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The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles Discussion (Nintendo Switch) [game]
 
The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles on the Switch
9.3/10 from 4 user ratings

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04/21/21, 18:49    Edited: 07/28/21, 05:24
 
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I only started the game yesterday and made it to the halfway save point in the first case. I'm enjoying it, Ryunosuke's animations are pretty funny and the dialogue has some great jokes, but I won't lie, I wish these games had a "I've played Ace Attorney before" difficulty setting, even if it just let you skip explanations.

At least it's not as bad as Layton vs Wright, which had tutorials for both gameplay modes that were so long, I just stopped playing. Maybe I'll revisit it after this game.
08/02/21, 17:19   
Edited: 08/02/21, 17:52
GAA1 Case 4 is another good one...mostly.

SPOILERS THROUGH END OF CASE 4
Man, 50% of the cases so far have just been really unlikely accidents! And as a result, we don't get the cathartic courtoom confession that we get in almost every other AA case (or any courtroom at all, in case 2). And even in case 3, we have no idea what actually happened, and the closest thing to an explosive conclusion is the defendant letting out some maniacal laughter at the Not Guilty verdict. Then he dies in a fire. What the hell. And considering the English lady from the first case is presumably getting a slap on the wrist, these cases all end on huge downers so far.

But I loved seeing the banker witness from Case 3 on the juror's bench for Case 4, fun and unexpected callback. And seeing the "maid" up there, too. Lots of crimes that need juries in London, I guess.


QUESTIONS GOING INTO CASE 5
- Is Swan Lady going to face justice? Seemed like she was going to get off scot free in Shanghai. I bet we see her again. I don't think we ever found out her motive, either?
- What's the deal with the Inspector? Why does he cough up blood? What are his "secret orders" from the police?
- Who really killed Kazuma? No, I still don't believe he was assassinated by a bedpost!
- Who tampered with the omnibus during the trial? Was Gina Lestrade in on it? Her smoke gun provided cover for the tampering. Presumably McGilded was calling the shots, but were there more hands at work here?
- Who burned the omnibus, with McGilded supposedly inside? We're told his corpse was found, but we never really saw him...
- Why was it called the Phoenix Wright Omnibus? Kind of a weird place for an Easter egg.
- What's the deal with Van Zieks? Why do defendants in his cases always die tragically afterward? Even the Not Guilty ones... is that why he stopped practicing law for some time?
- Why are Iris's parents "not around," as she puts it?
08/03/21, 05:35   
Edited: 08/03/21, 05:40
I do have a pretty big question regarding chapter 2 (SPOILERS!)

If this whole incident was indeed an accident, then why were the passengers drugged the night before? To smuggle Nikolina onto the ship? For some reason, I didn't think this was needed, but is that the only reason everyone's food was laced? I kept thinking there was going to be more to the story, like "If everyone was drugged so that they wouldn't notice the emergency stop, how could it have been an accident?" But, I guess the passengers being drugged was just a fortunate circumstance that the perpetrators found themselves in, since everyone had already been drugged to hide their efforts to sneak Nikolina onto the ship.
08/04/21, 02:33   
@PogueSquadron Yeah I read that as just coincidence. I believe the passengers were drugged only to smuggle Nikolina onto the ship unseen.
08/04/21, 04:50   
CASE 1 SPOILERS I liked it. Pretty standard quality for a tutorial case, although it did drag a tad with the final steak/coin bit (the poison through the mouth wound was a better twist to end on). The killer was a fun enough character with a funny gimmick. "Shut up!" I really liked Kazuma's character.

@PogueSquadron

I'm with you guys in feeling like something else is up in Case 2. It doesn't quite add up the way Ace Attorney usually does. Hmm...

But assuming I'm wrong, CASE 2 SPOILERS I thought this was a pretty interesting change of pace. On one hand, Ace Attorney Investigations is probably my least-favorite in the series, but this was more entertaining than most (or all?) of that game thanks to scenario writing that was a lot more...I dunno, fun. Like, it still actually feels like Ace Attorney, with the goofy snake and the over-the-top Dance of Deduction and the Susato Takedown, etc.

