A couple of weeks ago when it came out I mentioned that none of the gaming podcasts I listen to had really even mentioned the broom game. Now a couple of weeks later that has slightly changed,
Waypoint Radio Ep. 541 devotes about 1/2 an hour to a discussion of the game, the issues, and holding people accountable for their shit. It’s led by regular host Renata Price, who is a transwoman, and while regular boing boingers might not get much new, it’s a good summary that might be useful to pass on to friends that might
Triple Click Episode 143 goes farther. All three of the hosts (Maddy Myers, Jason Schreier, and Kirk Hamilton) are games journalists, so they had to play it as part of their jobs, but they took the opportunity to take that experience and turn it into a long discussion of their history with the franchise (Maddy, for example, started reading them when she was 10 as they came out and was very active in the fan fiction community, Kirk in his early teens and liked them, and Jason as he started college and thought they were ok - so there is a good range of fandom represented), how they have felt about it as they get older and, of course, how they feel about it today in light of J.K. Rowling revealing herself to be a bigot. They also talk about their experience with the game itself.
tldl: They have soured on Rowling and Harry Potter. Aside from the the actual Hogwarts Castle (which is apparently a very detailed location) the game was flat, and despite some interesting bits in the castle, really just like an Ubisoft open world game with Harry Potter paint on it. None of them intend to play further past the point that they had to, for both reasons, but think that even if Rowling weren’t an asshole that would have just meant they could have fully enjoyed the few interesting bits at the beginning before still falling off.
They also talk a lot about the issues in the books that they did not see when they were younger - the lily white wizarding world with token diversity (which makes the games increase in inclusion feel weird - what happened to all the diversity (POC, queer people, and a token trans character) portrayed in the game (set in 1890) during the hundred years between the game and the books? This leads into a discussion of how the problems with Rowling and the original books, and Rowling’s continued control of and involvement with the franchise make it impossible to separate her and the flaws of the books from any new works.
It’s a good, thoughtful discussion by people who at least liked (and in one case loved) the universe and who love games about the problems around all of this.
I think the top one is from one of those Big Brother shows?