"HOLD IT! You should buy this game now!"

So, here we have it. The game I am about to review is the sequel to the great DS game known as Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. Also known as Gyakuten Saiban 2 in Japan, this game was released in January of 2006 in North America. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Justice For All (which will be called JFA from this point onward) is a text-based adventure game developed and published by Capcom and released on the Nintendo DS. Just like it's predecessor, JFA is an updated port of Gyakuten Saiban 2, which was released in Japan for the GameBoy Advanced. It features touch screen control just like the first game did. However, unlike the first game, there aren't any new cases in the DS port of the game. Because of this, JFA only has four cases, while the first game had five.

Now, before I start the actual reviewing of this game, I must say one thing. If you're thinking about getting this game, but you haven't played the first game, I highly suggest you play the first game first. You probably won't understand the back-story if you haven't played the first game. Not to mention, you are seriously missing out if you don't play the first game. Anyway, on to the review!

Unlike most of my reviews, I'm going to talk about the story of JFA first, as it's the main point of the game. I have to say this first and foremost: this is a text-driven game. This means that you will be reading a lot of text throughout the whole game. So, reading text turns you off, don't even think about getting this.

The setting of the game takes place roughly one year after the events of the first game. In JFA, you will meet a fairly large cast of characters, ranging from old faces to new ones. People who've played the first game will recognize returning faces such as Phoenix Wright, Maya Fey, and Detective Gumshoe. However, a lot of new characters are also mixed in with the old, such as Franziska von Karma and Pearl Fey. Some of the new characters are great, and some of them I hate. Still, this is the same with characters from the first game, so it's not much to complain about.

In JFA, you take the roll of the defense attorney Phoenix Wright. You guide Phoenix through four all-new cases. In each case, Phoenix must get his client a "Not Guilty" verdict. The cases themselves are pretty decent, and each one is longer than the one before it (the first case taking up about 2-3 hours at most, and the fourth case taking about 10 hours, at least). I'm not going to tell you what any of these cases are about, because that would spoil the game. However, I must say that I found the cases from the first game to be a bit better. The great thing about JFA is the fourth case, though. It pretty much makes the whole game worth it, as it's perfect.

There is also an interesting back-story in the Phoenix Wright games. Just like with the cases, I can't say anything or I'll spoil it, but Phoenix's story continues from the first game, and it's done really well. As I stated earlier, if you didn't play the first game, you won't understand the back-story of JFA, so I think you should definitely play the first game before playing JFA.

Just like in the first game, you will find that the characters develop very well. This isn't limited to the major characters, either; you will find that even the minor characters develop a lot, as well. There were two other elements in the first game that made the story awesome. These were, of course, the dramatic moments and the humor. The story in JFA is just as dramatic as the first, so that held up well. The humor, on the other hand, lacks in JFA. It had its moments, but the first game was so much funnier overall.

Well, I said a lot more about the story of the game than I planned. Still, we have to keep moving forward. Next up we have the gameplay. You will find that the gameplay of JFA is very similar to the first game. In fact, it's almost identical. For this reason, I'll only be telling you about the new features of JFA. If you haven't played the first game and don't know about the gameplay, I suggest you read one of the reviews for the first game to get a full explanation of the gameplay.

First off, I must say that the people who made this game did a terrible job with proofreading it. The first game was guilty of some spelling and grammar errors as well, but the quantity of them has increased in JFA. I especially couldn't help to notice a huge grammar error in one of the endings of the game (yes, there are two endings in JFA, but once again, I'm not going to spoil anything), and it really annoyed me. Hopefully they'll do a better job with proofreading in the third game.

The lack of a DS-exclusive case in JFA meant that the use of the DS's features in the fifth case of the first game didn't return in JFA. This is a bit of a disappointment, but it's really not that big of a problem. This may irritate some people, but it doesn't really bother me too much.

A new addition to JFA is that you can now present the profiles of people as evidence. This makes things more interesting, but also slightly a little more irritating. Now when you have to find a contradiction in a witness's testimony during a court session, the answer might be found by instead presenting a person's profile rather than a piece of evidence. Like I said, this makes things more interesting, but it also means that you have a lot more evidence, and it sometimes makes things even tougher to figure out.

