We don’t normally report on many apps and games, especially not ones that have questionable business models, however with the Wizarding mayhem about to unleash we thought we’d briefly mention one of the new entrants into the Play Store, Fantastic Beasts: Cases From The Wizarding World.
The game is set in J.K. Rowlings Wizarding mythology and sees you play the part of a newly appointed member of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. The gameplay is the set around finding items on the screen. This is a fairly standard and long-running game genre and to be honest not all that fun, especially on a Mobile.
A less than brilliant game tie-in to a movie is something I can accept, however, this little ‘Gem’ of a game comes along with the standard mechanics of limiting play to just a few rounds until you need to either wait half a day or use Gems to buy more game time. How do you get Gems, easy: use real money.
I know this is fairly standard, and perhaps getting on my high horse about it in this instance is useless, but this franchise, movie and Game are all specifically made to appeal to kids, and Warner Bros is literally targeting kids to take their money, or their parents’ money.
This game could have been given away for free as a marketing tie-in, but no they’ll use it to wring a few more bucks out of each child into the Harry Potter world. This is one of those apps that makes me wish the Play Store allowed you to block apps from your kid’s accounts, and yours.
