Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney

Gameplay

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney is a visual novel adventure game in which the player takes the role of Phoenix Wright, a rookie defense attorney, and attempts to defend their clients in five cases. These cases are played in a specific order; after having finished cases, the player can re-play them in any order. Each case starts with an opening cinematic showing a murder; shortly thereafter, the player is given the job of defending the prime suspect of the case. The gameplay is split into two types of sections: investigations and courtroom trials.

During investigations, which usually take place before or in between trial sessions, the player gathers information and evidence by talking to characters such as their client, witnesses, and the police. The player is able to move around a cursor to examine various things in the environment. By using a menu, the player can move to different locations, examine evidence, and present evidence to other characters; by showing certain pieces of evidence to some witnesses, the player can get access to new information. In the game's fifth case, created for the DS version and used in all subsequent releases, the player is able to examine evidence more closely, rotating it to view it from all sides and zooming in or out on it using touchscreen controls; they are also able to move a cursor to investigate specific parts of the evidence. The fifth case also features forensics tests that the player can use at crime scenes to find clues: the player can spray luminol by tapping areas they want to examine on the touch screen, which makes the player able to see otherwise invisible blood stains; and they can touch the touch screen to apply aluminum flake powder in order to search for finger prints. After applying it, they can blow into the microphone to reveal the prints. Once the player has gathered enough evidence, the investigation section ends.

In the courtroom trials, the player aims to prove their clients' innocence. In order to do so, they cross-examine witnesses; during these cross-examinations, the player aims to find lies and inconsistencies in the witnesses' testimonies. They are able to go back and forth between the different statements in the testimony, and can press the witness for more details on a statement. When the player finds an inconsistency, they can present a piece of evidence that contradicts the statement. In the Nintendo DS version, the player can choose to press and present by using vocal commands, and in the Wii version, players have the option to present evidence by swinging the Wii Remote. At certain points, the player has to answer questions from the judge, the witnesses, or the prosecutor through a multiple-choice answer selection, or by presenting evidence that supports Phoenix's claims. On the screen, a number of exclamation marks are shown; if the player presents an incorrect piece of evidence, one of the exclamation marks disappear. If all disappear, the client is found guilty and the player must restart. When the player solves a case, they unlock a new one to play.

Plot

Phoenix Wright, a newly-hired defense attorney at the Fey and Co. law firm, agrees to represent his best friend Larry Butz, who has been charged with the murder of his girlfriend, Cindy Stone. With the help of his boss and mentor, Mia Fey, he proves that Frank Sahwit, the prosecution's star witness, is the real murderer. Shortly thereafter, Mia is killed in her office, and her younger sister Maya is arrested after the police find her name on a note left by Mia. Phoenix takes her case, facing off against Miles Edgeworth, an equally-talented prosecutor. Phoenix manages to identify Redd White, a professional blackmailer, as the real killer, only to find himself charged with the killing instead. Representing himself, he exposes White in court and gets justice for Mia. His reputation established, Phoenix takes on another case, this time defending Will Powers, the lead actor in a children's TV show, against accusations that he killed his co-star, Jack Hammer. In a bizarre twist, it is revealed that Dee Vasquez, the show's producer, committed the murder in self-defense after Hammer tried to kill her and frame Powers for her death.

On Christmas Eve, Edgeworth is arrested for the murder of attorney Robert Hammond. He initially refuses Phoenix's help, but ultimately relents. Manfred Von Karma, Edgeworth's mentor, has himself appointed as a special prosecutor. After Phoenix learns that another man, Yanni Yogi, shot Hammond, he discovers that Von Karma provided him with the gun. Years earlier, Edgeworth's father, Gregory, convinced a judge to penalize Von Karma for misconduct, ruining his spotless record. Unable to deal with such a blemish on his legacy, Von Karma murdered Gregory in cold blood, leaving Edgeworth to believe himself responsible. Phoenix explains that Edgeworth motivated him to become an attorney: When a young Phoenix was accused of stealing money (a crime for which Larry was the true culprit), Edgeworth persuaded his teacher not to punish him. Following his father's murder, however, Edgeworth, motivated by a hatred of criminals, decided to become Von Karma's pupil instead. After Von Karma suffers a breakdown in court and confesses to the cover-up, Edgeworth is set free. Nevertheless, he decides to rethink whether or not he should resume his previous duties. Meanwhile, Maya, who had been acting as Phoenix's assistant, announces that she will be returning to her home village to finish her training as a spirit medium.

