Back at Hogwarts

Hogwarts Mystery hit number one on the app store and suddenly everyone I knew was a Ravenclaw again. I got it because I was bored one night and thought it would be funny for ten minutes. That was two weeks ago.

The setup is simple: you make a character, pick your house, work through seven years at Hogwarts. Classes, quests, the whole curriculum. It looks good, feels right, and if you spent any real time with Harry Potter, there’s something about being in that world on your own terms that the books and films can’t touch.

The monetization is vicious. Everything costs energy. A lesson, a quest, moving between scenes—energy, energy, energy. You can wait for it to refill slowly, or you can pay. The game asks constantly, for the smallest things, in ways that feel designed to anger you. There’s no pretense about it.

I’m still playing. I’ve spent money I shouldn’t have spent. People I respect are sinking hours into this despite knowing exactly what’s happening. There’s something about having your own story at Hogwarts that the books and films can’t give, and I keep paying for it.

I could just rewatch the films instead. They’re all at home. But you know it won’t fix anything. You play it anyway.