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Ace Attorney/逆転裁判

Pokemon Power

Well-Known Member
Uh, this is for a Capcom franchise, not a Nintendo franchise. So why is it here instead of the Other Video Game Discussion sub-forum?
 

Excitable Boy

is a metaphor
Finished the game. I'm finally free.

Well, until Thursday rolls around, anyway.

Considering that the two days for Case 5 and for Case 3 were effectively two separate cases, this game rolled by pretty quickly; essentially, there's seven trials, but each trial only lasts one day.

The hot Apollo-on-Phoenix action doesn't do a lot for me, honestly; it felt somewhat hamstrung by having the murder case masquerading as a civil trial. Having two characters written as stand-ins for the player facing off doesn't work for interesting interactions; there's just not much to be done with them, frankly. Phoenix being threatened by Atishon was obvious as soon as he showed up there, so there's no revelation to be had there.

I'm wondering if in some alternate universe, this part would've been Case 4 and the latter half lengthened into its own Case 5. TT and DD used connected cases for 4 and 5 with 4 going unfinished in both, so it seems odd that two completely different trials were condensed here.

The second part was... I dunno. The reveals were easy enough to keep up with before they happened (prosopognosia was obvious as soon as I got the notepad, Dhurke close to death + disappearing after Nayna comes in is self-explanatory), but it's hard for me to stay interested once the case just devolves into a clusterf*ck of everyone running around as everyone else. That and the whole "Ga'ran can't channel spirits" thing tossed in at the end reminds me a lot of TT's final case, and not in a good way.

I'm actually glad they went with having Apollo stay in Khura'in; it's a fitting end to his maturity arc, I feel, and his departure can help freshen up the main cast in the next game. Athena's clearly being lined up as the next character to grow up, so it'll be interesting to see where they take this.

And may a just say that I love how Capcom has stopped caring in the slightest about their pun names? Inga's full name is "Inga Karkhuul Haw'kohd Dis'nahm Bi'ahni Lawga Ormo Pohmpus Da'nit Ar'edi Iz Khura'in III," or "Inga Karkhuul How Could This Name Be Any Longer Or More Pompous Than It Already Is Khura'in III." Beautiful, really.

Uh, this is for a Capcom franchise, not a Nintendo franchise. So why is it here instead of the Other Video Game Discussion sub-forum?

Because it exists primarily on Nintendo hardware, and is considered a de facto Nintendo franchise for all intensive porpoises.

Same reason Layton, Yo-Kai Watch, Bayonetta /+ 2, and Monster Hunter all got threads here.
 

Psynergy

Strong Winds
Staff member
Super Mod
Not going to say too much in this post just but I just have to say that so far they're killing it with the music in this one. Loving just about every track so far. I will say though that

This case felt a little more involved than I was expecting from the first case, a lot less straight-forward than I first thought it would be and "Not Rock Star Jesus" was pretty amusing. Maybe it's just been too long since I revisited the other games though, but I also did like the element of everyone being against Phoenix, even Ahlbi for a bit.
 

Chibi_Muffin

Smart Cookie
Game is done.

I have mixed feelings about the ending. On the one hand, Apollo having his own office in Khura'in does show how much the character has grown so it's a fitting ending for him. On the other hand... First off, I don't like saying goodbye to characters, particularly major ones. I don't want this to be the last we see of Apollo nor of the Wright Anything Agency (which is why it's a slight relief that his deal seems to be temporary, although he's likely to be there for at least a few years still), but the only way to do that would be to have cases in both countries again, which was already odd in this game...

Confession: I don't really like the political and international angle Yamazaki's games (I.e. The Investigations, Dual Destinies and this) have taken in the end. It's what made me wary of this one at first, only until after California was revealed to be half the game was I more confident about the game. Part of the reason I prefer the filler is because I like the idea of Ace Attorney being what it was like in the first couple of games - a story about the cases an ordinary law office took. International stuff feels too grand, and had Apollo simply been elsewhere in America I likely wouldn't have been so uncomfortable with the idea. I just loved the dynamic between Phoenix, Athena and Apollo at the office and playing as all of them, and taking some of that away makes the games less exciting.

Similarly, I liked the way we caught out the queen - I think she was pretty obvious as a villain though, and I'm not sure whether I would prefer this over Dual Destinies' final showdown which I did find disappointing in hindsight. Even so, it's like, where do you go from here? You've beaten out a royal! I'm not sure it's possible to keep raising the stakes like this.

The last case with its usage of channeling and twist about channeling was as inventive as heck though. I suppose it'd depend on your view of channeling in the series, but it's fine by me. Even if the idea of Dhurke being dead was pretty shocking. There were a lot of twists and turns in this trial, and for a final trial that might be okay although perhaps it was too much, idk.

Was I the only one expecting a reveal that the founder/Holy Mother was Ami Fey? We never got to know her name after all...