In a fifth and final case, (not present in the original Game Boy Advance release, but added for the DS and subsequent releases) Phoenix, now running Fey's firm as Wright and Co., is hired by teenager Ema Skye to defend her sister Lana, the head of the prosecutor's office, in a case where the body of a detective, Bruce Goodman, was found in the trunk of Edgeworth's car. Together with Ema, Phoenix traces the origins of the murder to an incident two years prior, in which a serial killer allegedly murdered Edgeworth's predecessor while trying to escape custody. Damon Gant, a senior police captain, is tricked into admitting that he framed Ema for the murder in order to manipulate Lana into doing his bidding. Though Lana is cleared of murder charges, she agrees to resign her post in order to face judgement for protecting Gant. With Ema being sent to Europe to continue training as a forensic investigator, Phoenix looks forward to continuing his career defending the innocent.

Development

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney was developed by a team of seven people, and took ten months to make. It was directed by Shu Takumi and produced by Atsushi Inaba, with music by Masakazu Sugimori, character design by Kumiko Suekane, and art by Tatsuro Iwamoto. In 2000, after Takumi had finished his work on Dino Crisis 2, his boss at the time, Shinji Mikami, gave him six months to create any type of game he wanted to. Takumi had originally joined Capcom wanting to make mystery and adventure games, and felt that this was a big chance for him to make a mark as a creator.

At first, the game was planned to be released for the Game Boy Color, but after the development team were shown the Game Boy Advance system's screen and footage of Mega Man Battle Network, Takumi felt that the Game Boy Advance would be perfect for Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. The game was designed to be simple, as Takumi wanted it to be easy enough for even his mother to play. As it was less common at the time to use professional voice actors, the game's voice clips were provided by the development team: each staff member recorded every sample that was needed for the game, and then the best ones were used. Takumi used his privilege as a director to cast himself as Phoenix, however, while Edgeworth was voiced by Iwamoto, and von Karma by Sugimori.

The game was originally going to be a detective game, with Phoenix being a private investigator who found a body at the office of his client and got arrested; as the lawyer who was assigned to the case was useless, Phoenix took up his own defense. One staff member suggested that Phoenix should be a hamster; while this didn't happen, this early version of Phoenix did have a pet hamster. It was decided early during development to refer to the game as "Surviban: Attorney Detective Naruhodo-kun", with "surviban" being a portmanteau of "survival" and the Japanese word "saiban" (裁判, "court" or "trial"). Among other names considered were "Boogie-Woogie Innocence" and "Bingo Bengo", with "bingo" referring to answering correctly and "bengo" (弁護) being Japanese for legal representation. At one point, Takumi realized that finding and taking apart contradictions was not related to detective work, and felt that the main setting of the game should be courtrooms. The game was in danger of getting cancelled at one point, as two of the staff members decided to leave the company, but Takumi's division leader and Inaba got a member of the Resident Evil development team to help them part-time.