The biggest new feature of this game is the addition of Psyche-Locks. Psyche-Locks are only found in the investigation parts of the game, but they certainly make things more interesting. While you're investigating, you go around and talk to people, just like in the first game. However, with the addition of Psyche-Locks, sometimes you'll find that the person who you are talking to is hiding something. Whenever a person is hiding information from you, one or more Psyche-Locks will appear. As the player, to break the Psyche-Lock(s), you have to further interrogate the person, and present the correct evidence. If you don't have the right evidence, you'll have to continue in your investigation and come back later to break the Psyche-Lock. Once a person's Psyche-Lock(s) are broken, you will find out the secret of what they were hiding.

The final change in the gameplay of JFA is that you now have a health bar. These replace the five "!" found in the original game. Basically, if your health bar empties, it's game over. The risk of the decision you make affects how quickly your health bar will run out. Unlike in the first game, where if you lost all five "!" it was game over, some decisions will be more costly than others. One wrong move may deplete only a small portion of your health bar; another wrong move may deplete the whole bar. The health bar is in not only the court trials, but also in the investigation phases as well. The only way to refill your health bar is to successfully break all of a person's Psyche-Locks.

Now that the story and gameplay aspects are out of the way, there are only a few more things to talk about. Graphics is the next aspect I'd like to touch on. Just like the gameplay, you will find the graphics of JFA are pretty much identical to the first game. Nothing has been changed. The problem is that the Phoenix Wright games are ports of the Gyakuten Saiban games, which are GameBoy Advanced games. So, as a DS game, the graphics aren't amazing by any means. Still, everything looks pretty nice, and the sprites for the characters are awesome.

Now I would like to talk about the sounds. First off, the game is text-based, so you'll hear almost no voices. Just like with the first game, the only time you'll hear the voice of a character is when they say "Objection!" "Hold it!" or "Take that!" Other than that, there are no voices. Also, you can say these words into the DS microphone when the right situation arises, just like you could in the first game. Sound effects are fine, although I don't remember too many of them. The main thing about the sounds is the music. Now, a lot of the music in JFA is different from the first game. Still, they didn't do terrible with the new music by any means. I like it just as much as the first. Oh yeah, and don't think that all of the music is different, because it's not. Quite a few of the tracks from the first game return in JFA, and thankfully they were the really cool ones.

Finally, I'd like to talk about the playtime of JFA. Just like its predecessor, this is one of the longer DS titles that I've played. You would think that it wouldn't take as long to beat JFA as it would the first game, due to it being one case shorter, but you'd actually be surprised. I think it took just as long to beat JFA for me as it did the first game, if not longer. Sure, we're missing a whole case in JFA, but the cases actually last a lot longer. Remember how in Case 5 of the first game, there were two parts to the trials? Well, you won't if you haven't played the first game, but if you have, you know what I'm talking about. This made the trials...well, longer. Now, in JFA, every trial is split into two parts, so this makes the game much longer. Still...it would've been nice to have a fifth case. Oh, and will you ever want to replay this game again? Possibly. The game's formula stays true to the first game, so it all depends on if you liked the first game or not.

Now, let's recap before I make my final statements.

Story: 9
+ Almost everything about the story was as good as the first game.
- The first three cases aren't that great compared to the cases of the first game.

Gameplay: 8
+ Interesting additions such as Psyche-Locks and presenting profiles as evidence, while still maintaining the great gameplay of the first game.
- The spelling and grammar mistakes were even worse.

Graphics: 7
+ Sprites are really cool.
- For a DS game, the graphics are nothing special.

Sounds: 9
+ Even though some of it was different, the music is still great.
- It's not completely perfect.

Play Time/Replay Value: 9
+ The game lasts just as long as the first game did.
- There are four cases instead of the five that were in the first game.

Well, I give Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Justice For All for the Nintendo DS an 8.4/10. Even though I found it to be not as good as its predecessor, the game is still great and I highly recommend that you buy it.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 08/06/07