Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (Nintendo DS, 2005)

Reviewed for Big Boss Games by: KBN

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney for the Nintendo DS is the story of a rookie defense attorney. Fresh out of Law School, Phoenix isn't quite as confident on the bench as he needs to be. Luckily, he has his mentor and veteran lawyer Mia to assist him through his first trial. Phoenix, Mia, Maya (Mia's younger sister), and a slew of other characters will come into play throughout the 5-chapter adventure. Phoenix must not only prove himself in court, but also out in the world where he and Maya must gather evidence, talk to witnesses, and finger the real culprit.

Phoenix Wright is one of those interactive story type games that are so prevalent in Japan. When at a crime scene, you must search the area for clues. Using the stylus, you will scan suspicious areas, 'borrow' vital clues from people trying to hide them, and expand your knowledge of an area for when you're in court.

The microphone also comes into play in Phoenix Wright. When in court and Cross-Examining a witness, you have the option to either call for more information or raise an objection. You can do this via the touch screen buttons, or by yelling: "HOLD IT" or "OBJECTION" into your DS system. It doesn't sound like a feature you'd use too often, but some of the prosecuting attorneys made me angry enough to enjoy yelling at them, before debunking their tower of lies!

The stylus also comes into play with the evidence itself. Often, you will be given a map or a photo in which you need to identify the flaw in a witness' testimony, or a trial-altering fact, which has been overlooked.

Phoenix Wright is broken into five chapters of play. Each one is a unique case, but fits into the overall story. For example, the murder weapon from case one will come back into play in case two, where it was again used as a weapon of murder. The characters you meet, help, and intimidate in earlier chapters will come back to help you again in later stories, and sometimes characters will follow you between stories, being a constant help or a constant hindrance. By chapter 5, you will not only be investigating crime scenes and interviewing witnesses, but you'll also be using puzzle solving, and forensics tools to help pinpoint a killer and save your client from incarceration.

Phoenix Wright is a classic-in-the-making and a game that I'll be glad to hang onto for a long time to come. The courtroom proceedings can run a bit long, so it's not a game you can really just pick up at anytime, unless you have a great memory for detail, as the game does utilize a save anytime feature. It sounds short, but can give you hours of entertainment. Sadly, there isn't much replay value. Once you figure out how the murder was done and how to prove it it's not as easy to forget. In some instances, you'll be stuck in a cross-examination when the answer suddenly hits you. After hours of thought, you're not likely to forget it, but you'll have a great sense of achievement nonetheless.

Phoenix Wright is an overall great game, worth the money to play through it at least once, and an asset to classic gameplay with a great Touch-Screen spin.
Sometimes it's hard to decide how to prove a witness is lying, even if you know what they're lying about. You need to be VERY specific at times, which can often lead to a 'Guilty' verdict for your client and a 'Game Over' for you.

Overall Score: 5 out of 5 STARS!

It is not easy to find a game that manages to not require any reflexes, complex controls, and is very thought involving. That is what the adventure genre provides. Japanese text adventures often do not make it to the US, but Capcom took a chance and brought this DS port of a GBA game here.

In Phoenix Wright, you play a young defense attorney who is trying to get a start on his career. You are charged with defending criminals from murder charges, and you must prove their innocence and find the real murderer. There are court sequences where you cross-examine people and present evidence to find contradictions in their testimonies, along with adventure sections where you search areas for evidence that will help your case.

Phoenix Wright might be fun enough with the lawyering alone, but it also features great story and character design. You get to learn about the personality and history of each character, and none of these cases are without something strange and scandalous.

The music in Phoenix Wright goes along very well with the dramatic cases, and the game has a comic book look to it, with a variety of animations for characters. As a DS port, Capcom could have added some more animations to characters, but the art direction is appealing and the graphics are sharp and clean.

Overall, Phoenix Wright is an engrossing text adventure, and although it requires a fair amount of thought, the difficulty is fair and the game will not place you in many overly challenging or unintuitive positions, though sometimes the game seems to be thinking of a different answer to a question than you would. Overall, a very involving adventure game.

Ever since I was 6 years old I've been playing video games as my hobby. When I first saw this game at the game store I work in I thought, heck it can't be anything special. So I got Trauma Center instead (wich also is a very decent DS game). But after a couple of weeks a friend of mine who also works in that store told me I had to at least try the first case in this lawyer game. So I sat down for about an hour and played through case 1. I was addicted. I bought the game, played it through, and I have to say. This game is like a extremely great, funny, challenging and sometimes even a bit scary book. In the game you play the role of Phoenix Wright. Phoenix is a rookie deffense attorney who just took his first case. You get to learn difrent personalities very quickly. There's 5 cases in total, the first 4 cases are taken directly from the first GBA game (only released in Japan) of Phoenix Wright (called Gyakuten Saiban). The fifth case however is a brand new case where the game takes good use of the Touch screen and the microphone that the DS has. You have to use special fluid in certain rooms to find clues when investigating a crime scene, you have to use the touch screen and microphone together to find fingerprints. And its really fun walking around finding clues before going into court to defent your client.

