Harry Potter: Quidditch Champions is September’s best PS Plus game

I haven’t engaged with much Harry Potter media in recent years (the abhorent views of the series’ creator has soured me on all things Potter), but I still have fond memories of Quidditch, Harry Potter’s unique broomstick-riding sport. The Quidditch scenes in the movie adaptations were always my favorites, and one of the first games I remember playing consistently on PC was 2003’s Harry Potter: Quidditch World Cup. I’m no longer actively seeking out Harry Potter media on my own, but when I saw Harry Potter: Quidditch Champions had launched into PlayStation Plus and was a spiritual successor to Quidditch World Cup, I was curious enough to check it out.

I’m glad I did so because developer Unbroken Studios understands just how entertaining the fictional game can be. Quidditch is a wildly novel sport that finds a magical middle ground between soccer, rugby, and racing. It makes the transition to video game form surprisingly smoothly. As a free PS Plus bonus, Harry Potter: Quidditch Champions is an enjoyable blast from the past for me.

Grab that snitch

In Quidditch Champions, two teams of six fly around on broomsticks, aiming to throw a ball called a Quaffle into one of their opponent’s ring-shaped goals suspended high above the ground. Each goal grants players 10 points, and the team with the most points at the end of seven minutes or the first to reach 100 points wins. That alone is satisfying enough, as flying around on broomsticks and bashing into other players feels intuitive. It can feel like Rocket League at times as I drifted around the pitch in order to be the first to a Quaffle flying through the air.

The various roles players can take on give Quidditch Champions more depth. The Chaser is an all-around role. The Keeper is Quidditch’s version of the goalkeeper, who must make snap decisions on which rings to defend when the opponent is trying to score. The Beater is more defensive, throwing Bludgers and ramming into opponents to get them to drop the Quaffle or