But yeah, I understand what y'all mean about it being surprising that the death was largely a very unlikely freak accident. While I kinda like that the game acknowledges that these things do happen, it does feel a bit underwhelming in a way considering how meticulous the murders usually are. Also, I was pretty bummed that they killed off Kazuma; he had lots of potential. So I dunno, I can go either way, but I enjoyed the case's change of pace regardless. Practically a "bottle episode" of sorts. And Herlock Sholmes adds a lot of quirky fun to the proceedings (my wife hated him at first when he initially made all those wildly off-base deductions! But then she grew to like him when it turned out he wasn't totally incompetent).
08/04/21, 16:47   
....and that's it for The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures! Case 5, as expected, ends on a strong note, though I wouldn't quite put it up there with the all-time greats.

GAA1 case rankings: 5 > 3 > 4 > 1 > 2

CASE 5 AND GENERAL GAA1 SPOILERS
- So yeah, like half of the questions I had going into the final case didn't get answered. They must have had a sequel in mind the whole time.
- All those teases for the upcoming Crystal Tower exhibition and its impending explosion for nothing. When are they going to get to the fireworks factory?!
- On the other hand, it was hilarious seeing the Russian revolutionary sitting quietly with his mouse friend at the end of the jury bench. Herlock Sholmes' Logic & Reasoning Spectacular may be the game's back-of-box gimmick, but the newfound fullness of the courtroom is the real innovation at work here.
- Kazuma's name listed with Iris's mysteriously murdered father in secret communications? Definitely foul play in his "accidental" death. Which means Gregson's probably on the chopping block, too. I'm guessing Susato's dad's sudden illness is in this picture too, considering he's connected to both Kazuma and Wilson.
- If only we had this on 3DS to truly appreciate the stereoscopic evidence without having to cross our eyes. I never was good at Magic Eye puzzles either...
- It was obvious that the cat door gun would be pivotal to the coming mystery, and I immediately saw that one of the two photos lacked the peephole in the door, and yet I didn't put two and two together until right when it mattered...
- Loved using the coded leaks to force Gregson's hand at the end. Shades of encouraging Matt Engarde to plead guilty...
- I love the Skulkin Bros, what a pair. I like to think their design was a nod to Mario and Luigi.
- In general, I really liked the writing of all the bit players in the last three cases especially. Cockney Rhyming Slang for all the East End characters! "Fair Dinkum" from the Australian banker! Seemed really authentic and flavorful to me, a dumb American who giggles at stereotypes.
- One thing I do miss from other games is multi-day trials. It's nice to switch up the pace a little more often between court battles and investigations, and that last trial in particular was one lengthy court battle.
- The whole "Susato's last-minute evidence" thing was so convoluted, especially since they also wrote her out of the trial, I guess for drama's sake? Can't say I missed her, she might be my least favorite assistant in the series, so Iris was a welcome replacement.
08/05/21, 01:15   
Edited: 08/05/21, 01:29
GAA2 has begun! And it's off to a pretty good start.

GAA2 CASE ONE SPOILERS
- Well there goes Jezaille Brett. Shame we didn't get her on the stand one last time. Raito Menimemo was a fun substitute, though.
- And he's got SECRETS! About Susato's dad, and Kazuma, and the government, and, and stuff!
- Suspicious that, for the first time ever, the judge steps out from behind the bench, to fling a blabbing guy. He's definitely in on whatever conspiracy is afoot.
- And apparently there's a hitherto unseen SECOND case involving Natsume. I guess this was between cases 4 and 5 in GAA1. He did mention having a previous run-in with poison in this case, which wasn't a factor in his trial last game...
- So it looks like this game is going to be dedicated to solving all the first game's leftover mysteries. We've never really had that exact scenario, but I guess basically every game since Trials & Tribulations has had flashback cases and the like.
- I think I like Ryutaro Naruhodo more than I like Susato Mikotoba. Hiding a secret woman is even more fun than exposing a secret woman! Uh, in a manner of speaking, of course.
- The real victim of this one is Taketsuchi Auchii's forehead seedling. Cut down before it truly had a chance to blossom...
08/07/21, 20:17   
I just did GAA1 Case 3 (CASE 3 SPOILERS)

Quite a cool trial! It's reminiscent of one other particularly notable trial in the past games, but it also gave me vibes from 3-4, where the trial ends without a strong sense of closure and mixed emotions. Pretty surprising turn of events. I wasn't even sure what to vote when the game gave me the choice, so I passed the controller to Sarah who picked Innocent. It definitely feels less episodic than past games, with each case feeling more like a chapter from a larger story. Very curious where this is all headed.
08/08/21, 23:25   
@TriforceBun Yeah, that was a tough call. I picked the same option.

