….
[LIE Gaming Studio]
The atmosphere in LIE Gaming Studio is crowded - filled by gamers, game designers, and gaming news outlets.
Regal stood behind the closed stage - hearing the whispering just beyond the wall.
"So this is the little girl who got you into the Harry Potter world?" he asked. "You should be grateful."
"Ugh… that will just inflate her ego. She is already too much like my sister—"
The sentence cut off as the girl pinched his stomach.
"Right." David stiffened, then corrected himself immediately, his tone turning thick with sarcasm. "I am extremely and eternally grateful to my niece for introducing me to this magical world."
The girl looked pleased, the man resigned, and Regal let out a quiet laugh as he watched them, just an uncle and niece:
Emma and David.
Emma had been a Harry Potter fan since childhood, while David worked at LIE Studios' gaming division, part of the team developing the Harry Potter title that had been in production since September 18th nearly two years ago and was still far from finished, but today wasn't about completion, it was about the first look.
After years of silence, the world was finally going to see what they had built.
"I would have liked to talk longer, especially with you." Regal said, glancing at Emma. "But that will have to wait. I have something to show the audience first."
He turned toward the curtain as the crowd's rising noise pressed against it, the anchor holding the energy steady while the room itself leaned forward, restless and waiting.
Media filled the space, cameras, press badges, and phones glowing in raised hands, beyond them a crowd of fans who had followed every teaser for two years.
Regal felt his heart pounding, something that hadn't happened in a long time; he had stood through premieres, press tours, and investor pitches without a flicker, but this was different, this was his game, and in minutes the world would see it.
A grin spread across his face, uncontained.
"What's with that creepy smile?"
Pete, Creative Director and co-architect of what they were about to reveal, walked over with a bottle of water and a tablet. "Seriously, you are going to scare people."
Regal didn't dial it back.
"Pete." He raised a fist. "Let's blow their minds."
Pete bumped it without hesitation, matching the grin. "I want them to lose it, properly. At least ten people passed out from excitement."
"Maybe aim lower… or better, none." Samantha said, stepping in with her clipboard, already in full control mode. "And both of you, stop smiling, if his was creepy, yours is straight-up devilish."
Rock and Simon fell in behind her with the rest of the team, all suited, all running on adrenaline and too little sleep, as the anchor's voice swelled beyond the curtain and the crowd answered, not a cheer, but a rising pull of thousands leaning forward.
It was time.
Regal adjusted his suit, tugged his lapels, rolled his shoulders. "Okay." he said quietly. "Let's kill this."
"Yep." Pete replied with ease. "Kill everyone."
"What are you two–" Samantha began, but Regal was already walking.
"Regal isn't usually this violent." she sighed.
"Wrong." Pete waved it off. "He just matches the energy around him, that's on him, not me."
….
Regal stepped through the curtain and into the light, and the sound hit him like a wall.
The anchor was still on stage, she had been mid-sentence, trying to set up some kind of introduction, but the crowd didn't let her finish.
The second Regal appeared, the roar swallowed everything: voices and clapping and shouts all merging into one massive, sustained wave that echoed off the ceiling and rattled the stage monitors.
The anchor looked at him, he gave her a nod, a small one, appreciative, I have got it from here, and she stepped aside with a smile.
The noise didn't stop.
He walked to center stage, took a breath and let it wash over him for a second.
And then, in the first row, just slightly to the left, he saw her - Gwendolyn.
Sitting with her legs crossed, watching him with that look she got when she was proud of him but would never say it out loud in front of people. He gave her a small smile, a quick wink.
She shook her head, barely, but she was smiling.
Right.
Regal decided to match their energy.
"LADIES AND GENTLEMEN–" He spread his arms wide. "WELCOME TO THE SHOW."
The roar doubled, tripled and he could feel the floor vibrating through his shoes.
"Yeah! I like the energy!" He laughed into the mic. "But… but, but, but…. maybe take a breather? Can't have you waste everything before you have even seen the thing."
The noise didn't die down, if anything, it got louder, and now individual shouts were breaking through, names, questions, someone yelling something about how is he.
Regal grinned. "Yeah, yeah. I know. I am asking a lot from the Harry Potter fandom. You guys show love with volume. So, you know what? It's your call."
He waited, hands in his pockets, letting the room do its thing.
Slowly, the noise settled, not into silence, but into an electric, barely contained hum, like a room full of people holding their breath.
"Now." Regal said, pacing a few steps. "For those of you who came here hoping to catch a glimpse of our Harry Potter main trio…" He paused, gave an apologetic wince. "I hate to break it to you, but the kids are busy with exams. Especially our Ron."
