The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles (Nintendo Switch) Preview

Ryunosuke Naruhodo is a great protagonist. Similar to the titular Phoenix Wright of the previous entries, he's emotional and caught up in bad business at the start of the story. The first case sees him "committing" a murder and the tutorial has players acting as their own defence guided by his university friend. The courtroom is set out as players will remember, with some tweaked but familiar characters such as the bearded Judge and the spineless Prosecutor. This light-touch tutorial helps set up the historical world where a newly westernising Japan has taken to holding Western style court judgements. It's a very cool idea and really puts a new burst of energy into the world of Ace Attorney. That first case is also a total banger!

Gameplay should be instantly familiar to any layers of the other games in the series with lots of visual novel style conversations punctuated by bleepy sound effects and very occasional voices. These scenes play out with minimal animations usually but the character models/art is very emotive and help frame the dialogue giving it an obvious meaning and charm. The court gameplay should also be familiar to fans of the series with case files, witnesses and cross examinations all taking place. Cross examining is the usual goldmine of fun dialogues and digging into information that fans of the games will love. There are a plethora of evidence files and objects to inspect closely and disprove faulty testimonies. It's all rather thrilling. There is also an in-game "achievement" system that pings occasionally, unlocking extras and giving players a burst of serotonin.

Dialogue is what carries the story and there is a lot to read. Lines are rarely voiced but audio cues and sound effects for text keep the scene lively. The words themselves are translated and localised superbly, retaining plenty of Japanese references, helping to make the world more believable. Characters themselves are usually caricatures of certain jobs or types of people, giving them lots of fun ticks and, though sometimes repetitive, comedic animations. The cases are as twisty and turney as they were in the previous games with an emphasis on misleading the player and forcing them to discover the loopholes themselves outside of the tutorial. It has a very good way of making players feel like they are coming to the conclusions themselves in a way similar to the satisfaction of building IKEA furniture or a PC.

Visually this package is a treat. Slick menus with nice stylistic choices frame the collection and help put forward upgrades right from the off. Each character sports a very nicely rendered 2D/3D character model with clean shading reminiscent of Ace Attorney Trilogy, the repackaged earlier games. Environments get a huge bonus in attractiveness by featuring amazing Japanese scenery but through an earlier historic window than its predecessors. All the user interface and icons animate smoothly and have plenty of hover effects making it obvious for players what action they are about to take. This is about as good as it can be given that the games originally used a stylus. Music is also excellent with lots of punchy remixes of series' favourites as well as some great setting booster background tracks.