To paraphrase the famous preamble of Law and Order, “In the Japanifornia justice system, NPCs are represented by two separate yet equally important groups: the police and prosecutors, who investigate and prosecute the crime; and the defense attorneys, who defend the obviously innocent suspects.”
The Ace Attorney series is beloved for its over-the-top courtroom antics and drama, but as stated above, there is another essential aspect of the justice system: investigations. And that’s the focus of Capcom’s latest game compilation: the Ace Attorney Investigations Collection, a compilation of 2009’s Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth and 2011’s Ace Attorney Investigations 2: Prosecutor’s Gambit.
Until these games, Ace Attorney games took place mainly in the courtroom. Yes, there were investigation sections where you looked for evidence, but they were always to support the trial gameplay. In the Investigations games, that dynamic gets turned on its head. Here, every case is an episodic mystery box set at the scene of the crime where you must investigate to determine who committed the crime and how. In other words, if Ace Attorney is Matlock, then Ace Attorney Investigations is pure Columbo.
Thankfully, despite this change in focus, the game is still Ace Attorney with absurd characters, laugh-out-loud dialogue and situations, and moments of insight where you uncover the truth of the case, making you feel like a genius lawyer in your own right. And if you’re an old-school fan of Ace Attorney, this duology works beautifully as the continuation of the original trilogy, with the return of many of your favorite characters (minus Phoenix himself, short of two non-speaking background cameos).
In both Ace Attorney Investigations games, you play as fan-favorite prosecutor Miles Edgeworth. After his experiences in the first three Ace Attorney entries, Edgeworth has abandoned his previous credo of “All defendants guilty,” instead embracing a philosophy of searching for the truth, no matter where it will lead. However, meeting a young girl, Kay Faraday, who claims to be a “Great Thief” of the truth puts this philosophy to the test. Her appearance begins to unravel a tapestry of past cases where Edgeworth must confront the mistakes of his youth and the follies of his law mentors. But with the help of his loyal subordinate, Detective Dick Gumshoe, nothing will stop Miles Edgeworth from discovering the truth and unmasking every criminal for the world to see!
The gameplay in both games is an adaptation of the core gameplay from other Ace Attorney games, set at the crime scene rather than the courtroom. Rather than cross-examining witnesses, you instead argue with suspects in the field. In these arguments, you use the same basic mechanics of examining and pushing the target’s statements to find contradictions in their story and reveal their lies. Unlike Phoenix stuck in the courtroom, the analytical Edgeworth has a few new investigative tricks up his sleeve rather than just asking questions.
The first is using “Logic” to make deductions about a crime scene. While examining the scene, you can discover pieces of information to send to the logic panel. There, you can make connections between two pieces of information to come up with a brand-new conclusion about the case.
Prosecutor’s Gambit introduces another new investigative tool: “Mind Chess.” Here, Edgeworth enters into a conversation with a suspect, using observations about their statements and body language to deduce certain truths they would prefer to remain hidden. I love how this mode actually makes use of the expressive character portraits that Ace Attorney is known for. By observing a character’s animation, you can determine if they are uncomfortable, angry, or lying, then choose the most fruitful conversational path to move forward.
Both the Logic and Mind Chess sections demonstrate how much more cerebral Miles Edgeworth is than Phoenix Wright, differentiating the way the characters handle their respective jobs. Miles is methodical, ensuring he knows every possible outcome before even opening his mouth. It’s refreshing playing a high-status character who is firmly sure of themselves rather than a defense attorney constantly bluffing his way out of trouble in the courtroom. This dynamic also ensures Edgeworth has much further to fall when he gets things wrong, leading to some moments of high comedy as he tries to conceal his mistakes or high drama as he is left without a clue how to move forward in a case.
Unfortunately, both Ace Attorney Investigations games share a central weakness of all Ace Attorney titles. There is a single line of logic/evidence you must follow to get to the truth. Even if you have already figured out what happened in a case, you must use the right evidence or conversational topic at the right time to progress. It drives me crazy when I present evidence that should contradict a statement, only for the game to reject it because I needed to use it on the fourth statement, not the third. More recent entries have gotten better about this problem (though they haven’t completely solved it), but Investigations is old school. If you lose the game’s single thread of logic, you lose.