Writing

Takumi felt that the best way to write a mystery with a good climax is to reveal various clues, and then pull them together into one conclusion, and not have multiple possible endings. He said that the biggest challenge with that was to make the gameplay and story work together; the goal was to make the player feel like they have driven the story forward themselves, with their own choices, even though the game is linear. When writing the episodes, Takumi ranked each after its importance: the first episode was the most important, to make sure that the player likes the game; the second episode was the second most important, to solidify the player's interest; and the finale was the third most important. In general, each scenario was finished before anything else was done; after this, characters were designed based on the scenarios, and then Takumi adjusted dialogue as needed to make sure that it fit the designs. At this point, it was also decided what scenes were going to have specific cut-in illustrations made for them; Takumi drew rough sketches of them, and also drew the storyboards for the episodes' openings, which consist of series of detailed drawings that show what is happening.

In Takumi's initial draft of the story, the second episode, "Turnabout Sisters", was the first episode of the game. The development team decided that it did not work well as something that would ease players into the game, because of its length among other factors. Because of this, Takumi wrote a shorter episode, "The First Turnabout", which was used as the game's first episode. Takumi wanted players to focus on the thrill of "nailing the culprit", especially for the first episode; because of this, the culprit of the first episode is shown in that episode's opening, as this was the most direct way Takumi could think of doing it. According to Takumi, it was a challenge to write the episode, as, in addition to keeping it short, he had to set up the world of Ace Attorney and the types of characters that players would meet. The third episode was written for the sake of the character Miles Edgeworth, and the theme of the fourth episode was "rekindling the relationship". In it, Takumi tried to portray an intensively strong friendship between Phoenix and Edgeworth; he did wonder if that was what people got from it, saying that some people interpreted the bond between Phoenix and Edgeworth as an "intensively passionate bond". Because of these two episodes, Takumi considered Edgeworth to in a way be the game's protagonist. The classroom trial in the game's fourth episode was based on real events: when Takumi was in second grade, he had found a 5 yen coin and put it in his pocket; his teacher accused him of stealing it from another student, and made him apologize to her.

Takumi only spent little time on writing a backstory for Phoenix before writing the game's story, and instead made up dialogue and developed Phoenix's personality as he went along. Takumi said that Phoenix is Shu Takumi in everything but name, with dialogue similar to what Takumi would have said in each situation in the games; he attributed this to him being a first-time writer who did not think about developing characterization prior to writing the story. Takumi didn't write a backstory for Dick Gumshoe; instead, Gumshoe's character and personality just "fell into place" after Takumi decided that the character would end his sentences with "pal". Other aspects of the character came about organically as Takumi wrote the story; for instance, at one point Edgeworth says that he will cut Gumshoe's salary, which became part of Gumshoe's backstory. Takumi came up with the partner character Maya because he thought it would be more fun for players to have another character with them, giving them advice, than investigating on their own. Originally, she was going to be a lawyer-in-training, preparing to take the bar exam.

Takumi found the game's first defendant, Larry Butz, to be particularly difficult to write, and had to re-write him several times. Originally, Larry was going to be an "average Joe" type of character, who only appeared in the game's fourth episode, but after his inclusion in the first episode, Suekane and Iwamoto told Takumi to give the character "some oomph". Following this, Takumi wrote him as a "prickly tough-guy" who had the habit of telling people he was going to kill them. Some of the higher-ups at Capcom did not like this, so Takumi changed him into a character who laments his lot in life, saying "I'm going to die!" or that the situation is killing him. The culprit of the third episode was originally going to be male, until Suekane pointed out that all villains in the game were male. The development team debated over what to do with the now female character; some staff members thought it would be odd to have a female character be the director of an action show, and some wondered what to do with the director role if she could not fill it. In the end, Takumi changed the scriptwriter character into a director, and made the culprit a "strong, glamorous, fashionable, and cool-headed" producer.

