Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Justice For All (Nintendo DS) Second Opinion Review

One thing to note as you begin on another bundle of cases with Phoenix is that things have changed since the original. It's been about a year since the corruption in the prosecutor's office was unmasked by Phoenix and he is no longer the rookie lawyer we grew to love in the original. He's still unbeaten, Maya has returned to his side and Edgeworth is nowhere to be found. There is a new prosecutor in town who is the daughter of old adversary Von Karma and everyone seems to have gotten wise to the tactic of "badgering" the witness. To top all this unfamiliarity off Phoenix gets amnesia just prior to the final day of a case that he seems to have had a firm grip on.
This brilliant beginning does a fantastic job of unsettling the player and making them feel like a rookie all over again. The major strength of the original was strong characterisation and the developer's ability to get you 100% involved in the game like no other handheld title had managed before. Coming in and feeling so out of your depth as the amnesiac Phoenix does in the middle of a case immediately draws you in as you feel genuine panic at times and confusion as people are mentioned and references to prior days in court that you have no idea about. Of course if you've played the original you'll have a small advantage as the basic court proceedings and indeed entire game has a familiar feel to it. It still comprises of a maximum of three days of court proceedings interrupted by detective work at the scene spent questioning those involved in the crime and trying to piece together gathered evidence to solve the crime. Court scenes are fundamentally the same with Phoenix cross-examining the witness in an attempt to find contradictions. Luckily though the game has made advances from the original and they do a great deal to make this a sequel in it's own right.

To begin with the "life" structure has changed. In the original you had 5 lived in each court day that got knocked out as you incorrectly stated that a contradiction was present. Well now you have a life bar that follows you around all the time and is a great deal more sophisticated than the previous method. Now different contradictions, questions and evidence productions all take different amounts off the life bar making guess work more workable in the right situation. So producing the wrong piece of evidence isn't as bad as say declaring the wrong person as the culprit (which will usually end the case there and then). The cross examination is also a great deal more intelligent with some testimonies being genuinely perfect and sometimes utterly correct (whereas in the original all testimonies had SOMETHING wrong with them). This immediately eliminates the old tactic of asking about every minute point of the testimony has it won't also get you results, you will actually have to read the court record and try to get a good feel for the case to succeed.
One of the few criticisms of the original was that the detective work out with the court was a great drop in quality compared to the rest of the game. The developers have tried to rectify this by introducing a new feature, namely the "Psyche-Lock". Essentially this allows Phoenix to see when people are hiding something via a number of locks and chains that appear across the witness in question. This allows Phoenix to enter a battle of wits against whoever is lying and by producing evidence or making correct suppositions he can break the locks and uncover the lie. Your life bar pops up here as well and sometimes you just won't have enough evidence to break the locks so complete guess work will get you a fat game over screen, another time when the game forces you to work that grey matter instead of abusing the game mechanics.

Of course a straight lawyer/detective sim would frankly be dull without the undeniable charm and humour crammed into the DS cartridge. A mix of old and new characters give this game a freshness yet familiarity that all good sequels should have, and the ante has really been upped with the new characters. A sexually hyper fake doctor, a whip happy prosecutor obsessed with fools and a flying magician are just some of the people you'll encounter. The amount of nods to gaming culture is admirable as well and in a time of chasing non-gamers it is nice to be acknowledged. YTMND and the terrible Legend of Zelda cartoon both get references and eagle eyed gamers will no doubt spot countless more. One more thing manages to round off this superb world and that is a soundtrack that manages to be different from the original but equally as impressive. Yet more addictive tunes inhabit this and no doubt it'll be crammed onto iPods in the weeks to come.
One criticism that has to be levelled at Justice for All is that this is solely a port of Gyakuten Saiban 2 on the DS and unlike the original offers no touch screen use aside from menus and no extra cases. This was to cut down development time but with only four cases on offer it does feel like a stopgap until we get the next title in the series (which is DS exclusive). That's not to say the package isn't worth it, this is released as a budget buy and still offers hours of gaming but compared to the original it definitely feels weaker. You could argue that full dual language support makes up for it, and it would certainly be a strong argument. On the title screen is a small orange box, one tap and the whole game switches to English (this includes voices and even the name of the game). It's admirable to see in a time when certain companies seem actively anti importing that others are not afraid to include options that everyone will like (Japanese gamers apparently like to learn English, English gamers like to get games early). Okay, there are a few minor language errors (one clever staff member spotted how at one point a female is referred to as a he) but considering the value behind getting a full dual language game early and for a budget price...well importers everywhere should feel a warm glow inside them for the fact that this game was made.

Reading back through this review there are precious few minus points levelled against the game, primarily because there are none. Thrusting you back into the legal world and meeting the expectations of the fans was always going to be tricky but Capcom have managed to produce a simply astounding piece of software that improves on the original and maintains it's rightful place as the premier game series on the DS. It's rare that a game can deal with violence, sexual themes and corruption but still stand up as a non-gratuitous game but Justice for All manages it with a style that also makes it the most mature game on the DS. Games these days dumb down to the consumer constantly, but Justice for All takes a risk and ups the complexity of cases in the series and decides to test the IQ of the fan whilst still keeping it's charm and comedy. Ally this with top class presentation and a soundtrack to die for and you have one of the best games on the DS. Big question remains though, is it better than Ace Attorney. Well, it makes less use of the DS capabilities and has less gaming in it but ups the difficulty level and advances the story and gameplay aspects brilliantly. That combined with the low price point puts this oh so slightly above the original, but it really shouldn't be compared. Look upon both as the one glorious game and you will be in gaming heaven. So all rise for the verdict, Phoenix Wright has been found not guilty of failing to meet expectations. Court is adjourned.