Those end credits though. What a tease. Part of me wishes they would've actually done something with that part of Apollo's past and his feelings about that. The whole revolutionary thing again feels a bit too large scale for me, and it came out of nowhere. We had no idea Apollo had been raised abroad so after two games that part of his past came out of nowhere to me, and I don't hugely appreciate adding massive reveals about a character's past like that after so long, especially when it's pretty clear that this was not planned when Apollo was created (two different writers, after all). It was executed decently enough, but even so, I'm not too happy with them slapping the international element on an established character like that.

So, overall thoughts:

Favourite case: Case 4 - Turnabout Storyteller

It's perhaps short, but that's almost a blessing - it doesn't really have the high stakes 2, 3 and 5 has and it didn't drag either. It had fun twists on the standard mystery tropes of DID (with the personalities not actually being dangerous here) and food as a murder weapon (with allergies to complicate it). Also, Blackquill being the assistant here was really fun, it's certainly gimmicky to have a prosecutor fill that role but considering his and Athena's dynamic it certainly paid off.

Favourite major new character: Rayfa

She seemed like a spoiled brat at first, but that's what made her character arc satisfying, as in case 3 she began learning the problems with what was going on and became more responsible, reflecting the themes of the game (which rather than propaganda seem to be family and succession). Having her be a semi-assistant in case 3 was also nice since it gave us some downtime as such to get used to her.

Favourite minor new character:

I can't decide between Betty and Bonny, Uendo and co, or Sarge as said before. There not much time for most witnesses to develop so there's no arc as such to be invested in for the cases individually, so I'll go with the witnesses I found most fun.

Favourite villain:

I don't really know! I have difficulties with that. :p I liked the ending of case 3 not having a real villain though, Beh'leeb and Tahrust weren't really murderers as such and the whole problem in that case stemmed from the risk from the DC Act, which I guess was a decent way of showing the problem with it in only one case?

Good points of the game:

- Again, Rayfa's arc. Very satisfying and something I wasn't expecting from this character.
- The murder mysteries were also very good, having twists, turns and cleverness without being overly complex.
- Alhbi is also as cute as heck, and I liked seeing him.
- Motives actually matter again, a complaint I had in Dual Destinies.

Meh points of the game:

- Nahyuta. The stuff that happened around him in the final case was neat, but for most of the game his character just felt kind of stagnant, and his base personality wasn't one I really cared for.
- Whilst I like gimmicks in Ace Attorney games, Psyche Locks, Perceive and the Mood Matrix all feel underused, even more so than in DD. Forensics are a fun idea although again underused and the rotating part of fingerprinting felt clunky. Divination Seances were alright although I wouldn't miss them.
- There were the right number of cameos and I liked the characters they picked, although there are two things: I'm not sure if Edgeworth specifically should have returned (I didn't see that character as that necessary tbh), and maybe it would've been nice to see one more character we haven't seen in a while. (And yes, I know about the DLC)
- The overarching revolution plot. It was fun to solve and I liked the revolutionaries as characters, but at the same time I'm just not a fan of the wider scale recent games have been taking.
- The ending, as said before. Makes sense for Apollo's character arc, but at the same time it's heavily marred by said international scale having a permanent effect now, and also because I was iffy on adding yet more to his backstory which I wasn't sure was necessary.

The bad points of the game:

- The pacing. Apart from case 4, it can get so so slow, to the point of exhausting me. Part of this is the one day trials, like in case 2, so a lot of stuff is shoved into one trial and one investigation even though the case itself is as long as it was made of two of each. The other is that there is some stuff that should be shorter than it was, like the looking for and being in the cave stuff in case 5.
- The witness cast was tiny in this game, even if the witnesses themselves were pretty fun. There were only a couple per case, which made the game as a whole feel a little empty since the cast was so small, and made the culprits too easy to find.

Overall, I wouldn't say it's a bad Ace Attorney game, but it's far from being my favourite as well. The fact that most cases had slow pacing and high stakes really diminishes its value to me personally - I like to dip into cases for fun, and only case 4 really lets me do that. Also not a fan of where the Khura'inese plot ends up going. I wouldn't not recommend this game, but I feel like it's far from the series' best.

I'll be sticking around for the DLC, though - I wonder what that will be like?
 
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Tangeh

Well-Known Member
Game is done.

I have mixed feelings about the ending. On the one hand, Apollo having his own office in Khura'in does show how much the character has grown so it's a fitting ending for him. On the other hand... First off, I don't like saying goodbye to characters, particularly major ones. I don't want this to be the last we see of Apollo nor of the Wright Anything Agency (which is why it's a slight relief that his deal seems to be temporary, although he's likely to be there for at least a few years still), but the only way to do that would be to have cases in both countries again, which was already odd in this game...

Confession: I don't really like the political and international angle Yamazaki's games (I.e. The Investigations, Dual Destinies and this) have taken in the end. It's what made me wary of this one at first, only until after California was revealed to be half the game was I more confident about the game. Part of the reason I prefer the filler is because I like the idea of Ace Attorney being what it was like in the first couple of games - a story about the cases an ordinary law office took. International stuff feels too grand, and had Apollo simply been elsewhere in America I likely wouldn't have been so uncomfortable with the idea.

