Ace Attorney Investigations Collection review

There are hundreds upon hundreds of iconic video game characters scattered throughout the wonderful games that make up this medium, but as far as I’m concerned not many can hold a candle to Miles Edgeworth. Originally the smarmy prosecutor rival of Phoenix Wright in the first Ace Attorney game, Edgeworth eventually warmed to the spiky-haired defence attorney and ended up more friend than foe. As the series progressed Miles became more concerned with finding the truth in the courtroom than successfully prosecuting all who crossed his path, and one of the best things about being an Ace Attorney fan was seeing his finger waggle in the name of justice. Unfortunately, those of us in the west were unable to experience all of Edgeworth’s story thanks to an unlocalised game, or at least that was the case until the Ace Attorney Investigations Collection.

Despite being part of the broader Ace Attorney series, the two Ace Attorney Investigations games are quite the departure from the courtroom. Instead of the bulk of the game taking place with a judge overlooking the affair, Investigations is a little closer to a traditional adventure game. You’ll wander around environments looking for evidence, and use your little grey cells to prove people innocent and figure out whodunit.

Each of the ten Turnabouts (essentially cases) across both Ace Attorney Investigations Collection games is split into individual chapters, which vary wildly. Investigation scenes are the simplest, generally placing our ruffled hero into a fairly small location and tasking him with finding out all the key details required for the case. This involves all the classic adventure game tasks of examining items closer to discover clues, talking to witnesses, and of course a hefty dose of logic.

Logic is Edgeworth’s main weapon in the war against crime, and as a mechanic is fairly straightforward. Various facts are gathered as you examine items and grill colourful characters, and in the logic menu, you’ll need to connect these to uncover the truth. Often this is simple enough (like connecting a fact about the cause of death with a fact about a gun you’ve just found) but that doesn’t mean it isn’t satisfying to put all the pieces together and gain new information.

For those who are concerned, they’ll miss the tried and tested Ace Attorney formula of scrutinising testimony in the Investigations games – worry not. Despite a lack of courtroom, when you’re confronting suspicious people you’ll still have to engage in presenting evidence and pressing statements made to uncover more information. This is just as compelling as ever, perhaps even more so thanks to playing as an arrogant character with more witty quips at his disposal.

For your first couple of cases this setup of investigating and confronting is great, but as with all the games in this legal drama universe, there are a few gimmicks that’ll shake things up. One ally you meet has a gadget that virtually recreates crime scenes based on your evidence, which can be used to visually spot inconsistencies and is a blast to use.

In the second game, a new type of confrontation is added called Mind Chess. In these face-offs, you generally don’t have the evidence to back up your suspicions, and instead need to use your words to confuse foes into giving you more information. With a strict time limit, you’ll need to find questions they’ll be willing to answer, stay silent long enough to make them sweat and put them into conversational checkmate. It’s a really cool addition to the formula, and requires fast thinking and a bit of analysis of the various characters to succeed at.

The Ace Attorney games are well known for their weird and wonderful characters, and the Investigations games are no exception. Whether you’re chatting with a narcoleptic flight attendant or a sassy reporter with a point to prove, there’s always somebody delightfully weird and charming to interact with. Loads of familiar faces return from other games in the series too, which long-term fans will be delighted by.

After completing both games in the Ace Attorney Investigations Collection I have now experienced the entire Ace Attorney series, and in terms of story the Investigations games are possibly the most impressive. Overarching plots involving corrupt legal systems, master thieves and Edgeworth’s backstory gripped me from start to finish, and make this a more obscure part of the series that demands to be played.

Now as with all the modern Ace Attorney collections, Investigations features all sorts of lovely bells and whistles to delight the dedicated fanbase. All the art and music you could want is available in the game’s gallery, there’s new updated art that is gorgeous and features some seriously impressive animations, and there’s the usual inclusion of “Story Mode”. At the push of a button you can activate this and the game will play itself, pointing you immediately to the right answer in a confrontation and helping immensely if you get stuck.

Although Story Mode can be activated at any time though, it won’t always simply take over the gameplay like it did in previous collections. Investigation scenes can only be switched to Story Mode by restarting them from the beginning so they are played exactly as the game wants them to be, and because of this if you get stuck towards the end of a specific scene your time will be wasted watching things you’ve already seen. Alongside the sometimes slightly baffling logic that has to be followed exactly as the developers intends, this can mean you end up frustrated not knowing what to do next – and Story Mode used to fix that issue much more elegantly when it didn’t force restarts in certain scenes.

The Ace Attorney Investigations Collection is made up of two of the best games in the entire Ace Attorney series, and is full of drama, charming characters and a seriously compelling plot. The more adventure game framing doesn’t detract from the series in the slightest, and if anything the different gimmicks make these titles effortlessly digestable. With Edgeworth at the helm and hours of wonderful crime drama to gorge on,I’d object to any Ace Attorney fan skipping this collection.