Potter fan but I bought this for my partner who is, unlike a lot of brand specific games the gameplay does not require a prior knowledge of the subject (but merely adds to it via nostalgia).For any deck building game fans, I would best describe this as a mix of Dominion and Marvel Legend. You essentially start off with a basic hand for your character (Harry, Ron, Hermione or Neville) and then buy cards to get more spells, items or allies to go into your Discard Pile. Everytime your Draw Pile runs out you shuffle your Discard Pile to create a new Draw Pile, so you are constantly refreshing with the new cards you have bought. Using your cards you have to defeat the Villains from that film (and all previous) before they capture locations, with each Villain having a special power it requires you to be tactical with which order you defeat them.What makes this game particularly stand out is how much the gameplay and added features adapts throughout the seven years (levels), it keeps it interesting and eager to try the next level.For me though the best part is that it is PvE, meaning that all players are working together to beat the Villains and teamwork is essential to succeeding. I have played this with experienced board gamers and complete newbies (including my Mum) and everyone has picked it up extremely quickly as it is so easy to follow the turn order.I would highly recommend to any board game fan but especially any Harry Potter fans, a great family game!

It is kind of complicated game at the beginning. The instruction wasn't clear, we have to watch YouTube to understand how to play. Once you know the rules, the game becomes more complicated through different levels. Taking ages to complete. Worth having it especially for Christmas kill times.

My friends and I were already both Harry Potter fans and board game players so the combination of these two things was bound to be considered good to us, but that said this is still a beautifully designed game.Those unfamiliar with card deck building games may take a short while to get used to the playing style as you're not moving a piece around the board as instead you are strengthening your set of cards in order to defeat the various villains that appear throughout the game. The game play is straightforward as there's only a couple of different things to do each turn.It's also beautifully tiered and gets progressively difficult as you move through the games. There are seven games in total (one for each book) and contain no spoilers within each year, just additional characters or items that are added in the books at that point. When I introduced this to my non board game playing 'Harry Potter fan' friends the first game is simple enough that they could pick it up easily and were left wanting to continue the game - this is an incredibly moorish game and once you've completed one game/book you immediately want to move onto the next. Game 7 is very difficult and a real challenge every time and has great replay-ability as so many variables can change from the order villains arrive to which cards you can add to your hand.We have made up one additional rule when you play it as when attacking a villain you have to verbally cast a spell - slaying the Basilisk with 'wingardium leviosa' has never been such fun!We usually start with Game 5 after lunch on a Sunday afternoon and hopefully, if we've played well enough, we're defeating He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named in Game 7 by dinner! I cannot recommend this game highly enough.

We played as a two, and although the game is immersive and addictive, we found it too easy. We won all 7 games, so now we’re trying to find a way to make it harder to play but just as interesting.

The game is fun and, since it's cooperative, kids younger than 11 are able to play it with some guidance. It's even worth the work of separating the different types of cards when putting the game away after you're done.Negative: It was sent to us with just a thin plastic sheet around its box, which not surprisingly ended up not in mint condition on arrival - with bumped in corners and perhaps the odd scratch. A simple cardboard box or any other appropriate packaging for shipping would have prevented this slight damage.

This is an excellent game but we have a vital piece missing. The family will be taking it back to Denmark with them after Christmas without this piece. Customs and taxes mean the box cannot be returned from UK and then sent to Denmark. Recipients have to pay import fees. All we need is one piece which could be sent to the purchaser in UK and she would even be prepared to forward it to Denmark at her own expense. Big disappointment as the game is expensive. Apart from this we recommend the actual game!