Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney Trilogy – Analysis

The Japanese judicial system is… interesting.

Basing myself on the Wikipedia On this subject, we can discover that institutions such as the police, government prosecutors’ offices, courts and correctional bodies maintain close and cooperative relationships, with the shared objectives of limiting and controlling crime.

Since 2001, Japan has had a conviction rate of over 99.8%, even higher than in authoritarian regimes.

This may be due to a system that allows prosecutors to choose whether or not they want to go to court with a case, which means trials have been described by academics as “ceremonies to confirm prosecutorial decisions.”

This, combined with a culture of interrogations very focused on obtaining confessions, in which defendants often even admit to having committed crimes that they did not commit due to psychological pressure or to protect their families, means that a Japanese defense lawyer, in order to prove the innocence of your client, you almost have to prove who actually committed the crime!

Almost. Obviously, in real life, all of this is much more nuanced, and a defense lawyer would never be supposed to be playing detective to exonerate his client.

In games in the series Ace Attorney, however? Yha, get out your magnifying glass and aluminum powder, because if you don’t discover the real criminal, your client will go to prison.

The first game in this series of Capcom came out in 2001 for the Game Boy Advanceas Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. The mixture of Visual Novel with adventure, in which players alternate between investigations and court sessions, looking for evidence and presenting arguments to prove the innocence of their clients, it was an immediate success, and since then, sequels and re-releases have been frequent.

Today, we are analyzing the Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney Trilogya compilation of the 4th to 6th games in the main series, Apollo Justice, Dual DestiniesIt is Spirit of Justice. The first initially left for the Nintendo DSand the other two for the 3DS, so the models will be different between the different games. Don’t worry that all screenshots presented are from the first two cases of the Apollo Justiceso there will be no spoilers!

In these games, we play the roles of several defense lawyers and their respective assistants seven years after the end of the previous trilogy. Throughout the games, we solve cases and meet interesting characters.

Each game is divided into two parts: the investigation and the trials. In the investigation part, we have to look for clues, talk to witnesses, and try to understand more about the case. At trial, we have to listen to witnesses’ accounts and use evidence to try to poke holes in what they said.

But let’s be honest: what the player will mostly do is read. Load things and read. Talk to people and read. Being in court and to read. From the Dual Destiniesthe game also has voice actingalthough it is up to each individual whether this is a good or bad thing.

Being a mostly narrative game, the central story is an important point to enjoy the game, and being the second trilogy in a series, it is always better to start with the initial games in the trilogy Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy. However, this story begins at a new point in the series, with a new protagonist who is as lost in the plot as any new player, so you can start here too.

In technical terms, these remakes they are very well done. The animations, although subtle, are dynamic, almost reminiscent of a pixel artand even when they later switch to 3D models, they continue with the art style of the game. O remake it also allows you to immediately play any chapter of any game, if the player just wants to relive a certain moment, and it has a museum mode with music (which is excellent), art, and videos from the various games.

The narrative of the various cases is also always fun and almost absurd, being in fact almost a parody of the Japanese judicial system, with underwear being the solution to a case, a witness called “orly”, or generational jokes about ladders and ladders. . The characters are always captivating and watching them talk and discover the case is always interesting and fun.

Noooooooooooooooooooooo…

Not everything is perfect. These games have the problem of sometimes not being obvious in what they want the player to do. For example, there was a time when a witness mentioned a necklace the victim had. The player was supposed to present a photo he had as proof of the victim without the necklace. Problem: there were two photos in which the victim’s neck was visible. And whenever a player makes a mistake, he gets a foul. After five absences, the trial ends with our victim being declared guilty. Fortunately, it is possible to continue the trial from the same point without any penalty, so this is not too bad, but there are still several more confusing moments.

To help with this, both the Dual Destinies like the Spirit of Justice have a help mode that allows you to receive hints after failing a phase of the trial several times, and even the Apollo Justice It has an auto-play mode that simply bypasses the need to unravel the mystery, so this isn’t such a big obstacle.

In the investigation part, there are also moments when the player gets a little lost, not knowing where to go to investigate. The game does not continue until the player does trigger at the right time or collect the right evidence, and it would be useful to also have a help system to point the game in the right direction.

However, none of this prevents Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney Trilogy to be a phenomenal collection of games. Not only are all the games excellent, but the trilogy itself is well created, with interesting extra content, the possibility of choosing any chapter, and graphics and sounds revamped for a new era of gaming.

TL;DR: If you like crime TV series, visual novelsadventure games, eccentric characters, funny puns, or any combination of these factors, Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney Trilogy It’s your game. But still, if you can, start with the initial trilogy. It’s worth it if only to interrogate a parrot.