GAA2 Case 2 finished!
SPOILERS
- Hey, our first multi-day trial!
- I totally forgot that we'd already glimpsed both Shamspeare and Metermann way back in GAA1-4. There wasn't much reason to remember Metermann, but you'd think Shamspeare would have left a bigger impression on me.
- I'm a little disappointed we're seeing so many characters re-used. I know that's the nature of the story, that all the cases seem to be linked together, but did that have to extend to the jury? We only got one new juror, and while she was delightful, I kinda wish we had more of these fun character animations to enjoy.
- I guess we've found the collar of the Hound of the Baskervilles?
- But before that, it looks like we're finally going to make it to the Crystal Tower exhibition!
08/09/21, 06:48   
@TriforceBun I have to imagine that Case 2 is Shu Takumi wanting to keep us on our toes. Of all of the Ace Attorney games, Danganronpa games, etc...I don't know if I can recall a case that was as much of "an accident" as this. I think I've seen characters get tricked into murdering other people, or characters being hired to murder other people, but I think this is the first time where it was just like...yep, life suck sometimes. I'm not sure how much I like it, because usually everything in these games happens for a reason. At the same time though, I don't know if we'll see Nikolina come back to become a bigger part of the story. For all I know, there will be something supernatural going on with Kazuma where we hear his thoughts on the matter? But yeah, ultimately I think it's Shu Takumi wanting to do something different. How many times have I played Ace Attorney where I've said "Maybe this was just an accident??" and finally it looks like we've gotten just that.

I could've just SWORN that we read something about Kazuma kind of bracing himself to become some kind of target for assassination or something like that. Maybe that idea was just a red herring? I kind of thought that this was maybe a reason Kazuma wanted us on the ship in the first place, because he needed some backup (or a replacement). I'll be curious to see if there's any more to Kazuma's story, or if we're just off to the races with Ryunoske and Herlock. Can't wait to play more tomorrow.

08/11/21, 06:12   
GAA2 Case 3 finished. For the first time in a very long time, I was completely stumped on the final Objection, and looked up the solution. I was definitely barking up the wrong tree with a fairly flimsy contradiction, but the actual answer wasn't all that compelling to me either. Maybe others will see it more clearly than I did, though.

GAA2 CASE 3 SPOILERS
- Regarding the above Objection, the bloodstain in the photo looked like it splattered a decent bit to me. It did look like it was running downward, but not super obviously so. And even if he were lying flat it could have run downward anyway, depending on what he was wearing, or his chest shape, or whatever.
- The Objection I tried to raise was that the cause of death was originally ruled a broken neck due to the assumption that the birdcage fell upside down, and knowing that it was rightside up after all made me think his neck was fine and that part was falsified by Sithe after the fact to muddy the fact that he died via stabbing. I find it hard to believe someone with a broken neck could get upright to be stabbed by a screwdriver.
- Speaking of fake broken necks, obviously Kazuma wouldn't die so easily! Can't say I'm psyched to see him back though. He's pretty blah, and I'm guessing these last two cases are going to get caught up in his daddy drama.
- I liked the twistiness of this case, and Sholmes' anti-gravity device deduction was a fun one, if extremely goofy and unnecessary.
- Why can't Gina be the obligatory teen girl assistant? She's the best! AND SHE GOT A DOG NOW WOOF WOOF
- We didn't get the story on Dr Sithe's weird masked daughter yet. So I'm guessing we haven't seen the last of her.


Rough case rankings for me through this point:

#8 1-2
#7 1-1
#6 2-1
#5 1-4
#4 2-2
#3 2-3
#2 1-3
#1 1-5
08/13/21, 04:40   
Edited: 08/13/21, 04:54
GAA2 Case 4 finished. Or, at least I think it is? What an unexpected ending...if you can even call it an ending?

