Now that the beta is released, you can discuss up to Case 4 in this thread. What did you think of it?

Man, I really wish the second half of his case was as awesome as the first half...

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I think this is a good case in its own right, but yeah, the second half is definitely weaker than the first half. I also think this is by far the weakest case in GK2, which is a shame, because it was the perfect thing to pile on at the end of Case 3

I think it's worth noting that Kay in this case is one of the very few defendants in the series who I passionately cared about and wanted to prove innocent at all cost (others being Edgeworth, Lana Skye, Vera Misham, Rhoda Teneiro, and Issei Tenkai. You can also add Adrian Andrews even though she technically wasn't one)

Anyway, I'll give some thoughts on the case as a whole

-Muto is a fun, new character. Nothing special, but she works well in the case and I didn't get as pissed at her at the end as I should've. I kind of equate her to Desiree Delite. Otome Itami, on the other hand, is one of the most boring and forgettable characters in the series. I know she's one half of a gag, but she doesn't even seem necessary and she's a huge hypocrite to her granddaughter. I'll give my thoughts on Bansai later

-The mystery in this case is really intriguing (I'll admit it; I'm still not sick of flying murderers) and the game actually had me floored at the beginning because I didn't think realize it was Kay (I know. I'm not a smart man). Kay works really well as the defendant in this case because we need someone that Edgeworth cares about enough to lose his badge over. I did get sick of Edgeworth constantly telling her to believe in herself, but it was sweet (there was a strange line of dialogue, though. I can't remember it but right before Kay remembers the bull, Edgeworth realizes that Kay was being the way she is to protect him. It seemed off that he didn't realize that, and I though he already had earlier in the case)

-Damn it, I liked the pointless Ema cameo

-I really wish Edgeworth showed some resentment towards Lotta for what she did to him instead of her just being another, "This is ____. She was a witness in a past case of mine." Lotta is probably the cameo that works the best in this game, actually (I consider de Killer major enough in the plot to not be a cameo. Also, Sawhit doesn't count)

-Barring the intro themes, I think this case introduced the least amount of music out of all the AA cases (besides 3-4, which had none). I could be wrong, but I think the only new music in this case is Kay's reminiscence theme

-The case really falls apart at the end as others have mentioned, and I think it's largely due to the villain. I was spoiled ahead of time that Bansai was the villain of this case and that he was responsible for pretty much everything (and his "IGIARI!" is absolutely terrifying). I was a little mad I knew he was the villain, but that was alleviated by the fact that the case made no effort at hiding him as the villain. I think there are a lot of factors that contribute to him being kind of weak, though

1. We don't know the victim in this case at all. She's a complete mystery. I realize that it makes sense in context for the case and Case 5, but with some other villains with authority (von Karma, Gant), we knew they were deplorable and it was affirmed because we got to know a lot about Gregory Edgeworth, Bruce Goodman, and Neil Marshall). The fact that we don't know the victim well and that a motive isn't given until later gives the killer a lack of character
2. I never hated Bansai; not on the level of von Karma or Gant where I had to scratch and claw to just stay involved in the case and not get knocked out; not in the way where making the villain finally sweat was absolutely relishing
3. He's so involved in everything but so disconnected from all of it at the same time. There's never a single comment from Edgeworth about how Bansai had a hand in his father's death
4. The final confrontation was so weak. The logic chess actually worked very well but we needed more of a confrontation with him to end the case on a satisfying note. Once Yumihiko left, we should've had one more testimony at least (with a, "This is the final testimony" precursor) to at least not make everything so jarring. And as BP mentioned before, have the final piece of evidence be something that wasn't given minutes ago


-The accomplices were also handled shakily. The confrontations are going well with figuring out the report is forged, but simply saying that to Muto makes her drop the act and immediately confess everything. I would've liked to figure out a lot of the crime for myself but she admits how everything turned out (and we even get the answer to the mystery of the extra auction member that was brought up minutes ago). I also don't think the forged IS-7 report is a good enough reason to help someone else murder another human being

