Parent's Guide: Wonderbook: Book of Potions - Age rating, mature content and difficulty

Wonderbook: Book of Potions is an "augmented reality" game for the Playstation 3 that makes use of Sony's big blue book, the titular Wonderbook. In order to get started, you'll need a Playstation Move controller, a Playstation Eye camera, and the Wonderbook itself (although that does come bundled with the game). All you need to do then is put your Wonderbook on the floor in front of the Playstation Eye, and your living room will be transformed into a wizard's lair of toil and trouble - and your Move controller into a wizard's wand.

Playing out less like a game, and more like the world's most impressive pop-up book, turning the pages of the Wonderbook will take you on a journey through the Harry Potter world, as you learn about items and creatures, brew your own potions, and eventually put them to use in chapter-ending mini-game. With seven potions to create, you'll make your way through the book from start to finish seven times, with a new challenge on each page. Whether you're using your Move controller as a magnifying glass to examine fairies, using it as a Wand to zap enemies in mini-games, or as a pointer to "fill in the blanks" during the interactive pop-up book style stories, there's plenty of inventive ways to make use of the controller that'll have adults (and children's) jaws on the floor alike.

As it's anything but action packed, though, Wonderbook: Book of Potions is one for those who prefer their games to be that little bit slower. With plenty of cool effects and tricks to keep young minds interested, and full voice acting to help those who can't yet read, this is a game that even younger players should have few troubles getting involved with. Perhaps the only real barrier is that some of the mini-games are poorly explained, and they're sometimes fairly tricky to guess. The game doesn't explain how to use a catapult to fire at red cap goblins, for example, while the process itself is fairly complex - you need to use the Move controller to aim a line on screen, and press the Move button to start a circle moving up that line, which lets you set the distance for your shot. When the circle moves over a goblin, you can press the Move button to fire your shot, which isn't impossible to work out for yourself - but it'd be a lot easier with some explanation. Luckily, moments like this are few and far between though, and on the whole young children should have little problems with this.

Sticking close to its source material, there's little for parents to be concerned about in Wonderbook: Book of Potions. There's no violence, sex, or bad language, but there are a few potentially squeamish scenes in which you have to squish a leech to use its juices - which seems a bit cruel, as it's still alive.

Age Ratings

Format Reviewed: Playstation 3