Similarly, I liked the way we caught out the queen - I think she was pretty obvious as a villain though, and I'm not sure whether I would prefer this over Dual Destinies' final showdown which I did find disappointing in hindsight. The last case with its usage of channeling and twist about channeling was as inventive as heck though.

Those end credits though. What a tease. Part of me wishes they would've actually done something with that part of Apollo's past and his feelings about that. The whole revolutionary thing again feels a bit too large scale for me.

So, overall thoughts:

Favourite case: Case 4 - Turnabout Storyteller

It's perhaps short, but that's almost a blessing - it doesn't really have the high stakes 2, 3 and 5 has and it didn't drag either. It had fun twists on the standard mystery tropes of DID (with the personalities not actually being dangerous here) and food as a murder weapon (with allergies to complicate it). Also, Blackquill being the assistant here was really fun, it's certainly gimmicky to have a prosecutor fill that role but considering his and Athena's dynamic it certainly paid off.

Favourite major new character: Rayfa

She seemed like a spoiled brat at first, but that's what made her character arc satisfying, as in case 3 she began learning the problems with what was going on and became more responsible, reflecting the themes of the game (which rather than propaganda seem to be family and succession). Having her be a semi-assistant in case 3 was also nice since it gave us some downtime as such to get used to her.

Favourite minor new character:

I can't decide between Betty and Bonny, Uendo and co, or Sarge as said before. There not much time for most witnesses to develop so there's no arc as such to be invested in for the cases individually, so I'll go with the witnesses I found most fun.

Favourite villain:

I don't really know! I have difficulties with that. :p I liked the ending of case 3 not having a real villain though, Beh'leeb and Tahrust weren't really murderers as such and the whole problem in that case stemmed from the risk from the DC Act, which I guess was a decent way of showing the problem with it in only one case?

Good points of the game:

- Again, Rayfa's arc. Very satisfying and something I wasn't expecting from this character.
- The murder mysteries were also very good, having twists, turns and cleverness without being overly complex.
- Alhbi is also as cute as heck, and I liked seeing him.
- Motives actually matter again, a complaint I had in Dual Destinies.

Meh points of the game:

- Nahyuta. The stuff that happened around him in the final case was neat, but for most of the game his character just felt kind of stagnant, and his base personality wasn't one I really cared for.
- Whilst I like gimmicks in Ace Attorney games, Psyche Locks, Perceive and the Mood Matrix all feel underused, even more so than in DD. Forensics are a fun idea although again underused and the rotating part of fingerprinting felt clunky. Divination Seances were alright although I wouldn't miss them.
- There were the right number of cameos and I liked the characters they picked, although there are two things: I'm not sure if Edgeworth specifically should have returned (I didn't see that character as that necessary tbh), and maybe it would've been nice to see one more character we haven't seen in a while. (And yes, I know about the DLC)
- The overarching revolution plot. It was fun to solve and I liked the revolutionaries as characters, but at the same time I'm just not a fan of the wider scale recent games have been taking.
- The ending, as said before. Makes sense for Apollo's character arc, but at the same time it's heavily marred by said international scale having a permanent effect now, and also because I was iffy on adding yet more to his backstory which I wasn't sure was necessary.

The bad points of the game:

- The pacing. Apart from case 4, it can get so so slow, to the point of exhausting me. Part of this is the one day trials, like in case 2, so a lot of stuff is shoved into one trial and one investigation even though the case itself is as long as it was made of two of each. The other is that there is some stuff that should be shorter than it was, like the looking for and being in the cave stuff in case 5.
- The witness cast was tiny in this game, even if the witnesses themselves were pretty fun. There were only a couple per case, which made the game as a whole feel a little empty since the cast was so small, and made the culprits too easy to find.

Overall, I wouldn't say it's a bad Ace Attorney game, but it's far from being my favourite as well. The fact that most cases had slow pacing and high stakes really diminishes its value to me personally - I like to dip into cases for fun, and only case 4 really lets me do that. I wouldn't not recommend this game, but I feel like it's far from the series' best.

I'll be sticking around for the DLC, though - I wonder what that will be like?

OMG I can't believe you finished that in a few days. xD Props.

How would you rank it among all games, now that you've played them all? I've never played investigations or PW vs PL but for me it would go:

1. Trials and Tribulations
2. Justice for All
3. Dual Destinies
4. PW: Ace Attorney
5. AJ: Ace Attorney

I didn't even dislike AJ:AA like so much of the fan base seems to (I nearly skipped it due to that and am glad I didn't), I just didn't think it was as strong as the other entries. The third case video sequences were horrifically long, they ruined Phoenix to the point where it wasn't Phoenix anymore in the slightest, and the last case was disappointingly short. Other than that I liked it - the first case in AJ:AA imo is by far the best first case in the series.
 

Chibi_Muffin

Smart Cookie
Hmm, how I'd rank them?