GAA2 CASE 4 SPOILERS
- So this trial is split across two different episodes. Have we ever had that happen before?
- It seems unnecessary if Trial Day 2 was going to conclude things, so I'm guessing this trial goes yet another day and we have to investigate the Professor case as well, to get to the bottom of things.
- So Mikotoba is Iris's actual dad. Maybe. I don't think he actually is, but that's the cliffhanger we're doing for this one, I guess.
- Naruhodo getting licked unconscious by a dog was very weird. I don't get it.
- Sure seems like Kazuma's dad got framed. And that Strongheart has been pulling the strings all along. I was hoping his obviously-the-villain design was just a red herring, but I'm losing hope.
- Poor Beppo, lost his job driving the omnibus, and now he's gone all kooky.
- I'm gonna guess that big trunk that Jigoku had at the hotel is going to be a thing, especially since he got to skip customs. Gotta be a body in there, right?
- The porter at the hotel was a juror some time ago, I want to say in GAA1-3? Maybe he'll give us the scoop on the trunk.


Rough case rankings for me through this point:

#9 1-2
#8 1-1
#7 2-1
#6 2-4
#5 1-4
#4 2-2
#3 2-3
#2 1-3
#1 1-5
08/16/21, 02:54   
Finished 1-4. I liked it okay, but a few things don't sit well with me (CASE 4 HUGE SPOILERS)...

Mrs. Garrideb is a terrible person! I guess this comes down to the line between a villain you love to hate and someone the game wants you to have sympathy for. I spent the entire case wondering why it wasn't an actual murder situation and it turns out narratively-speaking, it was to lessen Joan's guilt for the accident. I don't think this was necessary; in fact, I'm convinced she's far more guilty of this accident than Pavlova was in case 2 (where the victim actually does die). She's the one who was starting fires and hurling knives and junk at her disabled war veteran husband (who by all accounts is a very upstanding guy) after slapping him so hard it left a bruise, all due to a really stupid misunderstanding with a note not even addressed to the right name.

It bugs me that this character was played for laughs when I just felt sorry for Mr. Garrideb the whole time. And her reckless behavior put a guy in a coma. I thought the cast should've held her further accountable.

Otherwise, it was okay enough. Soseki was a fun defendant (and apparently based off a real Japanese writer at the time), the lovebirds were decent, and John Garrideb was good--I liked the sun-and-moon visual motif the couple had. Van Zieks is shaping up to be a solid prosecutor too, even if he cribs a bit from Edgeworth. I'm not as sold on Iris yet; they're doing all these historical nods and London trivia and jazz but then you find this 10-year-old doctor-slash-successful author and it's kinda weird. She doesn't even come across as a child, just an adult in a child's body.


So far:

4. 1-4
3. 1-2
2. 1-1
1. 1-3
08/16/21, 17:19   
Edited: 08/16/21, 17:19
@TriforceBun

Yeah, she's not great. I can't help but feel like there was a LOT of "women be crazy" misogyny in that episode, between Mrs Garrideb. Patricia Beate, and that juror's wife who threw him in the Thames. Not to mention the streak of fatphobia towards women. It didn't sit well with me.


@PogueSquadron

I had the same question. So I take it it doesn't come back in case 5? I was sort of hoping it would be revealed that the ballerina was that Bolshevic hitman all along.

Drugging the entire boat just to sneak a ballerina to a first-class, isolated cabin really stretches my ability to suspend disbelief. There are easier ways!
08/16/21, 17:42   
@Guillaume

Yeah, the fat jokes felt a bit mean-spirited after awhile. Can't say I care for the term "fatphobia" though. :p

I'm okay with Ace Attorney poking some fun at its characters since it's all very larger-than-life (and all in all the guys get it as bad as the girls, if not moreso), but (CASE 1-4) if you're gonna play spousal abuse for laughs or an abuser for sympathy, you gotta walk a fine line and I'd say they whiffed on that front.
08/17/21, 16:57   
...and that's it for The Great Ace Attorney 2: Resolve! Case 5 delivered what was expected, though I hate to say the end felt dragged out a bit too much.

