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Pottermore is
a website about the Harry
Potter book
series. Developed by J.
K. Rowling,
and partnered by Sony,
he site provides an area for fans to
engage in an online experience that coincides with reading the books. The site features many of Rowling's thoughts, several pages of text that were not included in the novels, a service that sells e-book and audiobook versions of the seven Harry Potter novels, and over 18,000 words of additional content. This additional content includes a large number of background details and settings.
Registration for the limited beta
release began
on 31 July 2011 (the birthday of both Rowling and her character Harry
Potter).
This allowed for the first one million fans to complete The Magical
Quill challenge. Registration was originally intended to open to all in
October 2011,but
the beta period was extended.
Pottermore opened to the public on 14 April 2012.Currently,
the interactive experience is only available for Harry
Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Harry
Potter and the Chamber of Secrets and
the first seven chapters of Harry
Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.
Development Pottermore had been in development for two years since its incorporation in April 2009.[The Leaky Cauldron's Melissa Anelli has been involved with the project since October 2009. On 15 June 2011, various Harry Potter fan sites including The Leaky Cauldron, MuggleNet and HPANA began to release geographical coordinates to letters that could be found on SecretStreetView.com. This website, created by Rowling, integrates Google Maps to reveal hidden letters that would spell out the title of her secret announcement. A webpage announcing the project first appeared in June 2011,where the webpage linked to a custom interactive YouTube channel featuring a countdown.Owls gathered on various other Harry Potter pages linked to this countdown as well.Rowling revealed some details of the site via a YouTube video on 23 June 2011.
Features
Exploring the books Visitors of to the website are able to participate in interactive reading experiences or moments beginning with the first book Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. Users can move through the chapters and follow Harry while collecting items for themselves such as: potion ingredients, books, galleons (a form of wizard currency), and candy. These feats earn users House points once they are sorted by the Sorting Hat. Furthermore, users are able to visit Diagon Alley, learn spells, duel other users, and brew potions. In addition to exploring the books, students from different Houses can compete with each other for the House Cup by gaining House points mainly through dueling and potion making.
Brewing potions
Pottermore gives users an opportunity to make their own potions in three
different cauldrons made
of pewter, brass and copper.
Each cauldron can make potions of increasing speed, with pewter being
the slowest and copper the fastest. Pewter cauldrons cost 15 galleons,
brass cauldrons cost 21 galleons, and copper cauldrons cost 25 galleons.
With ingredients bought in Diagon Alley or found while exploring
moments, users can make six different potions, each of which rewards
them House points if completed successfully. However, a potion can fail
if the wrong amount of an ingredient is added. This can happen if a user
leaves it to brew too long, does not keep the temperature within the
correct range, stirs the potion the wrong way, or crushes ingredients
too finely or not finely enough.
The potions that can be made in Harry
Potter and the Philosopher's Stone are
antidotes to Common Poisons, Cure for Boils, Forgetfulness Potion,
Herbicide, Sleeping Draught and Wideye, Awakening Potion, Swelling
Solution, or Polyjuice Potion.
Spells
Users can practice spells on
their own and use them later against other members of Pottermore in a
Wizard's Duel. A select amount of the letters in the spell are
displayed, which the user has to click each twice before moving on to
the next letter. There are four spellbooks: The
Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1), The
Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection, Curses
and Counter-Curses, and The
Standard Book of Spells (Grade 2). The spells that are currently
available to members of the site are as follows:
·
The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1)
·
Fire-Making Spell (Incendio), conjures flames
·
The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection
·
Curse of Bogies (Mucus Ad Nauseam), gives the opponent an extremely
runny nose
·
Knockback Jinx (Flipendo), knocks opponent over
·
Curses and Counter-Curses
·
Full Body-Bind (Petrificus Totalus), paralyzes opponent
·
Jelly-Legs Jinx (Locomotor Wibbly), collapses opponent's legs
·
Leg Locker Curse (Locomotor Mortis), binds opponent's legs
·
Pimple Jinx (Furnunculus), causes pimples to erupt on the opponent
·
Stickfast Hex (Colloshoo), sticks opponent's shoes to floor
·
Tickling Hex (Titillando), tickles opponent
·
Tongue-Tying Spell (Mimble Wimble), ties opponent's tongue in a knot
·
The Standard Book of Spells, (Grade 2)
Wizard's duel Each member of Pottermore has the ability to duel with other users. Each user can choose a spell to use against their opponent, and the winner is determined based on the rating of the spell cast. Users can practice against members belonging to their same House, but can only challenge members of other Houses. The winner receives five points for their House, while the loser receives zero points. The Wizard's Duel was shut down shortly after the site opened, but was restored on 13 December 2011.