-Mikagami really shines in this case. I like how her reasons for being involved in each case are clear. In the second, it's to cover up the truth of the assassination. In the third, it's because she believes the verdict was just. Now, we find out that she had her own agenda all along. I think her character was handled very well

-I still don't like Tateyuki, but this is where his character starts to show up less

-I was really glad to see Franziska back

-Minor complaint: It pisses me off to no end when a huge hole is blown in the rival's case, and it's never addressed with a solution (3-3 is the best (or worst) example of this). AA does this sometimes and it was mostly remedied with Simon in DD, but this case has an absolutely infuriating one; they never explain why the letter doesn't have a hole in it. The only reason it wouldn't is if somebody was trying to frame Kay and Edgeworth just drops the topic

Anyway, I wrote a lot more than I thought I would, but those are my thoughts

Really? I'd give that honor to case 2.


Eh, I didn't think any of the characters in this case were that great. Muto and Otome were a fun duo while on-screen (I liked how Muto always smiled, as if she knew she was in a comedy duo), but not really memorable.


I'm not sick of flying murderers either--but I felt the explanation for this one was kinda lame.


Me too, actually xP
"Hey, this song is really pretty! it sounds kinda familiar. But... wait... it can't be...?!"


gotta uphold the time-honored tradition of giving as little detail/info about other games as possible in AA.
(Ugggggggh, they don't even mention Nick's name!!)


I never really thought about it that deeply before, but I agree with this analysis. The reasons behind it make sense in the end, but that doesn't change the fact it isn't a very satisfying ending while playing it.


yes yes yes, screw all the people who hated Mikagami after case 2 and called her an idiot. She knew what she was doing the entire time, and had an awesome reason behind it. As a character, Mikagami is probably the best rival in the series.


Me neither. Thank god he gets less and less screentime with each case.


I thought the 'no holes in the raincoat' thing is probably one of the biggest "*facedesk* WHY DIDN'T I REALIZE THAT FOR MYSELF HOURS AGO?!" moments/contradictions in the franchise.
(that's a good thing)

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They do explain it:

I don't know. I like Case 2 quite a bit for some reason. The mystery kept getting more convoluted and I just got lost but then at the end it all came together. Plus, the mystery was made even more interesting by the special location and victim. It's a little longer than it needs to be, but I had a lot of fun playing it


She isn't that great but she wasn't that grating to me, either. I did like the little cheesy moment at the end with Kay, though, where she realized what an awful person she was for doing this to her patient. "You can't just take a care of a patient's body-you have to take care of her heart, too." I also like the explanation for the bandages and thought it was pretty funny


Agreed. I'm just glad it didn't involve ropes


Exactly. I don't think her development was predictable either. She didn't go from "Professional-->Caring about the truth like Edgeworth." She always cared about the truth at some level, but also believed in the sanctity of the law to find it. She is not the same character as Edgeworth at the end of this game


Me, too. I was referring to the hole in the letter from when the candleabra punctured the conductor's coat, which was one of the first contradictions in the case

Sorry if I wasn't clear. Edgeworth explains it, but the rivals never offer a suitable counter-explanation for how there could be no hole while Kay is still the guilty party. Before her confession, the case against Kay is actually extremely weak as Edgeworth proves a lot of actions of the murderer that Kay wouldn't do (pulling out the murder weapon on the 50th floor, changing the victim's clothes). Now that I think about it, this game shows off "The Dark Age of the Law" better than Dual Destinies

I didn't say Case 2 was bad, just the worst in the game (which isn't saying much :P) I'd say it's a better "Gyakuten Saiban" case than a lot of the main series.

