Review of Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Trials and Tribulations

This review is based on my experience with the Wii-ware release of Trials and Tribulations.

Score: 4/5

Over the course of the past few years I have come to love the Ace Attorney series. The crazy cast of anime characters and ridiculous occurrences of the franchise are jam packed with charm, giving the series a unique sense of style. Trials and Tribulations made no change in the way the game is played, but somehow it still managed to captivate me just as much as the previous two games in the series. If you didn’t like the previous games in the series then you most certainly won’t like this one either.

The Ace Attorney games can best be described as interactive novels. They are in the same vane as point and click adventure games. However, instead of pointing and clicking you have to navigate menus. Everything is text, except for a few choice phrases such as “hold it”, “take that”, and everyone’s favorite “objection”. This means that your success in these games hinges on how well you remember what you’ve read, while at the same time thinking critically about what you’ve learned. You are taking the role of a defense attorney after all.

This image speaks for itself.

Trials and Tribulations much like previous games in the series features a number of cases or “turnabouts” that are separate court cases in an episode like format. Each turnabout goes through two stages, investigation and trial. They begin by showing a crime, which Phoenix inevitably ends up getting involved in. Once you have your defendant it’s time to gather information and evidence for the trial by investigating.

Outside of the courtroom you have one goal, which is to gather evidence for the trial. There are four options that the game gives you outside of the courtroom. These options are examine, talk, move, and present.

There are different places in the world, which are depicted by various static backgrounds. Examine allows you to move a cursor around the background to try and find evidence. When you find something it will be added to the court record, which is your inventory. Each place will feature a different character who Phoenix can speak with about the current case. There will be multiple conversation topics to discuss, or you can show them items from the court record to hear their opinion by presenting it to them.

Like the previous game in the series, Trials and Tribulations brings back psyche locks. When a character is lying, or hiding something from Phoenix chains will surround them and locks will appear. In order to break the locks you must present the correct evidence. A health bar comes into play here, so when you present the wrong evidence it takes a hit. This adds a bit of challenge to finding evidence, but it can get to be annoying if you’re missing a piece of evidence.

You use these four options to conduct your investigations.

Once you have found everything the game wanted you to the trial will begin. This is where the player has the most say in what happens. The prosecution will call a witness, who will state their testimony. When they finish you will be able to cross examine their testimony. You can press each statement to question them a little further. The goal of the cross-examination is to show the contradictions in the testimony. In order to do this you must present the correct evidence at the correct statement. If you present the wrong evidence you will lose some health. Once all your health goes away you must restart at the beginning of the chapter. This concept is trivialized, because the player can save at any time.

While this system may not sound very exciting in writing, it is quite satisfying in practice. When you know what to present the game makes you feel smart for figuring it out. The music amps up and Phoenix gains some confidence. However, the game is scripted and sometimes you need to make some leaps in logic. This can lead to some frustration, but the game tries its best to direct you in the right direction. 

Since Trials and Tribulations is basically an interactive visual novel the most important part of the game is the story and writing behind it. I loved the previous games in the series, but I can say without a doubt that this one was my favorite. Fan favorite characters return, while new characters like the mysterious coffee drinking prosecutor Godot make their series debut.

Godot is an excellent addition to an already amazing cast.

A big part of why I liked the story in this game so much was that I’ve grown attached to the characters over the past two games. Trials and Tribulations taps into that by having sequences take place in the past and making the player be someone other than Phoenix Wright. It does a good job of expanding the world, while at the same time bringing conclusions to things that started in the original game. Trials and Tribulations was a surprisingly good end to the Phoenix Wright Trilogy. They leave room for sequels, but it’s just as easy to see this being the conclusion to the Phoenix Wright story. 

My problems with this game lie solely with the port. I played this game on the Wii and it’s clear that almost no work was done to adapt the game to the console. This game was originally for Gameboy Advance in Japan, which was ported up to the DS for the North American release. Capcom then took that release and slapped it onto the Wii. 

The game does not scale well to a bigger screen, which makes everything look super pixilated. Since this is a port of the DS version it causes some issues, because a television is only one screen. When asked to point something out in a picture while in court the image scales to how it would look on a DS screen. This makes the picture too small to see what’s happening in it, which just seems lazy.

The Wii specific changes are purely related to the Wii-mote. When Phoenix speaks in court his catch phrases come out of the less than stellar speaker on the Wii-mote. The only other change is that you can thrust the Wii-mote down to present evidence. It’s no surprise that a port of a port is less than ideal. However this is the ideal version for people who missed out on the DS version, which is now fairly expensive due to its rarity.

At least Capcom took the time to give Edgeworth a Wii-mote for this promo!

I can’t recommend this game and this series highly enough. Even if you don’t have the same connection to the Ace Attorney series that I do you will still get a kick out of everything this game has to offer. The story stands on its own, but it’s enhanced if you have prior knowledge from the previous two games in the series. On top of that the gameplay may be guided, but it’s still quite fun. You’ll find yourself addicted and wanting to know what’s going to happen next. While this port isn’t great it’s the only alternative to paying over $100 dollars for the DS version. 

Note: This review is also posted on giantbomb.com

     -Manny