Reviews » Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations [DS]
Reviewed by Metallian
The DS brought with its touchscreen a host of new possibilites for handheld games. Most of these were promptly beaten to a bloody pulp and far beyond by Nintendo itself, resulting in a slew of admittedly innovative games that nonetheless leave you looking like a Ritalin-chomping short-bus patron if you play them in a remotely public area. As such, games like Wario Ware, Cooking Mama, and Elite Beat Agents are better left to post-Tex-Mex bathroom sessions and a certain novelty status. The more enduring titles, at least in my caffeine-addled mind, are the more classic formulas; New Super Mario Brothers, Mario Kart DS, Advance Wars DS, and the Castlevania titles.
There is one old formula, however, that has fallen by the wayside for many years, and now, with the help of DS, is in a unique position to regain momentum in perhaps the perfect medium for it. I'm referring to the Point & Click Adventure game. Most of you will remember the classic Sierra and Lucasarts games of the 90's. Intellectually stimulating, often clever and intriguing, and ever merciful on video adapters, they were a great fit for the time. As days passed on the public interest moved away from anything that didn't have a kill-per-minute index of under 30, but there are still many of us that kept the faith.
And behold! What better way to play a measured-pace thinking man's game than on a teeny tiny system you can take wherever you go and pause whenever you need? Trust me, I've tried to play action games at work and Contra 3 becomes very annoying when your employer keeps nagging at you to "do your job" or "he's going to fire your ass" or some ridiculous shit in that vein. Can't you see I'm trying to shoot at this robot...eye...thing whilst hopping from missile to missile? Some people have no priorities. But I digress- With a stylus and touchscreen at your disposal it's a cinch to paw through environments for clues, move through areas, and select dialog options. It's a great fit for the system and I wish more people realized or cared. There have been precious few stabs at this; Trace Memory, Touch Detective, and Hotel Dusk: Room 215 come to mind, but unfortunately I thought these all kind of sucked for reasons ranging from arbitrary to justified to simply pedantic. There is one franchise that captured my fancy very readily however, and that is the now subculturally-famous Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney series.
Actually having its roots in Japan on Game Boy Advance, the game was considered more digestible with a DS refit. It's a definite improvement, because while the game isn't hard to navigate with standard buttons, looking for evidence and rhythmically tapping your way through pages of quirky dialog is easier with a touchscreen. It also makes the game largely playable with one hand, making it enjoyable on my frequent trips to Flavor Country (DON'T SMOKE, KIDS!), or various other times when I really should be doing something else. Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations is the third in the series and is yet another GBA translation. The hotly anticipated sequel (by me and about seven other people) Gyakuten Saiban 4 is coming soon. It has been developed exclusively for DS, and will feature many whiz-bang features that will have you madly tapping the screen and huffing on the microphone like a Ritalin chomping shor..... but moving on, this pleasantly old-school iteration is a very enjoyable one, and so far my favorite of the series.
The formula for any Phoenix Wright game is rather simple and plays out in two distinct modes: Investigation and Trial. You play the role of, naturally, Phoenix Wright, an aloof young lawyer who frequently finds himself caught up in heinous (yet somehow strangely lighthearted) murders and ends up defending a client that always seems very, horribly guilty. Taking place in the near future, the justice system has been shockingly streamlined but nonetheless muddled. Normally an attorney would have no business poking around a crime scene, and the game sometimes alludes to this, but in Investigation mode, with a first-person perspective, you are still tasked to contaminate the hell out of each and every crime scene, moving from area to area, talking to witnesses, pocketing crucial evidence, and generally making a mockery of the entire judicial branch. Then you move on to the Trial, a third person text-fest in which you must point out contradictions upon cross-examination (only the prosecution can call witnesses) and present evidence to back it up.
Those (like me) who were raised as much by Dick Wolf as their own parents may blow a very important gasket thinking too hard about Future-Law, so I've found it's simply best to just try to settle in to the PW special brand of "logic" and go along for the ride. Did I mention that the investigation and trial are limited to a day each, barring extenuating circumstances? And that the judge decides the case without a jury? And that burden of proof is on the accused, and in order to land a not guilty verdict, you must accuse someone else and lay the conviction smackdown on them during the very same trial?
Yeah, well, I didn't say it made a lot of sense, I said it was fun. Too wacky to even represent the Japanese justice system very well (which is monumentally wacky), the courtroom antics are puzzling, but that's not where Trials and Tribulations pays the bills. It's the quirky presentation in general that makes it memorable. Phoenix, clad in his omnipresent blue suit, is constantly concerned about the spikiness of his hair (Too spiky? Not spiky enough?) and is accompanied by his assistant Maya Fey, a 19-year-old Spirit Medium who frequently channels the dead, often in a court of law. She also has a habit of being kidnapped and/or framed for murder, you know kids these days. Other memorable characters include: Miles Edgeworth, hotshot Prosecutor and lifelong friend of Wright, who dresses more foppishly than Jon Pertwee's Doctor, Franziska Von Karma, vindictive German prosecutorial prodigy who wields a whip and is not afraid to use it in court, and the hopelessly incompetent, shabbily-dressed but well-meaning Detective Dick Gumshoe, among many others. Phoenix's main rival in TaT ( God that abbreviation seems wrong) is the mysterious new prosecutor Godot, a man distinguished by a red glowing visor, a maniacal love of coffee, and a commensurate loathing of Wright. Coming from two prior games filled with the same characters, their mannerisms actually get me chuckling like a moron, especially at the courtroom battles that occur.