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I loved this case, for all sorts of reasons; it was dramatic, had an absolutely detestable villain and really helped to develop Edgey and Kay more as characters and endear them to me. Part of me prefers Case 3 SLIGHTLY due to to its (in my opinion) better mystery and anyone who has completed the game will know that case 5 is truly deserving of top spot, but this is still a stellar case nonetheless :)

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I think I know why I don't like him. His character, in his most base form, is "funny defense attorney", but he's not funny. And I don't think that's intentional. There's a particular moment in the final confrontation in Case 5 with him and Kay that feels really forced and awkward

I probably should replay the case at some point. I'm looking at some of zslyzer's walkthrough and it seems better than I remembered (though I am getting a little tired of the pop culture references). He's not at the end yet, though, and I think it falls apart after Yumihiko leaves

I forgot to mention this in my original post-I think it was a really nice touch by the writers how the, "I will help you recover your memories" note translates to everyone as Kay's amnesia, but it's actually talking about the promise notebook

I still think the writing is clunky as hell as a whole, but the stuff that goes down within the first half of this episode is definitely something that will make this game stand out to me after I've beaten it. To think that case 5 is even better (according to you guys) makes me quite excited. I agree too that Ray Shields is a lame and boring character and he is not funny, even though he's obviously supposed to be.

Currently I'm at the point in this case when Justine (Mikaragi or whatever) starts to show her true colors i suppose. I still don't like her character. I think it is stupid in concept and I find it hard tp take her seriously as a rival, but I hope that will change once she's done talking at the point I'm at xD

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I didn't think the writing was all THAT bad- quite the opposite, I actually enjoyed it - but maybe that's just me

But yeah... I can kinda agree with you with the characters to some degree I liked Ray personally and found him to be good company, but the running gag of 'Hey, let's exchange hugs!' wasn't at all funny to me, and he seemed to be basically like Larry, except a little more sensible and intelligent; neither of these things were enough to ruin him as a character for him, but he was certainly wasn't my favorite in the game by a longshot Justine's true colors gave her a lot more depth and likability to me personally, but I will agree the whole 'I was only fighting against you to try to work against someone else' twist kind of made her less intimidating and depending on your point of view, less epic as a rival. I personally liked it when she turned out now to be as callous, inhuman and infexible as she was made out to be, but you know, that was just me

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My biggest gripe with Justine is just her characterization. Her motive might be fine to me, but it's just the way she talks and acts that seems too wishy washy to me which is my exact same issue with Agent Lang and Simon Blackquill. They are too damn indirect and formal somehow. More nuiscances than they're intimidating.

Moving along I think the writing is okay and I do find the case to be better than case 2 actually but the lackof funny, witty and dialogue kinda makes it monotonous at times.

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I've been looking at some of the patch and I think I might've been too harsh on the case at first glance. A lot of my criticisms still stand about it, but it wasn't nearly as abrupt of an ending as I remembered. Maybe it's because I expected it or because the playthrough made it one large part for the final showdown. The patch even made it more clear about Bansai's motive in IS-7. I'm gonna replay the game soon with a friend, so I'll make a better judgement then. Right now, I might like this case better than Case 2

One more thing bothered me about this case, though: Edgeworth uses an elevator without complaint...twice

I thought Blackquill was the most intimidating since von Karma and 2-4 Edgeworth

As for GK games, keep in mind that your rival is almost always the villain. Besides the villain of Case 3 (who even does it to some extent), all the villains in this game are the ones putting up the opposition. Shi-Long Lang fulfills the role of the I-3 and I2-5 rival (before the final boss). In I-5, he defends Shih-na but then he's kind of just using you to take down Quercus his own way. Mikagami fulfills the role of the I2-2 and present day I2-3 rival (von Karma is the past one). And the reason I gave special mention to I2-3 earlier is because the villain is protected by the law, which extends to Mikagami. Yumihiko is never a rival besides I2-4, but it's still more his father.

I certainly like case 4 better than case 2 even if it falls apart at the end. Still has good moments.

