The malleability of video game genres made the industry one of the most innovative forms of art out there. Developers can call their game a ‘visual novel,’ but that doesn’t mean that it has to be basically a book with some character sprites. A visual novel can be a point-and-click adventure game, or a dating simulator, or a choose-your-own-adventure game, or anything else developers can imagine.
One of the most innovative visual novel series out there is
Ace Attorney
has a monopoly on the ‘courtroom battle’ genre, though, it’s been around long enough that imitators have started to come out of the woodwork.
Ace Attorney
-likes are on the rise, and it’s exciting to watch this genre evolve in real time.
What Makes Ace Attorney So Unique?
The Subject Matter Is Broad Enough For So Much Creativity
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Ace Attorney
is known in broader pop culture as ‘the wacky anime lawyer game,’ and that’s a pretty succinct way of putting it. Law procedurals cover all kinds of crime, so Shu Takumi was on to something when he came up with a lawyer mystery. The courtroom drama is known for its storytelling potential, though,
but turning cross-examination into a gameplay element was something new.
Ace Attorney
plays like a typical point-and-click adventure game during its investigation segments (except for the
Investigations
games, which play out more like typical third-person adventure games), but during its trial segments, the leading lawyer must examine each statement the witness makes to find the one that doesn’t line up. If a statement contradicts evidence, the player can present the evidence to object to their statement. If nothing is quite objectionable, but the witness is being suspiciously vague, the player can press them for more details until they say something the lawyer can work with.
Games in the Ace Attorney
Series:
Game
North American Release Year
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney
2005
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Justice for All
2007
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Trials and Tribulations
2007
Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney
2008
Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth
2010
Ace Attorney Investigations 2: Prosecutor’s Gambit
2024
Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney
2014
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Dual Destinies
2013
The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures
2021
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Spirit of Justice
2016
The Great Ace Attorney 2: Resolve
2021
While the series added more and more gimmicks to the courtroom over time, ranging from observing nervous body language to seeing psychic manifestations of people’s secrets, cross-examination remained the core of the franchise. With the wacky antics of the games’ casts and the utterly absurd twists and turns of each case,
Ace Attorney
carved out a dedicated fandom. Players on each side of the Pacific loyally followed the adventures of Phoenix Wright, Miles Edgeworth, and more, even when – or especially when –
Phoenix Wright’s first case involves defending his childhood friend from a murder charge, but by the end of the third game, he’ll have gotten wrapped up in the succession crisis of his teenage assistant’s spirit-channeling family. At the start of the sixth mainline game,
Spirit of Justice
, Phoenix finds himself having to defend people in a country where defense attorneys are pariahs and at risk of being executed along with their clients if they lose their case.
The series gets great mileage out of such a mundane-sounding career, and it’s delightful.
Ace Attorney
is over 20 years old now, so fans who grew up with it are now making games of their own. It took a while, but the niche ‘courtroom battle’ genre is finally taking shape outside of
Ace Attorney
. One of the more recent attempts at a unique courtroom game is
Tyrion Cuthbert: Attorney of the Arcane
, which takes a fantasy world and mixes the relatively mundane-sounding lawyer work with outright magic.
Tyrion Cuthbert: Attorney of the Arcane – A Unabashed, if Derivative, Love Letter
Attorney of the Arcane Feels Like It Started as an Ace Attorney Fangame, But That’s Not a Bad Thing
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As fun as
Ace Attorney
was, the supernatural elements could feel a little jarring. Phoenix’s assistant, Maya Fey, is a spirit medium who comes from an entire clan of ghost-channeling women. Later on, her young cousin Pearl Fey joins the main cast. Both of them regularly channel Maya’s dead older sister to give Phoenix advice. While this isn’t treated as normal, it’s by far the only supernatural aspect of the series to get so much focus, making it stick out when the rest of the world is composed of non-magical people.
Ace Attorney
is more along the lines of science fiction than anything else, but the ghosts being the only outright supernatural feature of the games is weird.
Tyrion Cuthbert: Attorney of the Arcane
attempts to reconcile the heavily logic-based nature of criminal investigation with
Attorney of the Arcane
takes place in a world where magic is common, and all mages specialize in certain types of spells. In the kingdom of Wyverngarde, Tyrion Cuthbert is a new defense attorney who wants to defend the little guy from the corrupt nobility. There’s one problem: he’s a muggle…or is he?
