Harry Potter fans, rejoice: this week, Niantic has released that they are in the works for a Harry Potter themed mobile game.
Niantic, the game studio behind mobile games “Pokemon Go” and “Ingress,” has partnered with Warner Bros. Entertainment under the studio name “Portkey Games” to create the mobile game “Harry Potter: Wizards Unite.”
It’s important to note that while Niantic is heavily involved in the development, Portkey Games is the developer of “Harry Potter: Wizards Unite.”
The game is rumoured to be released in 2018, although the launch date is yet to be announced. The game is believed to be an AR and location based game, similar to the current Niantic mobile games.
“Pokemon Go” is based on a system of “gyms” located in the real world, which are taken over by different teams, as well as walking around in the real world to catch different Pokemon. “Ingress” works in a similar way, although the gyms are portals.
“Wizards Unite” is expected to work on a more similar level to “Ingress” than to “Pokemon Go.” “Ingress” is a sci-fi themed game, where players must capture portals for their faction and destroy the portals of the opposing faction. While it has not garnered the success of “Pokemon Go,” some people believe that a wizarding theme would be easier to port over “Ingress’” theme.
While the game is official and was initially announced on Pottermore, details surrounding the game are few to none. “Pokemon Go’s” announcement came about with much more fanfare, with a video teaser garnering over 43 million views. So far, no official teaser video has been released.
This may be due to the backlash Niantic first faced when releasing “Pokemon Go.” Despite the huge launch, their player base quickly dropped. One hypothesis for this phenomenon may have been due to the discrepancy between the quality of the game and the initial teaser video. Perhaps Portkey Games doesn’t want to make the same mistake.
Portkey Games is a new game studio specializing in Harry Potter themed games from Warner Bros. Entertainment. They are slated to release both mobile and console games in the coming years.
To stay up-to-date on the new “Harry Potter: Wizards Unite,” follow them on Twitter and Facebook.
Story by
Andrew Leavitt
life@suunews.com
Photo courtesy of Niantic, Inc.