Ace Attorney 1
Dual Destinies
Trials and Tribulations
Justice for All
Apollo Justice
Investigations/Spirit of Justice
Professor Layton vs Ace Attorney

Generally ranked on how much I liked the new characters, how good the murder mysteries are, the gimmicks involved and how much I'd want to replay each one. Everything from AJ up I'd like to replay - whilst this one isn't necessarily bad, everything's so long and so linked together that I don't feel like I have enough cases to just dip into one.
 

Tangeh

Well-Known Member
Ah, I see. Yeah, I appreciate separation between cases, too. Being that the game takes place in two different countries you would think there would be a lot of separation, but I guess not. xD I haven't actually seen the prosecutor yet but I'm assuming it's the dude with white hair on the title screen and based on what I know I'm wondering if he's the prosecutor for all cases? I went into this assuming they would be different (with Phoenix playing against a new character and Apollo / Athena possibly facing off against returning prosecutors). Buuuuut maybe not. :(

My rankings seem to be pretty much based on how much I liked the final case lol, with DD taking the edge over PW:AA for the characters because I did like the final case of PW:AA more than DD.
 
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Excitable Boy

is a metaphor
- The cast of sidekicks in this game rotated a lot (at least, in the cases where you could have one); Case 2 had Athena, Case 3 had Rayfa, and then Case 5 went all over the map. It's a welcome change in keeping the interactions fresh.

- Prosecutor Sahdmadhi was... eh. Seeing Blackquill face off against him gave me a better appreciation for Blackquill, at least, but most of the time he just kind of blended into the rest of the case raising the usual "this is absurd"s and whatnot. His backstory doesn't do squat for me. He's almost as over-hyped as Godot, really, only his leitmotif is worse.

- The 3D perspectives were handled rather well in this game. After DD played it safe by sticking religiously to the same perspectives as the 2D games, SoJ did a lot to mix it up, and the hardware seems stretched to the limit when the in-engine cutscenes are displaying multiple characters. In particular, this part from Case 4 struck me as well done. The framerate drops are regrettable, though; I guess it's up the iOS port to run this game as it was meant to be run, at 60 fps in HD.

- Breakdowns were handled kinda weird in this one. There weren't a lot of them, and the ones there were were... surreal. Atishon's and Retinz's seemed to be mostly mental, so only Andistan'dhin and Geiru ended up with more traditional breakdowns.

- Was Jove Justice supposed to be channeled at one point? It's interesting that you're given his picture when it never has to be examined at any point. Since it's only presented to reference Apollo's father, there's no real reason to go with a photograph over, say, an embroidered hat, or even just a profile. I do wonder what kind of circumstances might've prompted his channeling, or if it would be a part of Apollo's maturity arc.

- Overall, I feel like SoJ ends up feeling strained by attempting to do more than it could really handle. Case 5 is a festival of returning characters, but they barely do jacksquat for the most part. The disjointedness of switching back and forth between Japanifornia and Khura'in, and related swiveling of player perspectives, as well as a lack of real connection between cases, doesn't seem like it will do the game too many favors with fanbase. While each case is actually well-executed, smooshing them into one or two days each and disconnecting them like they are does the game no favors. I think many people are unwilling to let it dethrone TT or whatever their favorite AA game is for that reason.
 
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Chibi_Muffin

Smart Cookie
Huh, I thought Spirit of Justice was longer than previous games, so I checked my Activity Log. Can't say how long I spent on the first trilogy since I did my playthroughs on a normal DS a while ago, but Apollo Justice was 23 hours, Dual Destinies was 31 (although I have replayed some court segments and stuff so it's probably an hour or two shorter), and Spirit of Justice is 38.

So six cases of Dual Destinies were around eight or so hours shorter at least than just the main cases of Spirit of Justice, no DC included. No wonder it felt like it dragged a bit - it seems like each case really was longer than usual.

By the way, to answer your question, EB...

I think you need a real name and face for both the Seances and channeling. That's why Jove's picture was important - they needed a reference to what he looked like either way.

Just collecting my thoughts more, since something about this game is just bothering me.

If I had to guess, my problems with Spirit of Justice are to do with the scale. Like I said, I don't like the international politics involved in recent Ace Attorneys, since I feel it distracts from the murder mystery aspect and I don't feel like it's any of the core characters' places to really get involved with that stuff. Here, I feel like it's at its worst - whereas in most of these games this stuff doesn't pop up until the last case, in this one half of the game takes place in another country, you aid a revolution which whilst is mostly due to a part of the legal system is still a way to overthrow a leadership, and in the end the final prosecutor and killer was the queen and you have to prove her rule illegitimate. Not only does it seem near impossible to raise the stakes for the next game (which is something these writers seem intent on doing) but the final case felt as much about politics as it did about actual defending and lawyering. It made everything feel so impersonal - I didn't feel like I was stopping Ga'ran for the lives she ruined like I felt I was with say, Von Karma or Kristoph or the Phantom, partially because whilst those lives do exist they're mostly in the background. Yeah, she indirectly caused case 3 and obviously Apollo's adopted family are suffering, but the suffering isn't as clear cut as stuff like DL-6 or SL-9 or UR-1, when the effect on the main characters was clear and the effects of the villain on those characters were a lot more direct.