Attorney of the Arcane
plays very similarly to
Ace Attorney
– some might say too similarly.
Cross examinations have the player examine one statement at a time while giving them the option to present evidence or press the witness for more information. Investigation involves point-and-clicking around environments and talking to involved parties in a first-person view, while also giving the player the option to present profiles and evidence out of court to try and get more info.
Even the user interfaces are very similar. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing – the strong foundation of
Ace Attorney
gave the developers the freedom to focus on other parts of the game. The story has a lot of fun with the concept of ‘magic law’ and the class inequality conflict, and while the base gameplay is severely loyal to its inspiration, there are a few extra gimmicks to give people a reason to actually play the game instead of just watching someone else stream it.
The biggest of these additions is Tyrion’s special power: the ‘Eye of Horus.’ Tyrion isn’t technically a mage, but this strange ability lets him read minds and hearts: a game-breaking skill for a lawyer. This way, even if a witness’ words are technically true, Tyrion can read their thoughts to find a contradiction instead. When things get really dire, Tyrion can even implant thoughts into people’s heads to see their reactions. Good thing he’s a hero.
Aviary Attorney: Somehow the Most Realistic Lawyer Game Yet
Despite Its Animalian Cast, Aviary Attorney Stays (Relatively) Grounded
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For those not into the supernatural and want a more realistic courtroom drama, have no fear: Sketchy Logic has that covered.
There is one catch, though: everyone in
Aviary Attorney
is a talking animal.
Repurposing drawings of humanized animals by 19th-century caricaturist J.J. Grandville,
Aviary Attorney
is a tale of political unrest during the 1848 February Revolution in Paris. While class tensions between the rich and poor are coming to a head, defense attorney Jayjay Falcon (who happens to be an actual falcon) finds himself with plenty of new clients. The game’s main appeal is its graphics, which are composed entirely of sketched backgrounds resembling caricatures of the time it takes place along with the aforementioned borrowed Grandville art. And, of course, that it’s about birds.
While the game is admirable for how hard it leans into its presentation, the gameplay is less unique. Like
Attorney of the Arcane
, it builds on the very strong foundation of
Ace Attorney
, but follows it too loyally at times: click on spots to investigate, talk to people, and cross-examine testimonies in court.
Aviary Attorney
ambitiously puts the player on a time limit in each case, though.
Jayjay only has so many in-game days to investigate before the trial starts, and if he doesn’t go to the right places in time, he’ll end up losing the trial. The good news, though, is that the game doesn’t end when Jayjay loses: it keeps going right into the next case, making the player feel the weight of the defendant they failed to save.
Related
There are tons of awesome single-player adventure games on Steam for players to enjoy, from Subnautica to Grim Fandango to Beneath a Steel Sky.
While it took a while, developers have finally started playing with the
Ace Attorney
formula to make some great new adventure games. By the time the first
Ace Attorney
released, Sierra Entertainment was well past its prime as the king of point-and-clicks – these wacky lawyers with their magical teenage assistants injected some much-needed life back into the genre. For as long as the series has been around, it’s surprising that
Aviary Attorney
came out, setting the ground for more indie lawyer sims to come.
Despite its dedicated fandom and the people it inspired,
Ace Attorney
‘s hook is still a niche one: ‘a video game where you cross-examine people and collect all the evidence yourself because the police are bad at their jobs.’
The fact that
Attorney of the Arcane
and
Aviary Attorney
weren’t complete financial failures despite being such clear imitators of Capcom’s lawyer franchise is a good sign, though: it means that
Ace Attorney
is big enough now that people all over the world understand what these two indie games were trying to do. And for those who found these games before
Ace Attorney
, welcome to the courtroom battle genre. Strap in, because it’s only going to get crazier from here.
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy
Visual Novel
Mystery
Systems
Top Critic Rating:
82
/100
Critics Recommend:
87%
Franchise
Ace Attorney
Platform(s)
Released
February 7, 2012
Developer(s)
Capcom
Publisher(s)
Capcom
Engine
Unity
ESRB
T For Teen Due To Use of Tobacco, Blood, Suggestive Themes, Violence
How Long To Beat
70 Hours
PS Plus Availability
Premium
OpenCritic Rating
Strong
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