Game Review: Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney - Justice for All

 

Justice for All serves as the second installment in the Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney trilogy developed and published by Capcom.  Like the previous game, this entry was originally released on the Game Boy Advance in 2002 in Japan with a Nintendo DS port following in 2007 for the Western market. Shu Takumi and his team at Capcom Production Studio 4 were asked by Shinji Mikami to turn the game into a full-fledged trilogy after the success of the initial entry. With work on the 2^nd entry underway, the team were once again up against time with it being noted that Takumi was only given three and a half months to pen the scripts for each of the games five cases before full production was set to start.  Not one to let the constraints get in his way, Takumi actually got the scripts written but due to memory constraints with the GBA cartridge at the time, the game only ended up having four cases as opposed to five like originally intended. That wasn’t where the struggles ended however, as with only a year to get the game out the door, the development team were under pressure to deliver new ideas and gameplay features which would justify it being a successor to the original game.  My research online wasn’t able to find much in terms of sales numbers for Justice For All but on the critical front it aggregated a favorable 76 score from media outlets at the time according to Metacritic.

The narrative of Justice For All once again follows defence attorney Phoenix Wright as he works to represent his clients in the court of law and obtain a Not Guilty verdict in the cases they are accused under.  Set over a year after the events of the prior entry, Phoenix has developed a modest reputation and has been able to draw the attention of clients with notable ease. Maya Fey, Phoenix’s friend and assistant who left to continue her Spirit Medium training back in her village soon reunites with the ace attorney as Maya ends up being accused of murder (A common occurrence in this franchise) after a spirit channelling goes wrong. While defending her, Phoenix soon meets Pearl Fey, Maya’s younger cousin and learns of the Fey Clan’s line of succession. As Phoenix and his cohort takes on a new batch of cases it soon becomes clear that another mystery is looming in regards to the disappearance of prodigy prosecutor Miles Edgeworth. With a mysterious note left behind and no clear answers, Maya is confused to learn of Phoenix’s cold indifference to the matter which is only flared up with the introduction of new rival prosecutor, Franziska von Karma, daughter to Manfred Von Karma. With a cold and calculating attitude alongside a lethal whip, Von Karma has made it her personal mission to destroy Phoenix’s reputation for what he did to the reputation of her father and her adopted brother Edgeworth.

As with the previous game, the game’s narrative is displayed over the course of its 4-episode structure with the majority of its focus given to each individual case. If you consider the fact the game is an episode shorter this time and you don’t count the tutorial case, the game only has 3 cases to set up and conclude these main story arcs. While you might consider that to be a limitation, you also have to consider the original version of the first game also only really had 3 episodes to tell its story if you discount the tutorial case. While I feel an additional case may have given these plot threads a bit more room to breathe, I can’t really fault what is here as Takumi does an admirable job layering the plot threads and then concluding them in a satisfying way with the final case. The idea to expand on Maya’s storyline and introduce the wider politics behind the Fey Clan was a great call as it does a good job setting the groundwork for Trials and Tribulations to cap off so well.  I like the underlying mystery behind the disappearance of Edgeworth and the introduction of Franziska von Karma. There’s a clear effort to expand on these characters and the stories they go through over the course of the games which feels rewarding for players who are actually invested in these games and like to see these characters grow and develop.

Let’s look a bit more specifically at the writing quality in terms of the individual cases though shall we? The game consists of four cases, those being The Lost Turnabout, Reunion and Turnabout, Turnabout Big Top and Farewell My Turnabout.  I have to be honest and say I only really liked two out of the four cases in this game, that being Reunion and Turnabout and Farewell My Turnabout. It’s clear as day that the rushed timeframe on writing the cases for Justice For All did Takumi no favours in respect to the quality of the writing for each case. I’ll get my grievances with The Lost Turnabout and Turnabout Big Top out of the way first.  The Lost Turnabout isn’t necessarily a bad case, but for a tutorial case it doesn’t really offer much to chew on and neither does it offer any compelling set up like the tutorial case for the first and third entry’s tutorial cases do. My primary issues come in the form of Turnabout Big Top though, this case is a whole heap of problematic implications and tiring, repetitive jokes. I think there’s a sad and empathetic story layered deep beneath the problems which makes it all more frustrating a case considering it gives way more focus to its worst elements.