Another function that takes good use of the DS microphone, is in court when you are cross-examining the witness to press the witness for more information. When you are showing evidence to prove an error in a testimony. You scream "Objection!", "Hold It!" or "Take That!" wich is really fun and makes you feel like you are living in the game at times. Of course there is a little button on the screen that you can push if you are on a bus and don't want to get alot of weird looks =)

All in all I think Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney for the Nintendo DS is one of the best DS games there is, and is without a doubt a must-have game. Its guaranteed to take you to a world where law is extremely fun and addictive.

5/5
9/10
97%
Excellent!

Who knew investigating bizarre murder cases would be so much fun? Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney is actually a port of the original GBA game, "Gyakuten Saiban" which was only released in Japan, with a new (DS specialized) fifth case added to this DS edition. Despite the fact that it's a port, it displays amazing graphics and sound, and makes of use of the special DS functions to the maximum, even using the mic to yell out "OBJECTION!" and two other phrases if you wish!

Whether you're into crime scene investigations and court cases (or not!), you'll be treated with excellent, intriguing, and very fun gameplay. No prior knowledge of law is necessary to play - anyone can get into it just like that! There isn't even a jury! You play as the protagonist, 24 year old Phoenix Wright, a brand new rookie lawyer trying to make sense of his profession.

This is a very simple game (not including the logical thought process of analzying the cases, which requires you own thinking, of course) to get into with extremely simple controls. The graphics and sound are great. The game also consists of quriky and very clever dialogue for the various characters you'll run into. You even grow to love the groan-inducing puns of some character names. In its entirety, the game is a wonderful pick-up, and will keep you entertained for hours...so whip up some evidence and, "TAKE THAT!"

After hearing many wonderful things about this game, I purchased it last week. At first, the gameplay does seem very much exciting, and you are absorbed in the game. However, at the second case it's novelty began to wear off and I realized that the game was really not as great as the glowing reviews make it out to be.

THE GOOD: It definitely has an interesting premise. Solving cases is a lot of fun...you need to actually think about the evidence you have and see how it contradicts the witness's testimony or whatever you are trying to prove/disprove. It's not always obvious, although sometimes you do receive quite an obvious hint. But there were many times where I had to think for a little and review the evidence a few times in order to know what to do next.

The graphics are ok; it's an anime' style game, so if you are looking for animation, this isn't for you. It's mostly static drawn scenes with the characters moving something like their mouths, etc. This doesn't really detract from the game though, as it's point is solving cases, not the scenery...having said that, the characters and backdrops are nice to look at, and are drawn well.

THE BAD: What really bored me about this game is that more than half of the game is simply clicking the 'next' button...and reading. I understood from reviews that this was a text-based game, and heavily so, and that was ok..as long as you are somewhat involved. But a large portion of the game is NOT spent in court. When you are in court, generally you are involved, because you are reading testimonies and trying to spot clues and loopholes, but out of court....you just click on a location and click on a character, read, read, read, next location, click on character, read, read, read, next location, and so on. It's very tedious and boring. The story is interesting at times, but I felt like I had purchased a book for the DS and was just sitting there reading it. Click. Click. Click. Where's the action? I tried to hurry back to court as fast as I could, since it seemed that that was the only place where you actually *played* the game.

Also, the game is very short. I haven't beaten it yet, but I've only been playing it for a few days, a couple of hours here and there, and I'm at the end of the fourth case; there are only 5. It doesn't quite seem worth it's high price tag to me, when for that price you can get a superb game for another console with better graphics and longer gameplay.

OVERALL: Overall, the game does have it's fun moments, but I was highly disappointed in it's gameplay, especially after reading all of it's praising reviews and the awards it's won. It's too short, and doesn't have enough of what actually makes the game good...solving cases. I get to a point when I play where I just don't feel like just hitting next and reading text, and shut it off. So it is an ok game, but I don't highly recommend it. If you have some cash to burn, I say why not...or better yet, buy the new one instead, hopefully that one will be a little improved. But if you're deciding between a few games, I would suggest you not get this, it's really not all that great. I HIGHLY recommend Elite Beat Agents...it's one of those games that I wouldn't have bought had I seen it in stores, but after watching an online review of it I purchased it, and it remains one of the few games that are seriously fun and I'm still NOT sick of playing.