Hogwarts Legacy missed a trick by not doing more with its companions

gamesradar.com:

"I wish someone was here to see that", says my fifth-year Hogwarts Legacy student to literally no one. It's a lament I hear a lot outside of missions, but this particular uttering happens just seconds after pulling off a combo of spells and attacks that I'm unashamedly proud of. But, as we stand among the fallen goblins and dark wizards, there isn't anyone to see what we've achieved in that moment – or on many of our adventures through the wizarding world.

Instead, the characters I've come to see as friends over the course of the game are probably in class somewhere, noses buried in textbooks, or frolicking in the common rooms thinking about Quidditch or potions. The only times I've been able to spend time with them – beyond a passing comment in a corridor – are the set missions that Hogwarts Legacy has allowed me to have with them. For a game based on a series of books with friendship so firmly at their core, Hogwarts Legacy is an oddly isolated experience.

There's no romance in Hogwarts Legacy, so why do I feel like I'm third-wheeling?

It's in those quests and relationship-focused side missions that you do get to know and love the five characters that make your core Hogwarts Legacy companions. They're brilliantly written, fun to be around, and have interesting storylines of their own away from talk of map chambers and trials. There's Sebastian Sallow, the dark-magic-obsessed Slytherin trying to cure his sister's curse, his blind and concerned friend and fellow Slytherin Ominis Gaunt, Poppy Sweeting who lives up to her name as a softly spoken, magical beast-loving Hufflepuff, and Natsai (Natty) Onai, the brave, justice-seeking Griffindor. There's also the astrology-obsessed Ravenclaw Amit Thakkar, who although not as