A mild ripple of disappointment moved through the crowd, softened by a few light remarks from the front rows as most simply nodded, Regal had already made it clear that none of the Harry Potter cast would be present.
He didn't deal in false expectations.
"Now. The game." He stopped pacing. Let the words land. "[Philosopher's Curse: The Hogwarts Experience]. I am not going to drag this out, because honestly? I am as excited to watch this with you as you are to see it."
He let the title hang for a moment as the crowd murmured, already familiar with the name, yet hearing it spoken here, on this stage, made it feel real in a way it hadn't before.
"But one more slight disappointment on the way, and then I promise we're done with those." He held up a hand. "This game doesn't follow Harry's story."
The energy dipped, confusion rippling through the crowd, a few groans slipping out as fans exchanged uncertain looks, having assumed something else.
Regal let it sit for two seconds.
"It follows the story of a wizard." he said, pausing just long enough. "A wizard that could be anyone… even you."
His gaze moved across the room as the murmur shifted and understanding began to form.
"That's the point of this game." he continued, voice lowering to pull them in. "We are already seeing the story of Harry Potter, in the coming books and movies. That story is being told and will be in the future."
He gestured outward, to everyone at once. "So now it's time to live ours, your story, your choices, your house, your path through Hogwarts… your wizard."
The energy surged back, building through the room as realization spread.
"That is what makes this special." Regal said, opening his arms. "This isn't a story I am telling you…. but the one you will tell yourselves."
The roar returned, stronger than before, vibrating through the space as he let it peak, then, as it began to settle:
"Now." he said, stepping to the side of the stage. "Let's watch… a little peek of our story."
He raised a finger, pausing just long enough. "Two years of work compressed into a trailer, four minutes and twelve seconds."
A beat and he blinked. "Actually… that's not that small, is it?"
Laughter rippled through the crowd.
"Yeah, that's pretty long for a trailer." he added, scratching the back of his neck as he corrected himself in real time. "You know what, it doesn't matter."
More laughter, a few cheers, the audience leaning into it as much as the reveal itself.
"Alright." he said, cutting it clean. "Okay time to see how this turns out. I am off."
A small wave, a step back, and the lights dropped.
The stage dimmed as the noise settled into something tighter than silence, a charged anticipation that prickled across the room. The massive screen flickered once, then came alive.
The title formed first, slow, golden letters materializing like they were being written by an invisible hand, ink that shimmered with the kind of magic that anyone who'd ever opened a [Harry Potter] book recognized in their bones.
A broomstick swept across the frame, trailing sparks that dissolved into floating embers. The music rose from somewhere deep and low and ancient, wrapping around the room like a spell being cast on everyone in it simultaneously.
[PHILOSOPHER'S CURSE: THE HOGWARTS EXPERIENCE]
At the edge of the stage, arms crossed in the dark, Regal watched with the same quiet awe as everyone else, no longer a CEO or producer, just a fan seeing it for the first time in three years.
….
The trailer started heavily relying on any long shots encompassing the world they have built:
Visuals. Atmosphere. A promise.
A train - the train - cutting through fog and green countryside, the Hogwarts Express rendered in a level of detail that made the windows reflect passing clouds individually.
The camera pushed through the glass, into a compartment, past students who moved and breathed and looked alive in ways that game characters historically don't - micro-expressions, fabric that shifted with the body, light catching the dust motes drifting between them.
Then Hogwarts.
The castle materialized through mist, towers emerging one by one, and the room collectively inhaled. Not because they hadn't seen Hogwarts before - they had seen it a hundred times, in films, in art, in their own imaginations.
But this was different.
This Hogwarts had weight. Stone that looked cold. Windows that caught the dying sun. Ivy that moved in wind that seemed to exist independently of the camera. It was a place, not a backdrop. Somewhere you could walk into and stay.
The graphic fidelity was so far beyond what anyone had expected that a visible confusion swept through the crowd.
People were glancing at each other, whispering.
This looked like… no.
It couldn't be.
Was this a cinematic cutscene? A pre-rendered sequence? Because this couldn't possibly be gameplay.
But then a HUD element flickered in the corner of the screen…. and the realization landed:
–this was the game.
This was what it looked like. And the whispers turned to shouts.
….
And then the trailer shifted.
The sweeping cinematic visuals gave way to something more structured - clean, elegant text overlays appearing beside gameplay footage, each one landing like a quiet detonation.
[Interactive Objects: 12,400+]
The footage showed a student's hand reaching for a book on a shelf. The book came out. The shelf shifted. A hidden compartment opened behind it.
[Voice Actors: 87]
….
.
[To be continued…]
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