And then there's Apollo's backstory. Whilst he's not the first character to have relations turn up after their introductory game (indeed, it happened with Apollo himself in DD with Clay), I feel like there's a major difference between learning about a friend or romantic partner out of the blue and learning that someone actually grew up in a whole another country, because the latter actually shapes people and you think it'd be brought up before then because of that, and in previous games there has been no indication of this for Apollo. Indeed, I'm pretty sure that this backstory was likely only thought up for this game (especially since the writer for Apollo Justice and for Spirit of Justice are two different people), with the exception of Apollo's biological dad which tbh wasn't one I felt particularly needed to be answered - 'he died in an accident' was enough for me. That's probably why this backstory bothers me so much - it feels tacked on to a character who didn't feel like he needed it. We already have intrigue surrounding Apollo's backstory from his first appearance - a plot line that has still yet to be fully resolved, despite the fact that Case 2's focus of the Gramaryes suggested the possibility - he does not feel like he needs another set of family members to be interested in, adopted or not. It comes across as this really fake way of trying to get us attached to the main plot, as if we're not expected to have an emotional connection to Dhurke and co unless they're related to a pre-existing character. Either that, or they really wanted Nahyuta to be like Edgeworth and Simon and therefore having a close connection in the past to Apollo for us to find out - but the problem again is that those two were introduced at the same time as Phoenix and Athena so it feels like both characters were designed around said backstory rather than trying to squish one into that role. Plus, Apollo doesn't feel Khura'inese to me, nothing about him really ties in to this highly religious country - indeed, he doesn't seem to care for the supernatural at all. At most, you can tie his desire to defend from being raised by a revolutionary, but otherwise he just feels way too detached as a character from this supposed upbringing.

And that's probably one of the reasons why the ending bothers me. It's like saying that the Wright Anything Agency - who Apollo has known for two games now and has been part of and contributed massively to the dynamic which gives life to the game, and which is also technically his family because of his sister - is not as important as a plot line which existed just for this game. Whilst a character growing up and starting to hold their own law office does make sense, here it feels like it's resolving Apollo's arc from this game only (I never saw independence as a big deal for him before, so while it shows he's responsible and capable as an attorney it's not completing an arc specific to Apollo either) to the detriment of future games - not only that he's not part of the agency any more, but resolving that family thing that's been going on since AJ - after all, it won't have the same impact if he is hundreds of miles away from Trucy. I'm just not fond of the fact that this international plot line has become so important as to take away a likeable character for us - it feels like rubbing salt in the wound because I was already really iffy on the idea of him having this backstory to begin with. Plus, again, I loved the Wright Anything Agency being the three of them and so being a fully realised law office after five games, as playing as multiple attorneys with different powers in the game, and how Phoenix, Apollo and Athena's personalities bounced off of each other. This game has pretty much destroyed that by taking away a vital component, so that's one less thing to be excited about for future instalments in my eyes. :/

I also don't hugely care for Nahyuta. He feels like a Godot or Franziska-eque rival who really wants to be the Edgeworth or Simon of this game, i.e. he's someone who spends almost the entire game being very antagonistic to the main characters but the game treats him as someone who needs help from the main characters and is important as a person. With Edgeworth and Simon, this worked since by the end of Case 3 in both of their respective games, they had helped out the defence in some way so at least we were starting to see a different side to them and so they were becoming more sympathetic, and by the time it was time to save them it was clear that their problems were related to some past murder so we already knew what had to be done ands how we'd ultimately help them. Nahyuta doesn't have anything like that - he doesn't really show any signs of changing until maybe case 4 and even then that's really minor, his real change is case 5 only - and his utter lack of any real emotion towards Apollo makes it really hard to swallow that he's doing that against his will. Other than that, his base personality is someone who is calm and highly religious and knows a lot about a given case to the extreme, which isn't hugely interesting. Sometimes he'll lapse into moments of goofiness, but unlike say Edgey's Steel Samurai interest, stuff like the burgers aren't really a recurring element of his personality so it doesn't feel like a quirk so much as a running joke. And again, whilst the revolutionaries like Dhurke and Datz were fun characters, Apollo's relationship with Nahyuta in the game (even if they were close in the past) does not feel strong enough to be a key element in his choice. That, and he doesn't really become a defendant until the very end so it's not even clear how we can help him, since it's not like we can change his mind because he's so stubborn - we can't talk to him and we don't have any idea about his issues in order to solve them ourselves. I also find his reason for acting that way really weird... I don't know how to explain it, but the twist about Rayfa's origins feels really extraneous to me for some reason, like it was a twist the game could've done without? If I had to guess, I'd probably say that the problem with Rayfa's origins is that the twist seems to matter to several characters, but never does it really seem relevant to Rayfa herself that much.

