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Phoenix Wright

The story of how I became aware of Phoenix Wright is somewhat of a strange one.  At one point when I was camping I was trying to find something to do while I was bored, and I started searching Verizon’s GetItNow on my cell phone.  For some reason, they had a mobile version of Phoenix Wright on there.  I downloaded the demo to try it out, and that just got me hooked on the character and the gameplay.

Fast forward to when I finally bought a Nintendo DS, and the newest Phoenix Wright was one of the games I purchased with it.  However, upon playing through the first case, I realized that the games followed a storyline.  Of course, that meant that I needed to purchase both of the previous games.  I was able to purchase the first game at a Gamestop, but I had a really hard time find the second game.  I finally decided to order it from Half.com, and it took forever but I got it.  And let me tell you, even though I find myself crammed between Warcraft, books, other video games, movies, and TV – I still find as much time as possible to play the DS.  And what game do I play?  Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, of course.

I’m just about finished with the first game, and it took me longer than most people in overall time.  However, I haven’t timed my actual in-game hours, which probably end up being around the average.

Don’t let me fool you, it’s not a perfect game.  Some of the characters are barely written with any…character.  Some of the witness quirks are a little annoying, such as the latest guy that I’m dealing with who makes me wait for him to wake up every time that I try to talk to him.  It gets a little old sometimes.

The game is by no means realistic in it’s portrayal of a trial system – trials are limited to three days, sometimes I’ve been limited to only using one item of evidence to prove my point (most of the time), and Phoenix seems a little altruistic to exist in law of modern times.  Maybe that’s the draw of it for me – perhaps it exploits the idealistic ‘fighter of justice’ lawyer image that seems like it will never exist.

The stories are excellent, and every case ties in with the ones before it, lending itself to have an overall story arc; this might not be expected with a game based on episodic trials.

All in all, Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney is what I would term a ‘must buy’ for the Nintendo DS – especially if you are interested in puzzle games or mysteries.