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\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\nCourt cases are handled with a jury and multiple witnesses, adding a lot more liveliness to the courtroom. I wasn\u2019t sure how I would feel about the jury when I first started, but the system very quickly grew on me. It\u2019s a great way to add in goofy gaffs and one-offs that might otherwise have not happened. I don\u2019t want to spoil any of the good ones, but I definitely got a lot of chuckles out of some of the more expressive jurors. The system kind of falls to the wayside in the second game though.<\/p>\n
Another strength of the jury is it let the writers get way with not having Ryunosuke or Susato being experts in British culture. I think culture shock, and especially the feeling of isolation and confusion in a foreign land, are meant to be big parts of the narrative. The jury being made up of common people willing to explain things often pulls Ryunosuke out of the fire in situations where he would obviously lack the knowledge. It seems a bit Deus ex Machina at times, but the overall flow of the story is strong enough that I never found it to be unbelievable.<\/p>\n
The game also plays around a lot with its investigation sequences. Previous \u201cAce Attorney\u201d games often swapped between a \u201ccourt\u201d mode and an \u201cinvestigation\u201d mode, that would drag across multiple days. It could cause some cases to drag out and get boring, and while there were a couple of cases like that in this game, most of it is streamlined in a way that feels enjoyable\u2026 but it\u2019s a shame that enjoyability doesn\u2019t extend to Sholmes\u2019 reasoning episodes. When puzzled by a perplexing problem, Ryunosuke will often have a \u201cduet\u201d of sorts with Sholmes. Sholmes will propose some horrendously wrong idea, that Ryunosuke will then have to go back and fix. However, you have to sit through a full Sholmes ramble twice to fix things, and I\u2019d rather just have had Ryunosuke try to solve the problem on the first try. I understand why it was done, at least for gameplay purposes, but these sections in particular would kill the mood for me, and I found myself mashing through them after the 2nd or 3rd one.<\/p>\n
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The localized script is nothing short of an astonishing accomplishment. \u201cThe Great Ace Attorney\u201d mixes elements from all kinds of languages and speaking styles that can seem overwhelming and foreign. The original \u201cAce Attorney\u201d games were moved from Japan to America in their localization, but \u201cThe Great Ace Attorney\u201d retains its original locations and motifs (for the most part). It presents an entirely new challenge to the localization team, and I think they hit it out of the park. There are still obvious quips that wouldn’t be in the Japanese version, but they’re handled in such a way that they feel right in-line with the rest of the dialogue.<\/p>\n
A common part of “Ace Attorney” localization often involves changing the names of characters around. This is done mostly to keep the spirit of the puns involved in them understandable. All of the major characters retain their names this time around, probably because their pulled straight from “Sherlock Holmes” stories, but most of the minor cast has name revisions unless their name was a Holmes’ reference. A lot of the changes are really good though. The European characters have their names changed to sound closer to their ethnicity, and even the few Japanese characters that appear had the same treatment. My favorite name by far that of the army general “Iyesa Nosa.” It’s a really clever localization that retains a Japanese-sounding name but makes the pun work for a non-Japanese audience.<\/p>\n
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<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\u201cThe Great Ace Attorney\u201d takes various creative approaches to how it handles its \u201cHolmes\u201d material. The titular great detective had to have an unfortunate name change to \u2018Herlock Sholmes\u2019 (along with his assistant going from \u2018Watson\u2019 to \u2018Wilson\u2019), but plenty of nods and creative spins are still there for those familiar with the works. Most of these are just in the form of character names. Tobias Gregson is the main police detective Ryunosuke and Sholmes deal with, but Inspector Lestrade is instead introduced as a young pick pocket. There are plenty of other small nods like a character named after \u201cThe Adventure of the Three Garridebs.\u201d Unrelated to Holmes, there is also a caricature of the famous Japanese author Souseki Natsume. \u201cThe Great Ace Attorney\u201d is rife with plenty of fun nods and re-spins of classic literature, and I highly suggest reading through the original Holmes short stories if you aren’t already familiar with them. It\u2019s not required reading for the game in any way, but it’s fun to catch all the little references and see how the writers chose to put their own spin on “Holmes” mythos.<\/p>\n
There\u2019re all kinds of tiny intricacies that pull not only the writing, but the rest of the game together. I love how Ryunosuke and his friend, Kazuma, have slight British accents because they had studied English in college (probably with either a British teacher, or another Japanese teacher who studied in Britain). I love the active use of British English, as American English wouldn\u2019t make much sense in these games compared to the other titles. I love how character\u2019s dialogue is localized within how they would perceivably speak. A Victorian British gentleman will have a much different tongue than that of an East End commoner. Many characters are foreigners from other European countries, and the localization team put in the work to make sure their words mentally read in a way that they would speak. I think this duology might be my new favorite “Ace Attorney” title.<\/p>\n
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