It's not like your standard game of Clue.
Clue: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Edition features Harry Potter-theme characters, locations and items but with a few new twists like secret doors, magic items, floo powder and dark mark challenges.
It's a magically fun game for children and adults.
Hasbro is getting good at making just enough tweaks to its standard lineup of games to keep customers coming back. Unless you're a collector, do you really need 10 different Clue board games? Probably not. However, if a few game options are changed, extra cards are added and the board is expanded, things become much more interesting.
Clue: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Edition begins in standard Clue fashion with the mysterious disappearance of a Hogwarts student by foul play. It's up to the player to find out who might be involved, what item or spell was used and the location where it happened. So far it sounds like basic Clue, right? Not quite.
First, the biggest change to this edition is player movement. Using large turning cardboard dials attached underneath the board, players randomly determine what fireplaces are lit and where travel can occur at the different locations on the board. Each player has a stash of floo powder tokens that can be used for travel.
For example, you can move from Gringotts to the Ministry of Magic in a single move through the floo network. The Burrow location sits directly at the center of the board and is only used when a player thinks he or she has all the clues necessary to solve the game.
Second, the moving dials also open and close doors to some of the rooms blocking or allowing access. Blocked doors can only be opened by magic items.
There are also two decks of cards separate from the standard clue cards featuring people, items and locations. One is a deck of dark cards and the other is a deck of help cards. The dark cards come up randomly by dice rolls or by the rotating dials that make up the playing board. When the dark mark is seen, a dark card is read and its negative affects applied. Some dark cards can be prevented by special help cards. Help cards are drawn by special die rolls throughout the game.
Clue: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Edition plays quicker than regular Clue and drawing cards and using the floo network is quite fun.
The negative effects of the dark cards usually take away floo powder, which can limit your movement and the number of accusations you make every turn. Playing the game was quite fun and engrossing and the new twists added to the game play in a positive way.
One gripe is the component quality of the game: generic playing pieces, cardboard counters for weapons and thin, flimsy cards. The sturdier components from previous versions of Clue were exciting to handle and looked great on the table.
Ryan Morgenegg is a multimedia specialist for the Deseret News.