Every Harry Potter fan will recognize the importance of their wizard or witch wielding the appropriate wand. Back in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, we saw Harry visit Ollivander's Wand Shop on Diagon Alley, where the young wizard was shown his new wand contained a Phoenix Feather from the same wand used by Voldemort himself.
Ron's broken wand is causing havoc in The Chamber of Secrets, and the Elder Wand is one of the Deathly Hallows.
We don't blame you if you don't make it through Hogwarts Legacy.
Visiting Ollivander's shop is a great way to experience the atmosphere.
Ollivander's Store in Hogsmeade is a very early clue-up quest that takes you to the town to collect essential tools for your magical education. After a few failed attempts, Ollivander finally finds the perfect wand for you, though unlike the movies and books, you are then free to customize it as you see fit.
It's worth mentioning that once you've made this selection, it's locked in for the rest of the game, so it's quite worthwhile to get this right. The handle of your wand may be altered throughout the game, although the wand itself cannot be altered.
Building a better wand
The wand builder is quite similar to the game's in-depth character creator. There are eight wand styles to choose from: notched classic, soft spiral, spiral, stalk, ringed, crooked, and natural. These appear to be inspired by the wand styles seen in the movies.
Each style then has three variations to choose from, resulting in 24 different options to choose from.
After that, you choose your 'Wood Type.' The developers have gone to town here with 38 variations covering virtually every tree that was ever available to the late Victorian magical community. Options include alder, aspen, beech, English oak, poplar, willow, and yew. Each of these is said to enlighten the user's personality and magical style.
After that, you select your wand's length, have 19 levels of flexibility to choose from, and as a measure of how distinct they are, you may wish your wand to be "swishy" or "surprisingly swishy."
Dragon Heartstring, Unicorn Hair, and Phoenix Feather are the most powerful wands, while Unicorn Hair is said to be difficult to use for Dark Arts, and Phoenix Feather is for those who want the most versatility.
Effect on gameplay
Strangely, despite the game's guiding you to believe that your wand choices will have an impact on your character's magical development and suite of spells, it's all just cosmetic. Your choices have absolutely no bearing on what powers you'll possess throughout Hogwarts Legacy, though in its defense, it's nice to be able to customize it such a lot.
The many wand handles you'll find throughout the game are also strictly cosmetic and, unlike cloaks, hats, etc., they don't affect your character's stats in any way, at least not via a photo mode.
Do you already have a wand?
Hogwarts Legacy allows you to link your Harry Potter Fan Club account to your WB Games account, so that you may already have a wand there, so you may import it into the game (the same applies to your Hogwarts house selection). If you choose this option, the wand Ollivander presents you with will already be personalized to you, although you may still edit it in the game.
The whole wizarding world feature is perhaps overly detailed, considering that it has little impact on gameplay, but anyway, the majority of gamers in this game are avid Potter fans, and clever details like this only help you immerse yourself deeper in the Wizarding World.
On PlayStation 5, Xbox Series S|X, and PC, Hogwarts Legacy will be released on February 10, with the PS4 and the Xbox One launching on April 4, and the Nintendo Switch on July 25.