Another way Ace Attorney Investigations differentiates itself from its courtroom-set brethren is with a new method of controlling your character. In the mainline series, you explore environments by clicking still images of locations to find evidence. Here, the presentation is that of an old-school point-and-click adventure game. You can move Miles Edgeworth around an environment and have him investigate various objects, talk to people, and more. The game makes use of the stylus for this on the DS. Obviously, this corresponds to using the mouse on a PC. Unfortunately, what I expected to be the most natural control method is also the most frustrating. Getting Edgeworth to face the right direction to interact with an object or person can be very difficult. Ideally, you should be able to click on them directly, but the game objects to this line of logical gameplay every time. I eventually abandoned the mouse and moved to using a controller. That worked fine but took away from the games’ unique point-and-click presentation, making it feel much more like, well, any other Ace Attorney game.
The Ace Attorney Investigations Collection brings the same high level of polish that Capcom brings to all Ace Attorney collections, including a big graphical update. Rather than the original’s pixel art, we now have detailed high-resolution backgrounds that bring these environments to life. A more controversial change is replacing the pixel art character sprites with new hand-drawn “chibi” models, and while they resemble the character portraits we see in cutscenes, they aren’t an exact match. This conflict between art styles is a little bothersome, but the new hand-drawn characters are so charming that you’ll forgive them after a few minutes of gameplay. You have the option to switch back to the pixel art sprites if you wish. However, these old-school charming sprites didn’t quite look right against the high-resolution backgrounds.
While Ace Attorney Investigations has been available in the West for many years on the Nintendo DS and iOS, this is the first time Prosecutor’s Gambit is available in the West. Of course, for those criminal suspects in the know, there were ways to play it before it was officially available. Back in the early 2010s, a passionate group of fan localizers set to work creating an incredible-quality English translation. That team did an astonishing job of maintaining the English tone of the series, expertly localizing all of the pun-filled names and absurd dialogue that Ace Attorney is known for.
So, how does this official translation compare to the fan localization? Unsurprisingly, this official localization is excellent. After comparing the two versions using YouTube, I determined that, though there are places where I prefer the fan version and others where the official one shines brighter, I genuinely never felt that one was superior. I will say that the fan name of “Sebastian Debeste” in the fan translation is better than the official “Eustace Winner,” but thankfully, the character is just as much of an ass in both localizations. Even though the fan localization is still an incredible piece of work, this collection is clearly the superior way to play the game. That said, I suspect that some intrepid hackers will eventually figure out a way to inject the fan translation into this to make what many may call the definitive version of the game.
So, which game in the collection is better? The first Ace Attorney Investigations has some solid standalone cases and characters, but unfortunately, it feels like a bit of a throwaway spinoff. But like many other spinoffs, the first season is for setting up the new status quo. Things don’t usually get good until the second season! Prosecutor’s Gambit offers a much more complex storyline than the first title, with more closely linked cases that force Miles Edgeworth into a crisis of faith about his beliefs in the law. Which is more important: the truth or the protection of innocent suspects? Should he remain a prosecutor or follow in his late father’s footsteps as a defense attorney? Though the plot is occasionally convoluted (it is an Ace Attorney game and they rely on outlandish coincidences), Prosecutor’s Gambit might tell one of the best stories in the entire series.
With the Ace Attorney Investigations Collection, Capcom has finally run out of old Ace Attorney games to put into modern packages. And as a final hurrah, the Ace Attorney Investigations Collection is a massive success. Not only do we get a polished remaster of the solid AA Investigations, but we also get a “brand-new” game that might offer the best-written story in the series. Despite some control issues, this collection is the best version of these games we’ll likely ever play. And after 14 years of Collection releases, including Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy, Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney Trilogy, and The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles, I am delighted that the entire series is fully available on modern consoles (barring a crossover game with a certain top-hat-sporting puzzle solver).
Now, please, let us finally move on to the next case, Capcom!