Also, I'm not a fan of how the stakes were so so high in every case here. The main character can die in any Khura'in trial, the office being repossessed in case 2, the Guilty verdict halfway through in case 3, the whole revolution... I think that's maybe contributed to why I feel like this game was so tiring and why I liked case 4 so much. It felt like every other case needed to be thrilling and urgent and tie into this massive overarching story, and as someone who likes Ace Attorney more for the standard cases and quirky characters, it kind of felt like there wasn't much of that. Similarly, maybe fewer new characters meant spending more time on the same things over and over again in the cases? Again, loved the de Famme sisters, Uendo and Sarge, but the game really did feel empty, I mean the credits had to go to other stuff halfway through because of the lack of witnesses (or maybe they did that in DD). Anyways, I'm pretty sure that the massive overarching plot line and the high stakes in most cases left me emotionally exhausted by the end of it, so whilst I did enjoy the mystery of the final case I wasn't so much driven by my feelings towards the characters as I was just wanting to make it to the end - and again, I think this was exacerbated by the lack of new characters in the game coupled with the massive scope.

I admit that this game has many improvements over Dual Destinies. The culprits are better - mainly because motive actually matters here, the murder methods are more interesting because they focus on playing around with various elements (food as a weapon, channeling, prosopagnosia, DID, suicide looking like murder rather than the other way around) than elaborate coverups, and of course free examination is back. But even if Spirit of Justice is superior to DD in terms of mystery, I still prefer the latter game so much more. It has more witnesses and so more characters I like in, a far better prosecutor, there's more filler and so more self-contained stories that make it easier to just play one as you wish, it's shorter and so not as tiring, better usage of the lawyer powers that were underused in SOJ, and a final case whereby the stakes are far more personal (I'm not saying that DD's main villain was well executed per se, just that I was invested in the case and the scale wasn't quite so overblown). DD is certainly flawed, but the problems I have with SOJ get under my skin so much more - if DD has a habit of making things fall flat when it comes to execution, SOJ's problem is more that the ideas they have, even if they are executed well, simply break my suspension of disbelief. Right now, I'm so annoyed by some of the stuff they did with Apollo in SOJ that idk if I would consider the whole thing to actually have happened in my head.

I'm sorry, it's just that... The foreign country stuff, the revolution, Apollo's backstory and him leaving, all of the high stakes, even simply how odd Khura'in is as a country, is just too much and too different from the previous games. This game was enjoyable for the most part but looking back there is something about it that doesn't sit right with me. Maybe it is just that it doesn't feel like the goings-on of a little law office anymore like it was in AA1-AA5, but that instead this game IS something so much grander in the end. That leaving the game as AA1-5 and just maybe taking the Californian elements and some characters like Alhbi and Maya suits me a little better. I know that's not a good attitude to have - just cutting and choosing the bits you like out of canon and ignoring the rest to your whims - but this game just doesn't quite feel like what I want out of Ace Attorney, and the Khura'inese stuff is to blame. :S Like it's a spinoff a la the crossover, but at the same time it's actually having an effect on the universe of the games as a whole, so it'd a game that doesn't feel like a part of the core storyline but it is.

...Sorry for the negativity, everyone. This'll be the last one. I don't hate this game, like I said, they made a lot of improvements over previous games and the mysteries and some of the characters were good. But the overarching elements kind of felt too ambitious in places, and IMO they kind of felt flat in the end. :/

On a random note, a little observation I made just after DD came out that still holds true now - is it just me, or with every new mainline Ace Attorney game, does the main prosecutor's hair get longer? I'm a little unsure about Franziska and Godot, but the others... :p
 
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Spacial

procrastination
Wrapped up Case 2 last night, not sure how I feel about one long investigation segment followed by a long day in court but I didn't mind it too much. Retinz's breakdown is definitely my favourite 3D animated breakdown, it's so much more creative than any of the DD ones (of those, my favourite would be the DLC case. I thought that 5-3's was an awful end to a weak case that was entirely humourless). I also really like Reus/Retinz's theme.

Apollo made a Doctor Who reference which I wasn't expecting, he's much more dorky and likeable than he was in DD and even AJ. It seems like SoJ will focus on him which I can't wait for.

And Maya's back! Her reunion with Nick definitely lacked the energy that they had in the trilogy but I'm happy to see her again anyway. Arrested for murder, just like old times. Whlie I'm thrilled with her return I can't help but feel that she won't have any role in the plot, which is a shame but understandable. The Feys were such a central part of the trilogy and the newer games just have a completely different tone without them so Maya won't really fit. I guess she'll just act as the defendant for once case and then sink into the background again. I'd've loved to see Mia but I feel definite that she isn't returning.

I'm loving Ema as a forensic investigator, she beats Fulbright by a mile (still falls behind Gumshoe, but I wasn't expecting her to top him). She's genuinely nice, but is independent also.
 

