Hogwarts Legacy and other Harry Potter games banned by Games Done Quick

The controversy surrounding Hogwarts Legacy doesn't catch a break. Recently, Games Done Quick (GDC) announced that WB and Avalanche Games' latest fantasy role-playing title and all other Harry Potter video games have been banned from future speedrunning events.

The move comes courtesy of the new direction for Games Done Quick (GDQ), which sees many other games getting banned alongside the prominent Wizarding World titles.

The news of Avalanche Games' latest fantasy role-playing tile getting banned comes from the new GDQ submission guidelines, as players begin to submit their runs for the upcoming GDQ event, "Summer Games Done Quick 2023." The list also contains many popular titles like Five Nights at Freddy's, Ion Fury, and even the original God of War title.

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Games Done Quick bans Hogwarts Legacy alongside other Harry Potter games from their upcoming events

According to GDQ, the list of disallowed games is curated based on "content, views, or an origin that we have deemed unsuitable for their stream." This includes all games with an ESRB rating of "Adults Only" as well as ones that are prohibited on Twitch. All the games that got banned by GDQ are as follows:

• Air Control
• America's Most Wanted
• Barkley, Shut Up and Jam: Gaiden
• Five Nights at Freddy's Series
• Frog Fractions
• God of War (2005)
• Harry Potter series, including Hogwarts Legacy
• Huniepop Series
• Ion Fury
• Kurovadis
• Eroico
• Natsuiro High School: Seishun Hakusho
• Rocko's Quest

It should be noted that, on GDQ's submission guidelines page, the Harry Potter games (including Hogwarts Legacy) and Five Nights at Freddy's titles are stated as "subject to further review," which suggests that the ban on these titles might not be permanent.

The Harry Potter games, and Hogwarts Legacy as an extension, are pretty tame compared to others on the "disallowed games" list. For the most part, they do not feature explicit or mature content. However, the titles getting banned can be attributed to the controversial statements made by the author of the Harry Potter novels.

Even before its release, Hogwarts Legacy was constantly under fire from groups of people who stood in opposition to J.K. Rowling, the author of the Wizarding World stories (including Harry Potter and the spin-off series Fantastic Beasts).

While J.K. Rowling is not directly involved in the game's development, she is still the creator of the universe that Avalanche Games' fantasy RPG is set in.

Although the game received mostly positive reviews from players and critics, the controversy surrounding it somewhat marred what is otherwise a pretty robust and enjoyable role-playing experience and a title that fans of the Potterverse have been asking for, for over a decade.