 he Phoenix Wright series has attracted a lot of love over the years. It’s not just the compelling gameplay, smart premise, and great characters, but also the hilarious, intense and occasionally touching encounters and trials these characters have undergone throughout the course of the trilogy. It’s with a sense of trepidation, then, that Ace Attorney fans will approach this fourth entry, which stars a whole new cast of characters (for the most part). Could this newcomer possibly hold up against the fans’ desires to hear from Maya, Gumshoe, Edgeworth and the rest of the gang? Let me assure you, readers, via the most clichéd and trite saying possible: Justice has been served (palms forehead – Ed).
The Ace Attorney games have previously had as their main character Phoenix Wright, following him from new kid on the stand to veteran pro, fighting for his clients, indulging in microphone-activated ‘OBJECTION’s and doing an unusual amount of detective work. Now, Apollo Justice takes to the stand, alongside his assistant Trucy (a young girl with a taste for magic), prosecutor Kavalier (an oddly nice dude, which is a complete departure from previous prosecutors in the series), and.... Phoenix. Again. He appears in the first case as the defendant, and the game ultimately centers around Wright and what he’s been up to in the last seven years.
A surprising array of elements has improved here. Graphically, the game has taken a massive leap forward, moving away from its origins (Phoenix Wright started as a Japanese GBA release)
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and looking more at home on the DS. The touch screen has been intergrated more intelligently, too. Puzzles now include checking fingerprints, examining 3-D objects, and even manipulating crime scene models. In the courtroom, the solutions generally feel more cohesive. There are fewer instances where there seem to be multiple right answers and only one will actually advance the game. The new ‘perceive’ system, too, is excellent, allowing you to examine certain witness statements for a nervous tic or twitch. It’s a fun gameplay mechanic, although it doesn’t make a heap of sense as actual evidence in a court
of law.
Ironically, the game’s main stumbling block is the heavy implementation of the one thing fans most wanted more of – Phoenix Wright himself.
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The final case, especially, is essentially all about Wright. Just as the player desperately wants to get to know these new characters better, Capcom show a stubborn refusal to let their old character take a back seat, leading to the most unsatisfying conclusion of any Ace Attorney game. It’s a real shame, especially considering how fantastic everything is up until that point. That said, Apollo Justice is absolutely the best in the series so far. If Capcom can iron out a few kinks and flesh out their new characters a bit more, future installments may even rank as some of the DS’s best.
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