Avalanche Software's Hogwarts Legacy may have been snubbed by The Game Awards 2023, receiving no nomination whatsoever, but it certainly topped many other charts.
To begin with, it is the best-selling game of the year, and that was true even before the Nintendo Switch version launched in mid-November. Following that release, the game returned to the very top of the weekly UK physical chart.
In early May, just as the game debuted on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One consoles, Warner Bros. Discovery revealed it had already earned over $1 billion in retail sales, having sold over 15 million copies. Just a few weeks later, WB Discovery CEO David Zaslav updated the revenue milestone to $1.3 billion.
We haven't received any other official sales updates from Warner Bros. so far, but it is likely Hogwarts Legacy hasn't broken the 20 million milestone yet, or we would've heard of it. Still, its enormous success was more than enough to start the rumor mill for a sequel, while no word or rumor has been spread about potential DLC.
It's not just sales, though. Now, Google has also crowned Hogwarts Legacy as the most searched videogame (globally) throughout the year. The action RPG set in the late 1800s within J.K. Rowling's Wizarding World managed to beat Naughty Dog's The Last of Us, Connections (the word videogame made by The New York Times), Battlegrounds Mobile India (the Indian version of PUBG Mobile), Bethesda Game Studios' Starfield, Larian's Baldur's Gate 3, Watermelon Game (a physics puzzle game by MomSesImSpcl), Blizzard Entertainment's Diablo IV, Mundfish's Atomic Heart, and Endnight's Sons of the Forest.
In Wccftech's review, Hogwarts Legacy was rated 8.5 out of 10 by Chris Wray:
Hogwarts Legacy is, for better or worse, an entertaining and engaging game. By far the best digital version of the Wizarding World, it offers a vast swathe of things to do. Even the more mundane elements (bandit camps!) are improved by a robust combat system that genuinely makes you feel like you're a part of the Harry Potter universe.
About the author: With over two decades of experience in gaming journalism, Alessio Palumbo has led the gaming vertical at Wccftech since August 2015. He started working at a young age for Italian websites like Everyeye.it, Gamestar.it, Nextgame.it, and Multiplayer.it before kickstarting the indie English-language publication Worlds Factory as its founder and Editor in Chief. In the last decade, he has coordinated the overall output of Wccftech's gaming section, managed PR relations, assigned reviews, produced daily news coverage, edited gaming content as needed, and delivered game reviews. Arguably, his trademark content is the long series of exclusive developer interviews that have been cited by Wikipedia and by the biggest news media and gaming publications. His passion for technology also makes him knowledgeable when it comes to gaming hardware and tech. His favorite genres include RPGs, MMORPGs, and action/adventure games.
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