MEGA SUPER SPOILERS OBVIOUSLY
- Fewer people in the courtroom means fewer fun animations and dialog. Especially when everybody's just brooding over attempted suicides and wrongful executions and dogs ripping people's throats out, I guess.
- Sholmes and Iris invented holograms! So dumb. The security camera in 1-5 was one thing, and the two-way radio bunny things, but come on...
- No Stronghart fakeout for me, sadly. At least he gave us the Damon Gant clap, I suppose.
- I will admit I didn't see Klint being the Reaper coming, but the game only starts to give you the clues right before you're supposed to reveal it in court. Same as him being Iris's dad.
- This was one of those final cases where it would maybe have been nice to get a full rundown of how everything exactly happened at the end, but the rundown alone might have taken hours.
- I guess the main thing I still don't know (or forgot?) is why Gregson went to the SS Grouse. Was it to investigate a smuggling ring? Or was that the cover? I forget. It's a little unusual if Gregson's "one last case" he wanted to investigate before leaving for Paris with Gina was a smuggling ring we don't really know or care about, so I feel like I just forgot the detail there.
- A little sad Gregson really was a hitman for Stronghart. I liked Gregson.
- I guess Kazuma really did nearly get killed by a ballerina's shove and a bedpost. What a punk, ha ha!
- We never found out why Inspector Hosonogi or whatever coughs up blood all the time, did we?
08/19/21, 05:33   
My wife and I have gone through more cases during evacuation and stuff, so here are my thoughts on them! (SPOILERS ABOUND)

1-5: A decent final case for the first game, but slightly underwhelming compared to many finales, I'd say. It's true what they say--as a standalone title, GAA Adventures leaves too many open plot threads. This case does do a good job tying up all the hanging 1-3 mysteries in a satisfying enough way, but I would've liked a bit more of a mystery element to the culprit or how he did it--solely based off his design, animations and personality, the guy immediately gave me "bad guy" vibes when I first met him. And the murder itself wasn't anything that special; the culprit was mostly hard to beat due to being extremely evasive and slippery: "Oh, but you can't PROVE that." Bah!

Still, I liked it. The further development for Gina was welcome, and Susato had really grown on me by this point. Iris is still a bit too OP but it was good to get to know her better and Ryunosuke and Sholmes were good as always. The Skulkin brothers were fun witnesses too and I liked their interplay with an impatient Gregson.


2-1: I appreciate when GAA bends the expectations a bit, and this case started off with a bang, by having the victim be a previous culprit and Susato in disguise to find the truth. Not too much to really say here--the pacing is better than the previous tutorial case and the culprit is fun, although I don't know why he was gloating so much over potentially being charged with attempted murder when we've already had previous characters treat that as an extremely serious charge.

2-2: Just did this one last night. It started off feeling really weak at the beginning--a minor "crime," a ton of reused characters and a recurring defendant and a bunch of the same environments made me wonder if this game had a shoestring budget or something. There are only three new characters in the whole case (jury included). However, the second half of the case really saves the whole thing and makes it work surprisingly well. The victim/defendant/culprit thing gets further shuffled around in creative ways and we find out some interesting backstory to this game's world that elevate the case quite a bit. The culprit's breakdown and mad expression is genuinely creepy and I appreciate the recurring themes of killing for vigilante justice. It makes the various villains land in very different places on the "morality scale," which is interesting.

Ultimately though, I think this would've been a fantastic case if it was somehow combined into 1-4 and trimmed down a bit. Maybe have 1-4 be the first investigation/trial day and 2-2 be the second. 1-4 felt pretty underwhelming to me in its crime and culprit and I suspect it's because they ended up splitting GAA into two games.


Current rankings:

7. 1-4
6. 1-2
5. 1-1
4. 2-1
3. 2-2
2. 1-5
1. 1-3
09/09/21, 16:53   
Edited: 09/09/21, 16:53
I finished it. What a ride! I might post some spoiler stuff below, but my spoiler free thoughts are that the collection (which, lets be real, it might be two games but it's essentially one long story) definitely lives up to the legacy of the series. Not sure exactly where it falls in my overall Ace Attorney rankings, but I'm glad it finally made it over to the West so I could experience it.