Nintendo DS version

The game's fifth episode, "Rise from the Ashes", was not included in the original version of the game; it was created four years later, as part of the Nintendo DS version of the game. The fifth episode was produced by Minae Matsukawa, under supervision of Inaba and Mikami. New music pieces for "Rise from the Ashes" were composed by Naoto Tanaka. When writing the episode, Takumi wanted it to link up with Edgeworth's disappearance in the second game, Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney − Justice for All, so he thought about what would be the thing that would be the most damaging to Edgeworth's psyche. He decided on corruption and betrayal from within the prosecutor's office, despite the seriousness of the topic. The character Jake Marshall was created as a parallel to Godot, in an analogy between the Skye sisters and the Fey sisters. The idea to include the use of the Nintendo DS system's microphone came from American Capcom staff members; the Japanese staff did not like the idea of adding unnecessary features, but Takumi thought it was important to make the American audience happy, so it was included as an optional feature.

Release

The original version of the game was released for the Game Boy Advance in Japan on October 12, 2001. The Nintendo DS port, which was titled Gyakuten Saiban: Yomigaeru Gyakuten (逆転裁判 蘇る逆転, "Turnabout Trial: Revived Turnabout"), was released in Japan on September 15, 2005, and included a new episode and an English language option; the English option was a selling point in Japan, with the hope that Japanese people who were studying English would play the game. North American and European releases followed on October 11, 2005, and March 31, 2006, respectively. A PC port of the Game Boy Advance version, developed by a company called Daletto, was released in Japan in an episodic format, starting on March 18, 2008. Yomigaeru Gyakuten was later released on Wii via WiiWare in Japan on December 15, 2009, in North America on January 11, 2010, and in Europe on January 15, 2010. The fifth episode was released separately on WiiWare, on March 16, 2010, in Japan, in May 2010 in Europe, and on May 24, 2010, in North America. An iOS version of Yomigaeru Gyakuten was released in Japan on December 21, 2009, and in the West on May 24, 2010.

A high-definition version of the first three Ace Attorney games, Ace Attorney: Phoenix Wright Trilogy HD, was released for iOS and Android in Japan on February 7, 2012, and for iOS in the West on May 30, 2013. Another collection of the first three games, Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy, was released for the Nintendo 3DS in Japan on April 17, 2014, in North America on December 9, 2014, and in Europe on December 11, 2014.

Localization

The localization of the game was outsourced to a company called Bowne Global, and was handled by writer Alexander O. Smith, who was not familiar with the Ace Attorney series prior to working on it, and editor Steve Anderson. While the Japanese version of the game takes place in Japan, the localized version is set in the United States. They would normally have left the setting vague while adapting cultural differences that the target audience would not understand, but because one of the episodes involves time zones, they had to specify where the game takes place, and chose the United States without thinking a lot about it. This became an issue in later games, where the Japanese setting was more obvious. All the voice roles in the localized version of the game were handled by localization staff; Takumi had wanted to do the English voice for Phoenix, but it was handled by Ben Judd.

Smith faced several problems related to the game's use of puns; in the Japanese version, each character has a name that relies on Japanese wordplay. While Smith and Anderson had a lot of freedom when it came to localizing the names of minor characters, they had to discuss the names of the main cast with Capcom. Smith came up with a list of first names and last names for Phoenix, with the first suggestion being "Roger Wright"; "Phoenix" was also on the list, but further down. Smith felt that "Wright" had to be the character's surname, because Phoenix's surname in the Japanese version – "Naruhodō", meaning "I see" or "I understand" – was used many times in the game's text as a joke. The reason for the suggested first name "Roger" was alliteration, and "Roger" being a good source of jokes. A staff member of the development team, however, thought that "Roger Wright" was too similar to "Roger Rabbit". Among other suggested first names were "Pierce", "Xavier", "Marcus", and "Zane". In the end, "Phoenix" was chosen due to how heroic it sounded.

As the game's dialogue consists of a lot of wordplay and misunderstandings, Smith would analyze scenes before writing them: he would see what the scenes were trying to accomplish, and where the beats in them were. After he had the structure of a scene in his head, he would write it; at times he was able to make use of the original Japanese dialogue, but most of the time he had to come up with new ideas himself. At several points, the English wordplay was inspired by the wordplay in the Japanese version. At some points, it was not possible to do wordplay in the same places as in the Japanese version, so Smith would change the structure of the scene slightly. At other points, Smith came up with a joke or funny line, and changed the scene to make the joke work. Around half of the jokes were rewritten based on the characters present in the scene, rather than being translations of the Japanese jokes.

