The stars of the movies coming out against her (the younger ones at least) has helped a lot with my feelings towards them and the IP itself. I hope it continues to outgrow her and eventually “JK Rowling” isn’t even thought of when it comes to Harry Potter.
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Quite so all of them coming out so vociferously and with such empathy helps a great deal, especially for those who do genuinely love the series and have been hurt by the Authors actions. Its touching as equally as the stories of those hardest hit by her actions are heartbreaking.
I have all the time in the world for Radcliffe, Watson and Grint. Especially as they (as I recall) made no attempt to speak for people nor pretend to be an expert, simply to empathise send love and to treat people with nothing but love and respect. A class act, and so young.
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That demo came to Ps5 as well. RE8 had an exclusive demo. never came to Xbox.
There was a exclusive demo for RE:village to the ps5 i think it was called the maiden demo; after that was the real demo which was split into 2 parts village and castle which playstation players got to play 2 weeks in advance (first week was the village section second week was the castle section) then it was released on all platforms with both parts.
Yeah that’s what I was talking about.
And my general point was Sony take it too far with the marketing. Which is fine but paying companies to block ads for Xbox is on another level.
Tiny tease
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Hi. I ve been reading thru the books with my daughter. 20 years later I understand the hype. Looking forward for the game
I’m not a Harry Potter fan and detest Rowling’s views on transgender people but this game is going to do huge numbers
I actually believe that ‘separate the art from the artist’ can be good advice, which has only become more relevant in the modern age where the world is much more connected. It’s so easy to access information these days & learn more about the type of people that beloved, famous artists actually are. Information that could’ve remained more hidden in the past. Plus, a lot of artists simply choose to speak more openly these days. Like everyone else, they can choose to use social media to put their opinions out there, as J K Rowling has done.
I think it can be a good thing to remind people that the artists, whose work they may love, are not perfect superior beings, towering above the rest of us like shining beacons. They’re just people. They’re messy & imperfect. They can & do fuck up badly just like the rest of us, but this doesn’t mean that you’re not allowed to keep loving their work.
In fact, the best artists hold the opinion that their art does not belong to them anyway. They believe that once it has went out into the world & been absorbed by an audience, it now belongs to those people. Whatever each individual person takes out of the art, whatever it means to them personally, is valid. A lot of songwriters & storytellers feel this way. A lot of them will not speak about the meaning behind their work, specifically because they do not want to taint the personal experience other people have with it.
I believe all of this, but at the same time I also believe that it can be a bad thing to try & apply hard, fast rules across the board, whatever the setting or circumstance may be. I don’t think that ‘separate the art from the artist’ should be used in this way, as an all-encompassing rule that must be applied here, in the case of J K Rowling & her creation. If people cannot separate their anger or distress at Rowling’s words from their personal experience of the Harry Potter world, that is a valid reaction & should be respected.
Personally, as a kid growing up in the 80s & 90s & playing in a Rock & Roll band with my friends, I immersed myself in classic British Rock music, eventually discovering (among others) the band Cream. I thought they were amazing. This lead me to the work of Eric Clapton, who I was a big fan of for a couple of years. I didn’t know anything about the man, outside of the fact that he is a brilliant guitarist & created some wonderful music. But then I learned of the horrendous racist tirade he went on, live on stage one night, & everything changed. I couldn’t listen to his music after learning this information. Still can’t to this day. Dude, White Room is epic. Bell-bottom Blues is fucking awesome. But I can’t listen to the man’s music now. Just can’t do it.
So yeah, ‘separate the art from the artist’ can be good, helpful advice, but shouldn’t ever be a requirement or blindly enforced. In the case of Hogwarts Legacy, I think people should be free to enjoy & engage with the work if they find they still can or want to. Harry Potter was a cultural phenomenon & means so much to a lot of people, for many reasons. But at the same time people should be free to cut it all out of their life if that’s what they want to do & I think that decision should simply be respected.