The way these battles play out is easily the best part of the game. By the time you get to court you can be assured of two things. One, that you will have little to no clue what is really going on, and Two, that you have collected or will be presented with enough evidence to miraculously piece it all together. Phoenix constantly breaks out in a cold sweat, and even though he's a bungling moron at times, he does have his moments, and that's when you find a contradiction in a witness's testimony. Finger outstretched, these inconsistencies are heralded with a rousing "OBJECTION!" In fact, while you can press a button to initiate the event, less esoteric players can choose to press Y to activate the microphone and scream it themselves. Once the trial has gained momentum and you've figured out the twisted logic of the thing, objections flying from either side, suspenseful BGM bleeping away, I daresay the game gets truly exciting as you deftly present the proper pieces of evidence and connect the right dots to absolve your client.
Trials and Tribulations has a few features picked up from the first sequel, Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Justice For All, that the original installment didn't have. One is the "Psyche-lock" system. Due to a glowing bauble gifted to Phoenix by one of his spirit medium cohorts, he can actually see when someone is lying. How, you might ask? Well because when prodded about a guarded question, huge fucking chains shoot out of nowhere all around the person, studded with as many as five ornate locks. You know, much like real life. Or something. If you don't have enough evidence to break through these mental defenses, you can actually be hurt by questioning further; there is a sort of life bar you have to keep an eye on. It's the same one that is lessened when you make an unfounded objection in the courtroom, and you keep the same bar for the entirety of a case. It's a little odd, but there has to be some risk of losing I suppose. There is also the bit which allows you to present Profiles of the people involved in a case as well as evidence, which is useful for dragging extra info out of people in the investigation phase.
Technically speaking, the game has nothing going for it over the last installment, but while JFA was short a whole case (four as opposed to five) and as such was a little bit of a letdown, TaT has a good length, truly interesting cases, and the largest and most colorful cast yet. This installment throws out all the stops, letting you play as multiple attorneys, and the last case in particular is my favorite of the whole series, as it's simply a very entertaining narrative as well as a complex case that is quite satisfying to solve. While there's certainly room to grow, as it's still a GBA port, there's not a lot of glaring faults. I might ask for selectable text speed, and perhaps a more streamlined way to present evidence to people in the Investigation phase, but it's still very good.
Here's a secret: I reviewed this game before it was out stateside, by importing it from ol' Nippon. Over there it's known as Gyakuten Saiban 3. That's how enamored I am with this series: I will gleefully import that blissfully region-free game card from many meridians away just to get my fix of pseudo-legal action. I'm not completely insane however; the game does offer an English text option, making long nights of pouring over a poorly written translation FAQ unnecessary. But isn't that still crazy? Well honestly, there isn't much of a difference. You can get it imported for a little over 30 bucks, which is what the MSRP is for us. The only differences are going to be a box and manual you don't understand, and you'll have to hit an extra button once you start the game, but aside from a few typos in the English text, it's exactly the same game. And don't let those typos fool you, the translation is excellent. TaT had me cackling at pop culture references from Ghost In The Shell and Final Fantasy IV to 300, as well as proper English puns and wordplay. So if you can't wait another second for your frantic legal action, Phoenix got your back.
Phoenix Wright is alone in the world, a very original series of games with undeniable charm, if inscrutable logic. Since we'll probably never see a Law & Order game that can't be best described in terms of dental surgery, GS will probably be the only worthwhile Legal Adventure games around for a while, and I'm quite alright with that. When all is said and done, it's just an involved little story that you play along with, which is not often seen these days and less often done well. A fine game to enjoy with your cup of morning coffee, or any time you simply want to give that thumb a rest, Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations is as fine a representation of the series as we've gotten thus far, and adventure fans should not overlook it. Highly Recommended.
Phoenix Wright: Trials and Tribulations - DS
Presentation
A simple interface and clean, no nonsense sprites aren't exactly flashy, but they serve the purpose well and convey the bizarre sense of humor that propels the game along.
Gameplay
It's a Point-and-Click so there isn't much to do wrong, it's objectively boring if you don't want to read a bunch of stuff, but if that's true you should probably go play Halo some more.
Replayability
I've never tracked how long I spend overall beating one of these games, but I do know that they keep me busy at odd times over a couple of weeks. And while I won't want to go back immediately, I'll certainly play through again someday- it's like a good book. An added bonus is you can play the cases in any order once you've unlocked them all by playing through once.
Value
It’s retailing for $29.99, and I personally don't have a problem with thirty for any game I don't have to make a bunch of excuses for.
Overall
It's not for EVERYBODY, but if you like text adventures it's an excellent example. There's some crazy Japanese stuff going on in there, but it's nothing that all those Final Fantasy turds in recent years haven't prepared you for. One of my DS favorites.
