I think Ace Attorney's status as a satire of the Japanese court system is kinda taken for granted nowadays.
Everyone kinda knows that's what it's supposed to be, but no one really takes it all that seriously and I find that, over time, this started applying to the games themselves too.
In the original game the satire didn't just come from Phoenix having to lead a room full of idiots by the nose towards the correct conclusion - it was about how influential people in power could game the system to skirt around the law and consequently get away with covering up their crimes, every single villain in that game was a different kind of influential figure which is why Phoenix was always on the backfoot.
However we're now at a point where none of the villains in this game really have anything to do with any kind of critique of the judical system and Phoenix's role as an underdog is simply the cause of that being the status quo.
With a far bigger interest in interpersonal relationships and petty vendettas, the series has now marked its full transition into a comedy of errors starring a wide cast of wacky characters.
Thankfully the thing that makes Trials and Tribulations stand out even despite this is how strong the character writing has become here.
Free from any burdens of trying to make a salient point, they can go all out on the comedy as well as the melodrama to create a surprisingly engaging and heartfelt story on top of some pretty effective murder mysteries - which are, crucially, actually mysteries this time.
From this point on the Ace Attorney series would become kind of buried in the mud of its own lore and memes while trying to sloppily make its way back to the thematic depth of that first game, but I'm glad we got this one last hurrah with these characters that manages to stick the landing, even if the gymnasium has totally shifted around them.
Everyone kinda knows that's what it's supposed to be, but no one really takes it all that seriously and I find that, over time, this started applying to the games themselves too.
In the original game the satire didn't just come from Phoenix having to lead a room full of idiots by the nose towards the correct conclusion - it was about how influential people in power could game the system to skirt around the law and consequently get away with covering up their crimes, every single villain in that game was a different kind of influential figure which is why Phoenix was always on the backfoot.
However we're now at a point where none of the villains in this game really have anything to do with any kind of critique of the judical system and Phoenix's role as an underdog is simply the cause of that being the status quo.
With a far bigger interest in interpersonal relationships and petty vendettas, the series has now marked its full transition into a comedy of errors starring a wide cast of wacky characters.
Thankfully the thing that makes Trials and Tribulations stand out even despite this is how strong the character writing has become here.
Free from any burdens of trying to make a salient point, they can go all out on the comedy as well as the melodrama to create a surprisingly engaging and heartfelt story on top of some pretty effective murder mysteries - which are, crucially, actually mysteries this time.
From this point on the Ace Attorney series would become kind of buried in the mud of its own lore and memes while trying to sloppily make its way back to the thematic depth of that first game, but I'm glad we got this one last hurrah with these characters that manages to stick the landing, even if the gymnasium has totally shifted around them.