I’ve had some weird experiences with Dual Destinies and Spirit of Justice that I haven’t really figured out how to put into words until very recently after finishing Great Ace Attorney, and it’s purely about vibes versus anything resembling actual quality. Like, I enjoyed a lot of the characters in Dual Destinies, and I have enjoyed a fair amount of what I’ve seen of Spirit of Justice’s cast, as well. The cases themselves have not been bad, the breakdowns are fun, and my generally negative feelings about Phoenix being shoved back into the protagonist role aside, I thought the returning characters were pretty alright.
But the vibes. Something bugged me about the vibes and I think I finally identified what it is. The original trilogy, Apollo Justice, and Great Ace Attorney feel like satirical takes on a job that actually exists in the world with like, some wacky shenanigans and supernatural nonsense mixed in for flavor. Ace Attorney Investigations 1 felt like a legal/political thriller with a goofy angle to it, and I get the impression that Ace Attorney Investigations 2 is like that as well but even better. So it’s definitely not the change in the writing team, even if I identified little hints of my vibes problem with Lang hating prosecutors as an entire profession because something something family tragedy in AAI1.
Dual Destinies and Spirit of Justice feel like those kids’ media where everyone in the world is deeply obsessed with some kind of children’s card game or collectible toy or whatever to the point where society revolves around it, except it’s for being a goddamn lawyer of all things. There’s a lawyer high school! There’s a dark age of the law that doesn’t mean anything but it sounds really cool and there are like mascots and shit for it! And then we get into this game specifically where a guy from Japan or Japanifornia goes to a fake Central Asian country where being a defense attorney is, like, illegal? Because it’s against the local theocracy’s religion? And like man I know it’s more complicated and there’s a historical explanation for what’s going on, but there are so many ways you can make a corrupt legal system that the main character has to work within the confines of without making his career feel like it’s escalated like Yu-Gi-Oh.
And like the thing is, I’m not against the absurd. Ace Attorney has always been absurd, and I think the escalation of Yu-Gi-Oh is dumb fun. I seriously don’t know why my brain is having as much trouble with DD/SoJ’s brand of absurdity as it is, but every time I pick them up I play for a little while and have a bit of fun and then end up not wanting to pick them up again for like, three years because something felt weird the last time I played it and I couldn’t identify what it was. That’s why I’m not actually giving a rating to this, because I feel like my feelings on the matter are deeply irrational and if I ever get over myself to buckle down and finish it, I think I will probably like it. Until then, what the hell.
But the vibes. Something bugged me about the vibes and I think I finally identified what it is. The original trilogy, Apollo Justice, and Great Ace Attorney feel like satirical takes on a job that actually exists in the world with like, some wacky shenanigans and supernatural nonsense mixed in for flavor. Ace Attorney Investigations 1 felt like a legal/political thriller with a goofy angle to it, and I get the impression that Ace Attorney Investigations 2 is like that as well but even better. So it’s definitely not the change in the writing team, even if I identified little hints of my vibes problem with Lang hating prosecutors as an entire profession because something something family tragedy in AAI1.
Dual Destinies and Spirit of Justice feel like those kids’ media where everyone in the world is deeply obsessed with some kind of children’s card game or collectible toy or whatever to the point where society revolves around it, except it’s for being a goddamn lawyer of all things. There’s a lawyer high school! There’s a dark age of the law that doesn’t mean anything but it sounds really cool and there are like mascots and shit for it! And then we get into this game specifically where a guy from Japan or Japanifornia goes to a fake Central Asian country where being a defense attorney is, like, illegal? Because it’s against the local theocracy’s religion? And like man I know it’s more complicated and there’s a historical explanation for what’s going on, but there are so many ways you can make a corrupt legal system that the main character has to work within the confines of without making his career feel like it’s escalated like Yu-Gi-Oh.
And like the thing is, I’m not against the absurd. Ace Attorney has always been absurd, and I think the escalation of Yu-Gi-Oh is dumb fun. I seriously don’t know why my brain is having as much trouble with DD/SoJ’s brand of absurdity as it is, but every time I pick them up I play for a little while and have a bit of fun and then end up not wanting to pick them up again for like, three years because something felt weird the last time I played it and I couldn’t identify what it was. That’s why I’m not actually giving a rating to this, because I feel like my feelings on the matter are deeply irrational and if I ever get over myself to buckle down and finish it, I think I will probably like it. Until then, what the hell.