Ace Attorney Investigations Duology or Prosecutor Miles Edgeworth Duology has been announced on today’s Nintendo Direct. What was once a cult-following classic has now been resurrected by Capcom as the series has been console-locked behind the Nintendo DS since 2011. However, it’s the 2nd game that has Ace Attorney fans excited about the spin-off’s return as it stayed region-locked in Japan for 13 years. They relied on a fan translation for the past decade to play the game. How does the fan translation compare to the official translation? Here’s what you should know about Miles Edgeworth’s spinoff.
Miles Edgeworth With No Phoenix
In Ace Attorney Investigations Duology, you play through two games featuring Phoenix Wright’s childhood friend and courtroom rival, Prosecutor Miles Edgeworth. Edgeworth gets involved with a crime syndicate investigation after he comes home to his office with a murder suspect lying on the floor. Investigations are conducted differently here than in the original Ace Attorney Trilogy.
The player controls Edgeworth with a partner of the case following behind him. For the first time, the Ace Attorney allows you to move freely around the crime scene instead of pointing and clicking with the touch screen. You gather evidence connected to the case and talk to your partners if they have witnessed something or give hints about the case that will aid your investigation.
Some evidence may not connect which requires Edgeworth to use Logic Deduction. Logic Deduction will leave you clues you haven’t found its purpose for. When two pieces of evidence link together, they will form a new lead in the case. Instead of confronting your rival and the witness in the courtroom, Edgeworth is pressuring potential suspects and witnesses to confess the truth in rebuttals. Presenting evidence and pressing for additional information is still a part of the core Ace Attorney gameplay.
Miles Edgeworth 2 Is Special
Why is Ace Attorney Investigations 2 a fan-favorite? The answer lies in the story approach and a single gameplay change. In Ace Attorney Investigations, Edgeworth was seen as a prosecutor targeted by a criminal syndicate. In the 2nd game, he gains motivation to search for his self-identity.
Miles Edgeworth meets a middle-aged scruffy man named Eddie Fender (Ray Shields in fan translation) during his latest investigation involving international affairs. Fender was the attorney who went against Edgeworth’s mentor and foster father, Manfred von Karma in the DL-6 Incident. Ace Attorney players recognized this case as it caused Edgeworth’s fear of earthquakes after witnessing the loss of his father, Gregory.
Fender asks Edgeworth if he could quit being a prosecutor to take charge of Gregory’s law firm. Edgeworth argues that he is already on the path of a prosecutor, yet he is unsure what it means to be one. He faces this problem through a series in the new game mechanic, Logic Chess. Logic Chess is how Edgeworth negotiates with witnesses, now you must time your reactions to lower their insecurities.
Ace Attorney Investigations Remaster Changes
At this year’s June Nintendo Direct, Ace Attorney fans’ jaws dropped when they saw Miles Edgeworth make an appearance. My heart skipped a beat when it heard Ace Attorney Investigations’ Pursuit theme. And changes are a delight to transfer the gameplay onto the Switch and Steam. Here are all the changes you should know for when the new game is released.
Sprite Redrawn
Capcom has redrawn all the sprites to a cleaner, sharper resolution. I absolutely love the sleek designs on the third-person perspective of Ace Attorney, especially Detective Gumshoe as we can now see his suit jacket beneath his grimy green coat. It’s more fitting than the Ace Attorney Trilogy’s remaster as the remaster’s lineart and paint made character portraits look like porcelain dolls.
Seeing it used for full-body sprites and expressions felt natural with additional animations for smoother movement. The backgrounds are treated the same to match the sprites’ polished look. Players can also swap between remaster resolution into pixels to relive the DS original.
Updated Gameplay UI
Ace Attorney Investigations UI has changed into the format for the Nintendo Switch and other consoles. Your evidence and case profile are stashed inside of a notebook. Logic’s UI changed to Edgeworth’s silhouette with the clues as thought bubbles. When connecting two pieces of evidence, the clues become puzzle pieces.
Logic Chess is now called Mind Chess to avoid confusing players with their gameplay mechanics. The React options are positioned on top of a character’s body showing awkward space. If given a textbox background, the position would feel much better to look at.
Fan Translation Name Changes
So far, the changes from the fan translation of Ace Attorney Investigations 2 have little change in the Capcom official translation. The most noticeable are the names of the fan-translated cast. On the official website promotion for the Miles Edgeworth Duology, two characters have their English names confirmed.
Eddie Fender was originally Ray Shields, the attorney assistant of Gregory Edgeworth. Judge Verity Gavèlle changed from Justine Courtney as she carried a gavel to silence anyone. The last but most important name fans are wondering about is rookie prosecutor Sebastian Debeste. The rumor around him is his name being changed to Eustace Wynner, a play on the phrase “useless whiner”.
Capcom Acknowledging Fans’ Effort
Ace Attorney Investigations 2 is the third game in the Ace Attorney series rescued from region-lock. Before it, there was the Great Ace Attorney Chronicles, a 2015 Japan-only released Ace Attorney prequel series telling the story of lawyer student Ryuunosuke Naruhodo. Due to the lack of 3DS sales on Ace Attorney Dual Destinies and Spirit of Justice, Capcom chose to only release the prequel series in Japan.
The Ace Attorney community did not sit still and took matters into their own hands by translating the Android version of the game. A similar effort was put into the Ace Attorney Trials and Tribulation for the Gameboy Advance because of the harsh criticism of Justice For All. They soon attracted the attention of Capcom developers and went out of their way to officially translate the games years later for the latest gaming consoles.
Now with Edgeworth’s story joining the remaster games, we are unsure where the series will go from here. Welcome to the club, Edgey!
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