Ace Attorney Investigations Collection

Shu Takumi, the creator of the original Ace Attorney trilogy, was heavily inspired by the works of Arthur Conan Doyle. The spin-off title The Great Ace Attorney features Sherlock Holmes (or rather Herlock Sholmes) as one of the main characters. Indeed, the design philosophy of the entire series can almost be summarised in the master detective's own famous words: "When you have eliminated the impossible whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth." Despite this, it wasn't until Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth for Nintendo DS that the series got a "real" Sherlock Holmes game. Now you can relive the adventure on newer consoles, and even try your hand at the sequel, Prosecutor's Gambit, which, until now, has never left Japan.

Before we look at the two spin-off titles, let's first summarise what Ace Attorney is all about. The series is known for its quirky characters and dramatic plot lines that twist and turn in all sorts of directions. This is especially evident in the games' iconic court trials, where you have to press witnesses and present evidence at the right time to save your innocent clients. But the series also has a, in my opinion, slightly less successful investigative part where you prepare for said trials by collecting testimonies and evidence. These sections are reminiscent of early Japanese adventure games from the mid-eighties and early nineties in that you have to exhaust all conversations and interact with just about every object on the screen, until you proceed to a new scene and must do it all over again.

So what makes this collection more 'Holmesian' or at least more detective-like? First off, there is the main character himself, the brilliant prosecutor Miles Edgeworth. Like Conan Doyle's famous detective, Miles is both confident and fiercely intelligent, as illustrated by how he gets a thrill of out explaining his own reasoning while wagging his finger in a superior way. Luckily, his friends, such as the good-natured detective Dick Gumshoe and the ever-unlucky Larry Butz, keep him grounded. Both of these are returning characters from the main series, and their personalities are as fun and sparkly as ever, but it's the new characters that really steal the show. I particularly enjoyed the teenage master thief Kay Faraday, who becomes Edgeworth's assistant, and Eustace Winner, a cocky, but utterly incompetent prosecutor, but even the minor character's display plenty of personality in their animations and dialogue.

The gameplay itself has also taken on a new focus that brings to mind magnifying glasses and deerstalkers more than Law & Order meets anime. Instead of a static first-person camera, you now actually see your characters as small sprites moving around the environment. The game though changes to a first-person perspective when you examine for example a body or a larger, suspicious object. In these cases, you might even need to point out a connection between an observed portion of the screen and a piece of evidence in your case file. Practically speaking, none of this changes much as you're still mostly combing the screen for clues, but it does makes the investigation more immersive. The same can also be said - for better or worse - about the unique mechanics introduced in this collection.

In Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth, the biggest innovation is that you not only collect evidence for your case file, but also build a mental inventory of observations. Using Edgeworth's razor-sharp logic, you can then draw connections between these observations, thereby coming up with new deductions. In the sequel, Prosecutor's Gambit, these mechanics are complemented by Mind Chess. This sounds quite fancy, but in reality it's just a normal interrogation where you, by choosing the right dialogue options, force your opponents to spill the beans, thereby "checkmating" them. There is also a unique mechanic tied to your assistant Kay Faraday and one of her tools, but I will refrain from spoiling this.

Both of these mechanics are superbly presented with dramatic transitions and effects - lightning whooshing over the screen, puzzle pieces falling in place, and chess pieces bursting - as if it were a prime time quiz show on TV. You really do feel like a brilliant detective, but in reality, I find both mechanics a bit lacking. Making the connections between observations is always very simple and doesn't let you juggle with alternative interpretations (like in Frogwares' Sherlock Holmes titles), while Mind Chess is nothing more than elaborate dressed dialogue mazes which you often end up brute forcing your way through. This isn't necessarily a bad thing though, as all the brainpower you didn't require during the investigation part is put to good use during your arguments.

Essentially, these are trimmed down versions of the main games' trials with you poking holes in testimonies from witnesses, suspects and even rival investigators or prosecutors. The game is not ashamed of wearing worn clothes so to speak, as it even uses the same trial UI as in the main games, and the characters' often quip about how is it just like being in the court room. The hush from the onlookers and all the fancy suits (except Edgeworth's own of course) might be missing, but the quality is top-notch as usual, and you are constantly amazed at how masterfully the plot unfolds, with you always knowing just about enough to present the right evidence at the right time. In short, the main improvement with these arguments is that they are shorter than regular trials, but appear more often. This makes the pacing of each case better balanced than in the main games, and the overall package feels more cohesive as a result.

I haven't said anything about the individual cases or the overall storylines so far, as I believe they are best experienced with as blank a slate as possible. But I will say that, just as the gameplay feels more cohesive, so does the story. Each game consists of five episodes, and while they can be enjoyed independently there are so many threads that tie them together that Capcom must have been using a sewing machine. This even holds true across the two games. Even though Prosecutor's Gambit was released two years after the original in its home country of Japan, the events of the two games are no more than two weeks apart, and so many of the main characters appear in both game.

Of particular note is the third episode of Prosecutor's Gambit. Here you play alternatively as Miles in the present and his father Gregory in a flashback. The two cases are 18 years apart, but still masterfully woven together, and while the premise is typically silly (a confectionary competition turned deadly), the storyline is surprisingly complex and emotional. In short, Ace Attorney Investigations represents some of the best storytelling in the series, and that's really saying something.

I've mentioned quite a few times that the collection represents the first time that Ace Attorney: Prosecutor's Gambit has been released in the West, but that is not entirely true. In 2014, a translation for the game subtitled Prosecutor's Path was released by a team of dedicated fans. This translation has already won the heart of many fans, and to be honest, having played both versions, I'm hard pressed to pick a favourite, as they both pack plenty of personality into each line. Even the names are often a coin toss; I prefer the official translation's Tabby Lloyd for a nosy reporter instead of Nicole Swift, but I don't quite think that Eustace Winner tops Sebastian Debeste for the aforementioned delusional prosecutor.

In terms of new content, the lacklustre extras (a music player, some concept art, a character gallery and added achievements), reveals a workmanlike job bringing the games to newer consoles. Most of the textures remain unchanged, but they look significantly sharper and the small character sprites have been redrawn completely without seeming of out place for that reason. It helps that the original games where beautiful even on the DS. Scenes are brimming with details, the animations are top-notch, and the locations are extremely varied - you'll visit a theme park, a prison and an airborne plane, just to mention a few. Some of the games' musical themes have been made available in new arranged versions, and while the soundtrack is a bit more subdued than in the main series, it's still excellent.

With the fourth Ace Attorney collection in just over five years, it's debatable whether Capcom is satisfying the series' many fans or just teasing them in a very cruel way. It's been eight long years since we got the last game in the series, Ace Attorney: Spirit of Justice, and a new chapter is long overdue. Capcom hasn't announced anything yet, so the wait is probably going to be even longer, but a least the Ace Attorney Investigations Collection with its 60 to 70 hours of great gameplay and storytelling, gives us something to do in the meantime.