House points and Cup Each member of Pottermore wins and loses House points as they duel, brew potions, and explore the books. These are then added and subtracted from the total for that member's House (Slytherin, Ravenclaw, Gryffindor, or Hufflepuff). All the members of each House work together to give their House more points than any other House. Every so often, a House cup with a special reward is awarded to the House with the most points, after which the points are reset. The first House Cup was awarded on 5 July 2012 to Slytherin, who also received early access to Chapters 1-4 of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. The second House Cup was awarded to Gryffindor on November 21st 2012, who received various screensavers and desktop backgrounds for their electronic devices.
Artwork
The concept of exploring key scenes from the books in a 2D/3D style and
the beautiful illustrations crafted for each of the scenes were created
by leading UK art studio Atomhawk
Design.
Atomhawk is also known for it's visual designs in several other
interactive games and platforms, such as Kinectimals (2010),Enslaved:
Odyssey to the West (2010), Mortal
Kombat (2011), Dead
Island (2011), Driver
San Francisco (2011),
and Doctor
Who: The Adventure Games (2010
- 2011).
History
Early registration: The Magical Quill Challenge
The website was launched on 31 July 2011, with an overwhelming number of
people trying to access the site. The site subsequently had a page
refresher and those who could get into Pottermore were informed of The
Magical Quill challenge. This allowed users who completed the challenge
to complete the early registration for the site. The challenge spanned
seven days, with each day corresponding to a certain book in the series;
with Day one corresponding to Harry
Potter and the Philosopher's Stone,
Day two corresponding with Harry
Potter and the Chamber of Secrets and
so on. Each day had a clue, which corresponded with the related novel
which the user must solve to enable their right to register before
October. The website would pick the person's username randomly showing
five names to choose from, for child safety. Only a certain number of
people each day were allowed to use their Magic Quill clue for
registration, to total to one million users at the end of the challenge
(6 August 2011).While many accounts were created by fans during the
early registration phase, many users created multiple accounts and sold
them for high prices on eBay,
despite being warned by the Pottermore blog and being assured that the
website would remain a free site. Some of these accounts were created by cyber
criminals hoping
to target Harry
Potter fans.They
posted promises of early previews and access to the site, leading people
to unintentionally buy malicious software and allow people to hack their
accounts. The
following table is an overview of the seven day challenge. Clues on days
1–3 were more difficult than the clues on days 4–7. For
North Americans, the final clue was released on 5 August 2011 instead of
6 August 2011. This was due to the fact that the clue was released at
1:00 am BST (British Summer time).
Philosopher's Stone: beta release
"I think Pottermore has the potential to be a lasting focal point for
the Harry Potter brand – The Leaky Cauldron for the fans. I think the
fact that it incorporates new content, a social networking element, and
is also the only place people will be able to buy the ebooks will prove
to be quite a potent combination..." —Charlotte Williams, The Bookseller On 10 August 2011, Pottermore sent a congratulations email to registered users, confirming that they would get early entry and that the beta period would begin once the sign-in button had reappeared on the website.On 15 August 2011, the sign-in button reappeared on the website, welcome emails were sent out and the beta period began.A very small number of users were invited to begin their use of Pottermore on the first day,with more users subsequently being invited until 27 September, when the final invitation emails were sent.The site received positive reviews from users and the media during the beta period. They praised the beautiful artwork on the site as well as extra content revealed by Rowling.Bryan Young of The Huffington Post has said, "to say that Pottermore is an immersive experience might be an understatement." He commented that the beta site still had a few problems, but also said that "the experience [was] smooth and utterly absorbing." Early users also said that even though the site did not bring back the feeling of excitement from when the books were released, it did add an extra layer to the reading experience, similar to the maps and additional content released for The Lord of the Rings series.
Public launch Pottermore was originally scheduled to become publicly available at the end of October 2011, but the beta period was extended.The Pottermore Shop (which sells Harry Potter eBooks and digital audio books) became available on 27 March 2012. Pottermore has also included an introduction video an its home page stating the same.On 8 March 2012, it was reported that Pottermore would open to the public in early April 2012. The website officially opened on 14 April 2012, but the interactive experience was only available for Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.
Chamber of Secrets
On 15 July 2012, the first four chapters of Harry
Potter and the Chamber of Secrets were
released for Slytherin House only; it was released to everyone else on
16 July. On 18 September, chapters 5-11 were released. Accompanying
these releases were new features. These included badges, the ability for
users to see their own all-time house points as well as the number
earned since the last house cup, second year schoolbooks, more galleons
to spend in Diagon Alley, and a status field for user profiles. The
final installment of chapters, including chapters twelve through
eighteen, launched on 31 October 2012.
Prisoner of Azkaban
The first 7 chapters of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban were
released on December 20, 2012.
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