I'm interested in how people play the AA games, especially if it's changed over the years.

I first got into the franchise in 8th grade, when I didn't have much to worry about in terms of time or commitments. I played through AJ, and after that had 3 more games to go through. The first time I played through AJ I got through it in about a week, while GS1 took about two weeks (I think the majority of the second week was for 1-5). I was playing through JFA at about that speed before I got burnt out during the circus case (keep in mind I've never liked that case much and had been playing nothing but AA for the last 3 weeks). It took a couple of weeks for me to get back into it again, and I'm pretty sure I played through the rest of JFA and T&T in a couple of weeks.

I didn't end up playing AAI until 12th grade, but since that was my first AA game in a while I got through that in less than a week. In all of these situations I pretty much played the game every chance I could get, and I didn't think at all about running out of AA games or going too fast.

However, when DD came out I really kind of wanted to "savor it" especially since we never know if the next one will come over, so I found myself feeling like I needed to stop after every couple of hours (I had also replayed all of the games in the 3 months leading up to DD so I might have also just been burnt out). I started in November and ended in (I think) April, meaning it took 5 months to get done. I think I completed VS in a couple of weeks.

So it's weird because I think I've lost the ability for that "need to play so bad that I don't go outside all day" that I used to have (which is probably a good thing in the end) but on the other hand I don't think I had as good of an experience with DD as I had the second time playing it. I'm feeling the urge to play SoJ a lot today, even though I'm busy for a lot of the day, so that's a good sign that I'm really into it, I think.

I'm debating in my head whether (should I feel the urge to) let myself binge the game in a week or if I should try and limit myself to have it last longer. It's a little easier this time because we get a new "after the game" case in a couple of weeks, but I still feel that feeling of "This might be the last one! Don't rush through it!".

What do you guys think? How do you play the AA games? Has it changed over time? Would you binge-play it or savor it against your urge to play it?

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I've basically always played the games as quickly as possible, partly of fear of being spoiled (which obviously has become a lot easier nowadays with more and more social media). Another important reason is that I consume A LOT of mystery fiction in general. I usually read like two, three novels at the same time, so it works out better for me to go through one story as focused as possible, so I won't mix things up. Stretching things out to several weeks just wouldn't be good for my enjoyment/experience of the mystery.

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Typically, whenever I play I go until I hit a "To be continued" and decide whether or not to go on from there. I don't like stopping in the middle of a chapter when I can avoid it. It feels like I'm cutting off the narrative where it wasn't meant to be split when I do that. With Spirit of Justice, however, this might change. I've played through case 2 so far, and the save points seem much farther apart than they were in previous games. For instance, the single trial segment of case 2 has a recess roughly in the middle. In previous games, you would expect a save point to be there, but not this time. These long segments are pretty difficult to get through in one sitting, at least for me. I've been managing so far, but I may need to change my strategy.

As for how long it takes to get through a particular game, it really depends on how much I've played recently. I started replaying the games a few months ago with the intention of getting through the entire series again in time for the release of SOJ. I finished the first game in a couple weeks, but slowed significantly during JFA and completely burned myself out about halfway through T&T.

As a side note, in the above example, the Pursuit theme, normally reserved for the climax of a trial segment, is played not long before the recess as well as just before the final breakdown. This makes me wonder if the segments were originally meant to be shorter but got spliced together. Thoughts?

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I play these games at 3 in the morning and only stop when I can't get any thinking done anymore. That wasn't always the case, but it's happened more often with the recent games on 3ds. Funny how it coincides.

I have a terrible play schedule and I'm not ashamed to admit it. At least I can get pretty far in a matter of an hour of play, but is it me or have long-winded mysteries been a thing with detective fiction for the recent decade?

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