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It’s come to light that EA was set to make a Harry Potter MMO in the early 00’s, but was “killed” due to the company’s lack of faith in the series.
That’s according to comments from the company’s former director of product marketing Kim Salzer. She was speaking on an interview with Twitch streamer The Real Brandolorian (as spotted by Video Games Chronicle) where Salzer was asked about any projects she worked on that didn’t see the light of day.
“A big one for me, because I was so personally involved in it, and it’s such a huge IP that has lived on; is an online massively multiplayer game for Harry Potter. We did all the research, we had a beta built out,” she revealed. “It was a combination offline/online experience where we’d actually mail stuff to the kids like prizes and ribbons and stuff like that.”
Despite all of the prep work, the project was “killed” because “EA was going through some changes at that time,” she says. “And they just didn’t know or believe enough that that IP would have a shelf life of longer than a year or two”. Salzer departed EA in 2003.
Fast forward to 2021, and the Harry Potter and Wizarding World license is now in the hands of Warner Bros. Interactive. The next Harry Potter video game project will be Hogwarts Legacy, an RPG set in the same universe but 100 years before the adventures of Potter and his friends. It’s currently pencilled in for a 2022 release, having been delayed almost a year ago.
EA came ever so close to developing a Harry Potter MMO. But it wasn't meant to be… #harrypotter #ea #mmo #videogame #hogwarts @OrigGamerLife pic.twitter.com/Dbux383HXY
— The Real Brandolorian (@Brandolorian17) December 21, 2021