Tangeh

Well-Known Member
I finished case 2! I did feel like the pacing was definitely really weird. The investigation portion felt long and then the trial felt long, but because there was only one of each it felt overall short to me. I felt like this case held my hand way too much, and the only time I really had to think hard was when I was trying to compare the two videos and instantly said "oh duh it's the cards" and then must have clicked the wrong part, got penalized, and then spent literally twenty minutes examining it for other inconsistencies (...there really wasn't much else to the videos so that was really boring xD). I got a game over just through that. I ended up getting frustrated and looked up a walkthrough and realized I was right the first time. >__>

The prosecutor had this weird mix of Godot's calmness, Klavier's indifference and then emotionalness when the going got tough, Franziska's habit of constantly harassing the defense and calling them childish names (yeah yeah all prosecutors do that but it was really exaggerated with these two), Blackquill's ability to use two speech bubbles to object, & then apparently Edgeworth's mysteriously vague connection to the defense (AKA Apollo). Literally every prosecutor has had a direct connection to at least one member of the defense team so that's no surprise at all, even though he's not from the country so seriously wonder how that's possible. I thought he was fine overall, though I felt more like I was fighting against the evidence and witnesses way more than the prosecutor. He was just kind of there to agree with what the witnesses said and very occasionally point out a flaw. Man he had a snarky angry grudge against Apollo, though. I guess just from his culture? But maybe something deeper going on too?

I said earlier that I was hoping this would finally clean up some loose threads from AJ:AA, but it didn't. Sadly. Although the way they left off at the end with "you don't like to talk about your past, do you Apollo?" gives me hope that they eventually will, with the reintroduction of Trucy and the Gramarye name as a starting point. Fine.

I felt that the three protagonists were really strong in this case. Trucy and Athena were both appropriately much more mature and the way that Athena objected to Apollo a few times and was able to speak out in court really showed that she's grown since her last incarnation, and I tbh really appreciated the humour that she brought in this case. And we almost never get to see Phoenix and Apollo interact, so the phone call between Phoenix and Apollo was really heart warming.

The first two cases were so high-stakes that I'm kind of interested to see if they can possibly top that aspect. xD

Isn't there a possibility of Reus being Apollo's father? It seems unlikely now that I know he's Retinz, but he was a member of Troupe Grammarye so I guess he fits the criteria. I can't remember what information we were given about Apollo's dad (did he leave the Troupe before Trucy was born? In that case it can't be Reus because he left 13 years ago) in AJ though so maybe he can't've been.

Well, Reus/ Retinz's age was 35, and Apollo has to be 24 since this case took place in April (it's weird that I know that without looking it up xD), so yeah he's not Apollo's dad.

The only info we have on Apollo's father is from AJ:AA, during that "flashback" thing where Phoenix is talking to the reporter Brushel. He was Thalassa's first husband, also a performer, and he died on stage a year after they were married.

Theoretically this should mean that Apollo's father is dead, but I've played enough Phoenix Wright to know that that could very well be false. xD Take both of Trucy's parents. Maya's mother. Freaking Retinz in this case.

Idk if they'll go that in depth into Apollo's past, but I definitely think this game wants to clarify some things from AJ:AA based on the second case's existence. Or maybe that's just my wishful thinking. >_>
 

Psynergy

Strong Winds
Staff member
Super Mod
So I finished Case 3. I don't have much to say but like:

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

That's all I have to say about that case. I'm starting to understand why a friend was saying this was a Top 3 AA game good god I love it. The music continues to be amazing too.

EDIT: Done. This game is just incredible. This might be my favorite in the series.
 
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Aegiscalibur

Add Witty Title Here
So the game wasn't as bad as I'd feared. A bit better than Dual Destinies.

My favorite part by far was the first trial of case 5. I could get used to these civil cases: it added variety, and it didn't feel like the other side was going to win by default. Having a civil war in the agency was also nice. Who needs prosecutors?

Bonus points for Paul Atishon. Make Kurain Great Again.


The rest of the game was alright. Nahyuta was hit and miss: antagonistic and thematically fitting but needs to work on his insults, though he also had a few good lines here and there.

Case 3: Couldn't they have just fled underground with their rebel friends? Would have made a lot more sense.

Case 4: Turnabout Filler, even by AA standards, and not very interesting either. Blackquill was nice but mostly wasted on this case.
 
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Chibi_Muffin

Smart Cookie
Anyways, after playing SOJ and mulling on it a bit (still not sure if I'm going to accept this as part of my 'canon' yet, some of the retconning they did just annoys me so much), I've decided to go back and replay AA1-5 in order. I've never really done this before but I wanted to refresh my memory on them and have a bit of fun. I've also been listening to some of the music from those games a lot recently too, it's really good.
 

Excitable Boy

is a metaphor
Not sure if I'm gonna bother with the Asinine Attorney cases, or if I'll just hold out for Turnabout Across Time.

Personal rankings for series look something like AAI2 > AA1 > JFA > AJ > AAI > Vs.L > SoJ > T&T > DD, but that's variable based on my mood.
 

Psynergy

Strong Winds
Staff member
Super Mod
The Asinine Attorney stuff doesn't really seem worth the time honestly, may as well just wait for the real case.

Also 2-3 is still the worst case ever and I hate it.
 

Chibi_Muffin

Smart Cookie
DLC case is out now. At the first trial. Full thoughts when the case is done, but...