As for the rivals, I felt that with Blackquill he was excactly like Ray Shields in the sense that, he's clearly intended to be a certain way towards the protagonist and in a sense, to the player, but it doesn't really work out that well. I felt that Blackquill was trying to act intimidating but it felt unconvincing at least when it came to the stuff he said and not what he 'did'.

But on the other hand a character like Justine is also supposed to have a soft and caring side so it makes a bit more sense to me when she doesn't feel threatening enough but I just dislike her gimmicky side of 'dancing' around with that gavel and rambling about law being religion. It seems like Yamazaki is trying to one-up Godot each time because his rival characters all have surreal nonsensical stuff to them and they do forced metaphors.

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Blackquill is the best rival as a rival since Edgey and von Karma in the first game, so in that respect I think he worked, but in terms of how physically intimidating he was I think GS5 had a bad "tell-don't-show" problem, like with Shigaraki being funny in GK2.

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But at least in GS5, the developers had a modicum of self-awareness when it came to Blackquill. He was clearly supposed to be physically intimidating in Case 2 (and to be fair he kind of was) but afterwards, it was definitely played for laughs. It was supposed to be funny by the fact that he kept breaking out of his shackles but nobody cared anymore. With Tateyuki, I can't really tell if he's supposed to be funny or so unfunny that he is funny. Either way, it doesn't work because the end result is that he's not funny

With Lang and Justine, I think they're both different enough in their own right. I don't really see Courtney as similar to Godot and his similarities with Lang are only really the "Lang Zi" quotes, but even that's a little stretch. To be fair, if Justine didn't change at all from her Case 2 and 3 persona, I wouldn't be a huge fan of her. At least she's different, though

Ok, can we all just agree to use the patch names? I don't know nay of the Japanese names, so i'm losing track of the various conversations.

It seems to me that everyone is split about this case. I really like though. The whole things with Kay regaining her memories at the end was touching, and while it could have had a better villainous breakdown (JUST LOOK AT ALL THE OPPORTUNITIES WITH THIS GUY!) He was one of the most hateable (is that a word?) murderers in the series. Plus, the setup is great and it leads into the final case very well, with some various unexplained plot points which I can't wait to be explained in the final case!

Also, since this seems to be a huge debate here, let me talk about both the characters and the which case is best.
Raymond: Why is everyone hating this guy? I think he's kinda charming. Not funny...but charming. I just love this guys aura of swag he brings with him wherever he goes. The music helps quite a bit.
Justine: Didn't like her at first, as I kinda felt she was just a bully and a jerk, but she's starting to grow on me. Currently playing case 5, and I gotta say, i'm really liking her.
Sebastian: I just....I don't....I can't...................HOW CAN ANYONE BE THIS STUPID? Then again, I am playing case 5, and, much like Justine, he's redeeming himself quite a bit.

Now which case is best? Well, i'm playing case 5 at the moment, and that one (so far anyways) is the best.

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Since the game was JP only for a while, I only knew the characters by their Japanese names. Then, I watched Dowolf's translation so I know those names the second best (it's confusing since in dowolf's version, Sebastian is named Raymond and Raymond is named Atticus. Plus, with the patch, there are now two Simons in the series). I don't even know all of the patch names yet so it's just easier for me to say the JP ones

As for Raymond, it's just annoying. Typically in Ace Attorney, what you see isn't what you get. With Raymond, it kind of is. The only time he gets a little depth is in Case 3 but even then he's not all that interesting. I kind of wish he just kept his 18 year old persona because I think young Raymond is a great character

I think every sense of depth he got in case 3 was diminished by how ANNOYING he was in his 18-years-younger self. Goood, so sassy and ugh. He drove me crazy with his fandom for that TV program and singing. /rant

As for the naming in the patch though, I just have one gripe that was pointed out in another thread (On this board I think...?) is that Justine Courtney is a bad name because they're both first names. It could've been Justine Courtessa or something silly like that, but you can switch her first name and "last name" around and it will still be the same kind of name.