Reception

Most versions of the game have received "generally favorable reviews" according to the review aggregator Metacritic, with aggregate scores ranging from high 70s to low 80s out of 100; an exception is the Wii version, which holds the aggregate score of 67/100, indicating "mixed or average reviews".

Famitsu praised the idea of making a game based around trials, which they found to be innovative. Thomas Bowskill at Nintendo Life said that the game had changed his idea of what can make for a great game, and called it a masterpiece. Carrie Gouskos at GameSpot said that the game revitalized the adventure game genre. Michael Cole at Nintendo World Report said that the game's design and interface would make it a good choice for non-gamers as well. Famitsu found it exhilarating and fun to uncover witnesses' lies. Bowskill called the investigation sections tedious and boring at times, but said that they were outweighed by the feeling of accomplishment from solving the cases. Craig Harris at IGN felt that the main issues with the game were its linearity, and how the puzzles are simple because of how the player can stop a witness testimony at any time. Cole, too, felt that the game was very linear, and that it was unclear how to proceed at certain points. He said that, because of how story-driven it is, the game has low replay value; he still felt that players might want to replay it after a few years.

Bowskill appreciated the 2D presentation of the investigations, saying that they suited the gameplay well and that it might have been difficult to find clues if 3D graphics had been used instead. Gouskos appreciated the game's presentation, calling it "unique and outstanding"; she said that the music and sound effects work well with the drama, and that the cross-examination graphics, showing the two opposing lawyers along with the sound effect of a sword being unsheathed, gave an atmosphere similar to that of a fighting game. Harris, too, likened the style to that of a fighting game. Gouskos said that the graphics, while simple, work well to show each character's mood and personality. Harris said that the visuals were well-drawn and that the soundtrack was "nicely rendered", but felt that the character animation was very limited. Cole said that the graphics, while dated, have "visual flair". He appreciated the opening cinematics for the cases, which he thought were both stylish and ambiguous, and the character animations, which he called "priceless". Nadia Oxford at USgamer said that early Ace Attorney games, despite the "tinny" sound of the Game Boy Advance versions, had spawned some of the most iconic music themes in video games; she noted "The Detective That Came From the Wild West" - the theme of Jake Marshall - as a particularly good track.

Bowskill found the mood of the game to be hilarious, and said that the game never gets stale; he attributed this to the diversity of the game's characters. Gouskos called the game's characters cohesive, over-the-top, and quirky. Harris called the story interesting and well written, citing the characters, situations, and dialogue. Cole was impressed by the mysteries and their resolutions, calling them "novel, unpredictable and plausible". He also appreciated the character development arcs through the game, which he felt provided pacing and made the cases cohesive. He called the English localization "top-notch", and appreciated its humor.

Wii, iOS, and Nintendo 3DS versions

Spencer McIlvaine at Nintendo Life was disappointed in how the Wii version only had a single use for motion controls, and how low-resolution graphics from handheld versions of the game were used. Dan Whitehead at Eurogamer similarly thought that the motion controls were only a minor addition, and was disappointed in how little effort Capcom had put into the port compared to LucasArts' remake of The Secret of Monkey Island. Craig Harris at IGN called it "incredibly lazy", wishing that it had included improved art and sharper text. Cara Ellison at Eurogamer called the Trilogy HD port "perfunctory", saying that animations are slow at times, that the high-definition graphics take away from the charm of the pixel art in previous versions, and that there is a delay after button presses.