I would also say, spoiler free, that the last 3 cases of game 2 were some of my favorites. The two games did a great job of setting up so many different mysteries leading up to the end and then actually stuck the landing (more or less.)

Also, I don't know how familiar you all are with the Sherlock Holmes stories, but I grew up reading them all over and over and over, so I'd say I am a pretty big fan and know them very well. And this game was FULL of references to the stories, both big and small. I couldn't even count all of the references I picked up on, some of them pretty deep cuts. It was clear to me that the writers were either very familiar with the stories or did their research well. Very cool for fans of the original stories.


Just kind of random, a very small thing but one that made me happy was when Sholmes and his partner Mikotoba finally got to work together again, and Mikotoba does that little tap dance thing when they solve things... adorable!

If I had to nitpick, I'd say that I liked some of the new gameplay stuff, but a lot of it feels super easy too. The Sholmes / Ryu "dance of deducation" thing, for instance, is a cool idea but it's so basic it's almost impossible to not get everything correct right away. The "pursue" thing is even easier, it's pretty much impossible to miss it. Pitting juries against each other takes a little more work, but nothing that complex.

Also the story MOSTLY makes sense but if you think about some parts of it too hard, they sort of fall apart a little. For instance, the fact that the big baddy is basically having people murdered off left and right, but let the guy who saw what happened in the graveyard survive for no apparent reason?

I don't really expect everything to perfectly make sense in these games though. Honestly, that's all nitpicking. The main draw of these games to me is the twisting stories and various characters and such, and it all delivers.
09/10/21, 22:03   
Edited: 09/10/21, 22:07
nate38 said:
I guess the main thing I still don't know (or forgot?) is why Gregson went to the SS Grouse.

He was sent there to assassinate Jigoku (who was trying to flee), in order to tie up loose ends for Stronghart. Except, the assassin was supposed to be Asogi and Gregson is more the brains of the operation or whatever. But Asogi ditched, so Gregson tried the assassination on his own and failed, with Jigoku getting the upper hand on him and killing him instead. And yeah, I agree about Gregson's character. He's a tough one, because the game kind of portrays him as someone we should care about, especially thought the eyes of Gina. But he also has just done a lot of really, really bad stuff. I think the whole him trying to transfer to France thing was supposed to be about him not liking who he had become and wanting to start over fresh or something? Though why he would think he could escape this guy who has people assassinated left and right, I dunno.

nate38 said:
We never found out why Inspector Hosonogi or whatever coughs up blood all the time, did we?

I don't think so, but it was grossssss.
09/10/21, 22:18   
Edited: 09/10/21, 22:21
Just finished 2-3. I thought this was the best case in the game so far! Although I did have the exact same issue as [ref=id=14605&pagenumber=2#538427]@nate38[/ref]...

I went through the exact same thought process he did while playing. I really felt that the contradiction should've been that only a single vertebrae was broken from the fall (the damaged birdcage shows he would've landed on his feet--why is [only] his neck broken? Shouldn't he have more injuries if that was the case?). I agree that that made more sense than his very subtle blood direction (which seemed to flow down his barrel chest anyway).

That aside, lots to like in this case. Character development for Gina (and new animations), lots of fun Sholmes nonsense, some great new characters in Drebber and Tusspells, and the return of a departed soul...although his new design is a lot less cool than the original one.

But what I really liked in this case was the overarching spooky atmosphere. The wax museum and graveyard, the Professor revelations, and the coroner's room all made for a good, creepy feel. A confession: I'm not really a fan of 19th-century London in stuff; it's smoggy and foggy and just dreary and oppressive, so the fairgrounds and eerie museum were great changes of pace for me. And the Professor backstory adds some nice richness to the game's lore, even if my guess that he was Klint Van Zieks ended up being way off.

Also let's not overlook the return of Susato. She's a good one.


GAA2 is really rollin' now. Interested in seeing where it all goes...!

8. 1-4
7. 1-2
6. 1-1
5. 2-1
4. 2-2
3. 1-5
2. 1-3
1. 2-3
09/22/21, 07:00   
Edited: 09/22/21, 16:51
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