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Aww. I thought his younger self was endearing

And while I overall prefer the patch to dowolf's version because the writing is better, but I do prefer a lot of his names. Justine Courtney-->Angela Von Jure

Justine Courtney seems a little cake on cake. Like they couldn't pick which one.

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A lot of the patch names were fan chosen. I believe the original was Justine Pallathena, which I think would've been worse to be honest, so I'm glad the patchers did change it in the end

I don't know the patch names =\
Honestly, I prefer the JP names because there's now dowolf's playthrough and the patch, meaning there's two different sets of English names; I find it simpler and easier to stick to the language that only has one set of names (and that is more "official")


yes pls

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After a long time... We finally get what I wanted:

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But back on topic... was I the only one that noticed this?

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Last edited by Nearavex on Wed Jul 02, 2014 9:07 pm, edited 2 times in total.

Nope.

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I might misremember it but didn't they also semi-directly reference Themis Legal Academy in this game even though Dual Destinies is newer?

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A reference to Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann in Ace Attorney. THAT is awesome.

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Am I the only one who absolutely loved Raymond Shields?

It may looks weird, but he reminds me of myself a lot. There was a time in my life may years ago where I asked people for random hugs too and I never expected a videogame character to do the same LOL.

I disagree about he trying to be funny. He doesn't really try to be funny, he is just a extroverted and good humored guy.

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I merely found his repetitive behaviour to become too much in the long run. I felt like the character he was in case 2 was no different from how he acted in the finale sections -- he had no growth and no really peaking moments in the game where his character shined IMO. So I felt he was forgettable.

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I see your point, but well, a lot of characters don't change at all.

Gumshoe is the same guy since the first one, but people (including me) love him. The difference is that he appears a lot more than Shields in the series.

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with ray i feel he was fine in case 2 and 3 and after case 3 pretty much had closure with his little arc i feel he should have had left the story besides his appearance in case 5 as that was set up in case 2. but after that he had no reason to be with you during the final confrontation heck alot of people that were with edgeworth besides lang, Courtney, and her son had no reason to be there as they had to do with this case and had personal stakes in it. this was not an issue with turnabout ablaze every character that was helping you had some stake in the fall of the big bad of the first game.

he feels very shoe horned in case 4 that i really don't understand why he had to be there. really the writers should do what some fan cases writers do like cardivore did with maya. if they don't have a point in the story of the case don't have them there.

I think this case was pretty good but afew bits i am unsure of , 18 years ago was Von Karma Aware that he was using a fake autopsy report becuase Banzai penlized him for using the very evidence he gave von karma also why did Banzai want ot use a fake autopsy report anyway ??

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Bansai "wouldn't allow others to hold power." He made the Detective hide from Von Karma that the body went missing and then had a report forged. This made it so Von Karma would be forced to either throw the case and lose (which Bansai could probably guess he wouldn't) or continue with the forged report (and VK wasn't a stranger to forged evidence) where Gregory would expose him and Von Karma would penalize him. So, VK wasn't initially aware but he did find out at a point and Bansai's ultimate goal was to keep Von Karma under his thumb

Actually, the fake autopsy report wasn't the cause of Manfred's penalty. Even if Gregory knew the body was missing, he couldn't prove it, or prove that the report was fake. (Manfred got a penalty because of the extorted confession.)

In any case, Manfred definitely knew the report was fake. It didn't take him long to figure out that the body was missing, and he didn't have an autopsy report at the time. So any autopsy report he would receive later would have to be fake, since there was no body to autopsy.

