The Art and Making of Hogwarts Legacy: The Magical Artbook

I am sure that many of you are familiar with the story of the Boy Who Lived. And that there are those among you who have tried on the role of a wizard and would like to be in Hogwarts for a day. Thanks to the Portkey Games developers, who created Hogwarts Legacy, you have this opportunity. But if you want to explore the world of Hogwarts Legacy in even more detail, you can refer to the artbook “The Art and Making of Hogwarts Legacy”, which contains stories about the game creation, descriptions of locations, character outfits, bizarre creatures, fascinating plants, and much, much more. You will be able to see in detail various art concepts that evolved from mere sketches into a complete fantasy world, and there is plenty to see because 250 pages contain not only descriptions but also magically detailed illustrations.

It is hard to describe the childlike excitement of looking at this artbook and reading its stories. Flipping through the crispy pages that smell so temptingly of printing, you will see that the universe of Harry Potter books and movies reveals itself from a different angle, but simultaneously the Hogwarts Legacy and the artbook “The Art and Making of Hogwarts Legacy” do not focus on the story and adventures of the three best friends and are standalone pieces.

Formulas for magical translation

To translate this artbook, we also sometimes needed magic. Mostly, we drew it from the Harry Potter series of books (you can read them in Ukrainian online for free on the Pottermore Publishing website) and partially from the video game’s Ukrainianizer (the installation guide can be found on Steam).

In particular, there was some wizarding slang in the game. For example, capeflapper is a term used to describe wizards who are not very clever. In the volunteer translation for the video game, as we saw, it was translated differently. The most popular variants there are «шанувальник накидок», «опудало», «придурок». We decided to play with «мантія» and synonyms for «дурень». That’s how we came up with the final version: мантелепень.

Another interesting term is nab-sack. This is a bag for catching animals. It was not in the books either. In the translation of the video game, we found variants of «хап-мішок» and «схопи-торба». We liked the latter, so we used it.

Everyone knows that proper names (names, surnames, places) in works that reflect reality are usually not translated. However, anyone who has read the Harry Potter books knows that in this world, reality is closely intertwined with fantasy, and therefore it is very difficult to find a single approach to the translation of terms: on the one hand, there is Harry, who has a common Potter surname for the English-speaking world and has nothing to do with pottery, and on the other hand, there are professors and other characters whose names have a connotation that is lost without translation. But over-adaptation can spoil the world’s atmosphere because it won’t sound as “magical” anymore.

In general, this artbook will be a real find for fans of the Hogwarts universe, because where else can you read about the origin of the game’s characters, learn their stories, look into the most famous locations, and discover their secrets? I am sure that this artbook will inspire you to play the game more than once and explore it in more detail.

Read more about this project here.

We are very grateful to MAL’OPUS for the opportunity to work on this artbook. We also express our gratitude to all those who support us in any way.

Tetiana Cherednychok, Sofia Shul

Translated by Anna Chyrva

September 25, 2023