Larry's first testimony. Oh my god. Couldn't help but laugh... Amazing.

Also, sorta bothered by the whole 'all the other prosecutors are cowards' line. Feels like it's indirectly throwing the other games' rivals under the bus for a cheap excuse to have Edgeworth prosecute. :/ They don't seem cowardly to me, why not just mention that the office is understaffed and that's why they need him to take cases?

Wonder what the trick to the time travel is; spoiled myself on the killer by accident but know nothing else. Got excited that we might be Mood Matrixing Larry during that recess but sadly it just seems Athena and Trucy are a joke in this case.

Edit: Alright, finished.

Not much to say. It was an okay case. Guessed time travel would be actually two ceremonies being held. Also, I guess Sorin's amnesia and Pierce's true identity were kind of obvious, huh?

As was Pierce being the killer, even if I wasn't spoiled... Wasn't going to be a recurring character, wasn't going to be the couple, so who else could it be? Seriously, this game has a problem with suspects.

The mystery itself was fine as those in this game are, and the pacing was better since it was spread out in the proper format - one mystery, two days of each game type. Still had an over the top transformation and breakdown though, didn't mind it for the most part (though those x-rays made me cringe) so maybe it should've just been toned down a little. Plus, the villain in this DLC case reminds me a lot of the culprit in the DLC case of Dual Destinies, although of the two cases I probably prefer that one since it had a bigger cast and I think some of the twists there were more inventive in the grander scheme of the series. This case just seemed okay to me, although the stuff with the happy couple was cute.

Although is it just me or did some of the returning characters seem off? Like the whole thing with Trucy forcing Athena to do a bunch of stuff for three days straight and Phoenix being fine with it, that mention of the other prosecutors being cowards, Edgeworth feeling a bit more hostile as an opponent and continually trying to end the trial which seems counteractive to finding the truth (I've just got past Turnabout Samurai in my AA1-5 playthrough and I don't recall him doing that in that game), the girls all being really mad about the bouquet in the end... It didn't feel quite right. It's odd, the only other time I really had a problem with the characterisation of older characters in this game (ignoring backstory related stuff for now, since I'm talking about personality) was how Athena seemed to have regressed a lot in skill in 6-4 when she wasn't that bad in Dual Destinies, and how both the writers and other characters seemed to be overemphasising her rookie-ness too much. Yet in this case the characterisation was really weird.

So yeah, done with Spirit of Justice at last - not playing the Asinine Attorneys. Halfway through AA1 right now and will compile my thoughts at the end of it. I'll probably see you again when the other 4.5 games are done. :p
 
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Tangeh

Well-Known Member
I'm still not done the 3rd case yet (/slowpoke) but I just got back to this game so:

This game holds my hand so hard that I feel like a child playing it. :/ ;___; I also really wish they'd stop it with the constant flashbacks. I REMEMBER WHAT HAPPENED FIVE MINUTES AGO TYVM.

If spirit channeling isn't actually involved in these murders that would be more of a plot twist than anything this game has shown so far, considering it has foreshadowed it probably about ten times now. GEE I WONDER IF IT IS THE SPIRIT OF ... I FORGET THE NAME BUT THE ANCIENT LADY WHO KILLS REBELS WHO POSSESSED MAYA.

Gee I wonder. I'm on the vision thing of the 2nd trial right now and I had a moment of "oh so that's why they kept emphasizing that the Plumbed Punisher theme sounds so much like the Steel Samurai" as soon as I saw the theme in the vision. Although I haven't gotten far enough to know if that gut reaction holds water, I objected to the gingisi (or whatever it was called) four times on the wrong lines before getting it. xD I did the same thing in the last trial, kept seeing inconsistencies in the vision but always forgot to line it up to the right sentence.

I feel like Rayfa might annoy some people but I find her entirely refreshing. I tbh always thought a personality type like hers was missing from Ace Attorney. She is literally a fourteen year old princess so her brattiness is to be expected. I'm sensing some big character growth for her in the later cases.

I'm trying to imagine a modern civilization in real life treating tourists like they treat Phoenix for not understanding every vague detail of their culture and loling.

Anyways, they did throw a curveball when Phoenix found that picture of Apollo in the rebel hideout, I was like "whaaaaaaat". Apollo had better have some goddamn tragic history that he's repressing from his experiences in Kurain because how in the hell would that never come up in conversation? Oh but I'm happy that I was right in predicting that they would explore Apollo's past some more. xD

Speaking of, isn't it about time that Apollo was accused of murder? He's one of few main characters who never has been and it's almost a right of passage at this point. Idk why DD & SoJ needed to have the client be a close friend in every trial. I never cared about the trials any less when it was a stranger in previous games... actually, I thought it was way better executed in 2-5 and 3-5 when Maya was in danger from something other than a guilty sentence. I was way more curious about her wellbeing then. xD

also how do they make money if they spend most of their resources digging their staff and friends out of the hot seat? like surely they wouldn't have charged Athena/ Trucy/ Maya for lawyer services?
 
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