I thought this was a nice case - it ran quite smoothly and was fun to watch. (Didn't have any possibility of playing it.) I got pretty damn annoyed at the beginning, though, when the bandaged Kay was brought in. "Ah, who is that?" Well, good sir, it's your assistant, just wrapped in bandage. Anyhow!
First I got annoyed by the behaviour of the amnesiac Kay, but quite soon I started to like it - quite a bit, actually; and her special theme music there was lovely. Ema's little cameo might have been quite pointless, but I liked it even so. It was nice to meet Franziska as well, and I thought she behaved very sweetly when it came to Kay at the end, especially what she said about her smiling, that it suited her better.
This was the case where I really started liking Mikagami - I liked her berfore as well, but it was a quite "neutral" liking. Now she proved to me that she wasn't only in the game to take the piss out of Edgeworth. Bansai was absolutely vile, but the vileness of him almost amused me... since it felt like he was made just to be heinous.
Yumihiko. Yumihiko... I already loved the obnoxious lil' fella, but here I got extremely touched and started to love him even more. Poor, poor Yumihiko. I felt sad when he got sad, when he ran away I just wanted to give him an embrace.
The ending was nice, "this isn't over yet" - I'm exited about seeing what's to come.

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I have quite a hard time collecting my thoughts about this case as a whole, maybe because it's the case in the game that so far took me the longest to finish (it was well over a month since I started it) or maybe because it doesn't feel like... it has a resonance bottom, or "flavour". It's like, you walk around, talk to people, stuff happen, but... I don't know, it's hard to explain. The closest case to compare it to, in that regards, would be DD-4, only a bit more self-contained (even though this one ended with some sort of unfinished business as well, but I felt that well before the end). And perhaps that is the reason it took me so long to get through, because it wasn't really something to get me hooked. It also felt like it took its sweet time to pick up some speed.

In a sense, this feels like the more introspecting part of the game for Edegworth, and perhaps that is one of the reasons the case in itself doesn't really stand out, because it serves more as a background for his gig. I'm not entirely sold on it though, the whole leave badge-thing mostly felt like an attempt to force character growth and raise the stakes through pretty much needless drama. It did however simultaneously show a softer and a more ruthless side of Edgeworth as well as nicely explore the relationship between himself and Kay. And Gumshoe, in his abscense, although it is telling that Edgeworth only really seems to care about him when he's not around. I liked Franziska's role in the case too. Ema was the epitome of a cameo for the sake of having a cameo and even though I don't have a problem with seeing her again, this case (or rather this game) was already crowded enough so it mostly felt blah. I hardly remembered anything about Karin from my first time with the game, but I found myself liking her. Courtney is becoming more reasonable and Yumihiko is his usual thick little darling self. I kind of love that he surely must have been aware that his dad was randomly sporting a long-ass fake beard and he just rolled with it. Shigaraki's creep tendencies are getting rather old. End Part 1 felt like it lasted forever. And of course fucking Shelly deKiller destroys the good mood by the end. But I like that Kay answered the walkie-talkie with "Edgeworth speaking". In the same vein I loved that Courtney apparently did a perfect imitation of Dr. Young.

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In contrast to the earlier post, I actually find this case the easiest to play through. It's mostly due to the short length of the case, though, that makes it easier to finish. I believe it only took me about two days in total to do so.

Anyway, this was a relatively relaxing case to play through. I quite like the atmosphere of this case as well as the location. Its mystery is also much easier to follow. That said, it still does have a lot of flaws. Bansai, for example, is not at all that great a villain. He just feels like Manfred/Gant Lite and isn't very interesting either. I'm quite glad he wasn't the mastermind because he's just so dull. The supporting cast is ehhh. Lotta I feel shouldn't be here, much like Larry last time. Weird how everybody takes her word for granted too. Was there any reason for her not to be suspected in the murder? Muto and Otomi are also just there for a good part of the case. Franziska is back, which I'm quite happy able it because she gets to whip all the annoying characters, so hurrah. Logic Chess was also a bit more intense which is fine, I guess. The pacing also suffered a bit. End Part 1 dragged on. I believe there was a half hour part followed by a ninety minute part which is dumb. It would've been fine if balanced as well, but in the end I think the shorter case makes it a bit easier to play through since a lot of stuff here is kinda addressed in case five.

And the ending is also too long. Literally every character in the room says their own goodbyes before leaving. Couldn't this have been shortened more?!

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