The thing that leaves a sour taste in my mouth is not that the game exists, or that there are people who are going to buy it eitherway, and even despite the JKR nonsense - it’s the active not-saying-anything that the company’s adhere to. Like, WB did the whole Making of Harry Potter 20th Anniversary thing, and then chose to not actually saying anything about her transphobia, instead having her interviews “from 2019”. Same goes for the new movie; come out and actually say “this has nothing to do with her, at all, fuck her” and I might be more interested.
Otherwise, it feels like it’s placating those who do agree with her.
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Yes, looks goooooood.
Yeah, I was pretty disappointed when I had been hearing that she was barely mentioned in the special apart from a couple of early interviews. Turned out to not be true at all and I haven’t gotten around to finishing it.
Harry Potter has always been a pretty big deal in my family. There’s not a lot we can connect with but Harry Potter (and the Toronto Blue Jays) have always been something we enjoy together. It sucks that to some degree she has shit all over it. I’ll never let her completely take it away from me, but it still sucks.
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Harry Potter needs less politicising, not more. People want to enjoy the franchise and the escapism it offers without being continually reminded that it’s author and creator holds views that some find offensive.
Similarly, neither the game nor the Anniversary mentioned Rowling’s philanthropy and how she is the second largest donator to charity in the UK, including, rather topically, founding a country-wide orphanage charity in Ukraine.
All these things are either great (philanthropy) or shite (antagonism to gender reform) but you can’t blame anyone for not wanting it to be an active part of the Harry Potter discourse, especially when the franchise is so much larger than her anyway.
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If Harry Potter is “politicised” at all then it is the fault of Rowling for using the platform and social “heft” being its author has afforded her to attack an already maligned community. If people want it to stop being part of the discourse then blame Rowling for not being able to keep her uninformed gob shut.
I shan’t even get into the idea that the “only politics” in HP are just as a result of her transphobia, the story and themes are already “political” as is any part of art, it’s just that was the “right kind of politics” not “Snowflake LGTBQIA+” politics.
And I would hope any person reading her views would find them offensive not just “some people”
And frankly, she loses any right to hide behind “but I’m a Philanthropist” when she goes out of her way to spout the hate she does.
I’m sure a lot of other bigots are lovely people except to those that they are bigoted against.
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An awful lot of strawmen in this post. Nobody is saying anything about Rowling hiding behind her philanthropy etc.
Harry Potter isn’t JK Rowling and it’s perfectly ok for people to not want to be reminded of offensive remarks the latter has said every time they want to enjoy the former.
Xboxs and iPhones and Playstations and Samsungs are assembled by literal slaves in China. It’s not right but nobody wants a disclaimer about it popping up every time they switch the thing on.
Absolutely feel free to detest Rowling for her beliefs on gender reform, or praise her for giving hundreds of millions to charity, but that doesn’t mean people should be harassed for wanting the escapism of Hogwarts without having to follow suit.
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No stawmen, responding to what you said. You brought up Philanthropy as if it’s a counter to transphobia. You brought up that it should not be politicised any more as if the story was completely apolitical until recently. You hid behind the phrase “some people” would be offended by her transphobia.
Personally, I wouldn’t mind seeing a disclaimer and reminded more of the sins of capitalism.
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I brought it up as it wasn’t talked about by the game developers and Anniversary, and it shouldn’t be.
What J K Rowling says and does can be, and often is, repugnant. But this is Harry Potter,not J K Rowling, and it’s ok to make that distinction if you want IMO.
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Separating the artist from the art gets you JK Rowling and her hateful views.
Or, you can read a British artist who doesn’t hate people like Sir Terry Pratchett. With that, I rather play Discworld again 
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Then if that was your intention that’s my misunderstanding, I understood a call for less “politicisation” along with mentioning philanthropic activity that has been unreported was being used as a scale to balance her “deeds”. My apologies.
I still disagree that it means the story and world is too “politicised” as any media its riddled with politics its just its the “invisible” politics that everything includes, it only becomes “too political” when you start mentioning minorities. “Keep politics out of my games!” people are wont to chant.
People can ignore the “politics” but they can’t complain its there or its “too much”.
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