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy was better received. Bob Mackey at USgamer appreciated how the games were mostly left untouched, while getting minor improvements, such as the ability to read the text at the player's own pace rather than waiting for it to "slowly [crawl] across the screen". He said that the game's graphical upgrades were hit or miss, with certain characters, including Phoenix and Edgeworth, looking great, while elements that originally had less definition, such as the judge's beard, were "a little wonky". Thomas Whitehead at Nintendo Life said that Capcom had done a "solid job" with the port, and appreciated the stereoscopic 3D effect and the game's faithfulness to the original; he, however, felt that the lack of an orchestral soundtrack similar to that in Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney − Dual Destinies was a minor disappointment. Geoff Thew at Hardcore Gamer called the updated art gorgeous, and noted that it did not have the same animation-related problems as the Trilogy HD on iOS. He appreciated the 3D effect, which he said works well most of the time, but said that the window frame in the detention center was not rendered on its own layer; he said that it was not a huge problem, but that it was distracting as the player visits that area often. He also commented on the lack of a remastered soundtrack, calling it a letdown.

Accolades

Eurogamer ranked the game as the 18th best video game of 2005. Destructoid named the game the 48th best video game of the 2000s, citing the courtroom gameplay and characters, and calling it "one of the most unique and surprising games" of the decade. They felt that the third game in the series had the best story, but thought it relied too heavily on story events in previous Ace Attorney games; meanwhile, they found Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney to be fresh and have challenging cases, making it the best in the series. Game Informer named it the 178th best video game of all time in 2009. Adventure Gamers named it the 29th best adventure game of all time in 2011, citing its story, characters, and creative gameplay. In 2015, GamesRadar named it the 55th best video game of all time, citing its music, story and look, calling it "Shu Takumi's masterpiece".

Sales

The Game Boy Advance version was the 163rd best selling video game of the year in Japan in 2001, with 62,169 copies sold. Another 37,143 copies were sold in Japan in 2003, of the budget-priced Game Boy Advance re-release, making it the 277th best selling game of the year in Japan. The Nintendo DS version was the 127th best selling game of the year in Japan in 2005, with 101,902 copies sold, the 133rd in 2006, with 113,000 copies, the 122nd in 2007, with 141,681 copies, the 139th in 2008, with 96,146 copies, the 244th in 2009, with 47,081 copies, the 557th in 2010, with 12,586 copies sold, and the 650th in 2011, with 9,460 copies sold.

Demand for the North American release of the Nintendo DS version was higher than expected, leading to the game being hard to find in stores shortly after its release; the third printing sold out in around a week. As of February 2007, 100,000 copies had been shipped in North America, which Capcom's vice-president of marketing found to be surprising. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy was the 139th best selling game of the year in Japan in 2014, with 46,819 copies sold.

Legacy

After the release of the game, sequels, spin-offs, and a crossover have been made. The second and third games in the series, Justice for All and Trials and Tribulations, were released in 2002 and 2004. The fourth game, Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney, which features the new protagonist Apollo Justice, was released in 2007. The fifth game, Dual Destinies, was released in 2013, and a sixth game, Spirit of Justice, was released in 2016. Two spin-off games starring Miles Edgeworth, Ace Attorney Investigations and Ace Attorney Investigations 2, were released in 2009 and 2011, and one featuring Phoenix's ancestor Ryūnosuke Naruhodō, Dai Gyakuten Saiban, was released in 2015. A crossover with the Professor Layton series, titled Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, was released in 2012.

A manga based on the game, written by Kenji Kuroda and drawn by Kazuo Maekawa, premiered in 2006 in Bessatsu Young Magazine. It was released in North America by Kodansha in five volumes from June 2011 to July 2012. The third and fourth volumes both ranked 2nd on The New York Times Manga Best Seller List for one week each in 2011 and 2012, respectively. A live action film adaptation of the game, titled Ace Attorney, premiered in Japanese theaters on February 11, 2012. It was produced at Toei Company, and was directed by Takashi Miike. An anime series adaptation based on the first two titles premiered in April 2016.