Let’s talk about the good cases next. Reunion and Turnabout is an amazing case and might be my favourite of the game just a personal preference. I love how it works to re-introduce the player to Maya Fey but in turn give them insight into her back story which only really gets hinted at in the first entry.  The core crux of the case is excellently set up and framed in a mystery that you feel exceptionally clever for working out.  As mentioned though, the main reason I love it is because it does such a good job in setting up the dominoes which Trials and Tribulations will topple in such a satisfying manner. I would argue Reunion and Turnabout is one of the most important cases in the entire trilogy and it does so much heavy lifting for the wider narrative while giving the player a really fun case to crack in itself.  I have something shameful to admit when it comes to Farewell My Turnabout, this is actually my first time beating it fully.  As a kid, I never could get on with the length and complexity of this case so I always just skipped it and moved onto Trials and Tribulations, which is mad in retrospect considering it’s the final case in the game. I think now that I’m older though and playing and completing the case for the first time, I realize I likely wouldn’t have appreciated the mature elements of this case as much as a kid, so maybe it was for the best that I got to experience it for the first time now.  I think as final cases go, Takumi does a damn fine job layering everything together.  The idea of a case in which your client is guilty but you’re forced by unforeseen circumstances to defend them is a fantastic idea and the game takes that concept all the way.  There’s a lot of tension and drama in this case too and it smartly weaves and concludes the overarching threads wonderfully.

Following on from my prior review, here is my ranking of the game’s cases from best to worst:

Reunion, and Turnabout

Farewell, My Turnabout

Turnabout Big Top

The Lost Turnabout

On the gameplay end of things, Justice For All plays for the most part very much the same way as the prior entry does.  Your primary form of gameplay is split into two sections; trials and investigations.  Trial segments are the main bread and butter of these games, with you standing in defence of your client in the court of law while the prosecution introduces witnesses which you must cross-examine and find the flaws in their testimonies. Your primary means of doing this is by pressing their statements to find these flaws or presenting evidence which directly contradicts what they are attempting to imply.  These segments are so satisfying on the basis that you get to unravel peoples lies and deceptions and turn the entire case on its head.  There’s so much back and forth in these segments and Franziska von Karma offers a much different flavor of prosecution compared to Edgeworth which helps differentiate the game somewhat from other entries.

On the other end there’s the investigative side of the game which plays similar to the prior entry except for one notable new additional, the psyche-locks mechanic. This new mechanic is introduced via the 2^nd case in which Maya gives you her Magatama which allows you to see when people you talk to are hiding or lying about something in the form of chains and ornate red locks.  It’s down to you to collect evidence throughout the investigation sections and use them to break these locks and force the individual to reveal the truth they are hiding. It’s a smartly considered system which offers a bit more to the investigative sections as apposed to just walking around, talking to people and investigating the environments. I have to say though, I felt more so in this game that the path of progression was a lot more convoluted in the sense that the game doesn’t clearly explain who or what you need to do next to progress the investigation. Even on what is probably my 100th replay of this game, I find the game can be annoyingly unclear with implying your next steps.  I’m also not a big fan of profiles being evidence you need to present in certain sections; it just makes the room for error way too large in my opinion as there were moments I was expected to present a profile to contradict a statement which I never really felt the game implied well enough to catch on to.

On the presentation side of things, you can clearly see Takumi and his team wanted to keep the overall DNA of the game’s visual side of things the same for the most part.  The animations and visual backdrops are all well constructed and continue to give a clear distinct aura to the game which helps keep it timeless.  I also appreciated that the team tried to introduce flashy intro sequences to each case to give it more of a cinematic opening.  They had to work within the confines of the technology at the time, but the artwork and animation really go a long way in making this game feel distinctly memorable.  On the audio side of things Naoto Tanaka took up the reigns of composing Justice For All’s soundtrack.  While I wouldn’t really call it my favorite soundtrack in the franchise, it definitely has some memorable tracks that help make it feel distinct from the other entries in the franchise.

I understand that there’s an almost dismissive opinion from the Ace Attorney fanbase when it comes to Justice For All and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t get it.  A case short and with only two arguably good cases to offer, I understand why people may feel this game fails to live up to the exceptional impression the first Ace Attorney game set.  I think despite its clear flaws though, there’s still a lot to appreciate with what Justice For All does.  It smartly continues and expands on the world of Phoenix Wright while introducing new characters and overarching plotlines to the mix and the core gameplay continues to offer fun and inviting mysteries to solve. Its flaws may be notable but so are its strengths and I cannot find it in me to dismiss Justice For All like a lot of others do.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