Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney

"Justice is hungry and she wants to be served."

Prosecution: Hold it!! The defense is an impostor! He is not Phoenix Wright!
Defense: Objection! The witness never stated he was, or has ever been Phoenix Wright!

First off the bat Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney is the fourth installment of the Ace Attorney series, the first three staring the Legendary Rookie Attorney Phoenix Wright. New to the game, the hero Phoenix Wright has been Disbarred and now the new rookie Attorney Apollo Justice takes the defense. Gone are Detective Gumshoe and your side-kick Maya, but now you have new allies this time around. Your assistant and magician Trucy and her father, the once legendary Phoenix Wright Attorney at Law himself.

The game is much the same as it was in the last three installments, but now the DS feature are back and are your greatest assets for solving cases. Finger print dusting, plaster foot print molds and 3D interactions of crime scene investigations can make or break a case, and mind bending new crimes to bust an artery over to bring justice down on the bad guys.

Of course Apollo, like Nick before grudgingly does much of the detective work for the clients, that is only half of the game. The actual court battles involves the same old methods of finding discrepancies in a witness's testimony and pressing them and presenting evidence to turn the case in your favor. But sometimes when backed into a corner of an air tight testimony, even if it is a steaming pile of... lies; Apollo's special abilities come into play. Just like a poker player Apollo will focus in on the witness and study his or her body movements carefully, looking for their nervous twitch to reveal when they're telling a bold faced lie.

The game took a lot of rack from fans of the series for deciding to bring in a whole new cast, but deep down, Apollo is same old spiky headed everyman of Justice, but in a newer, shinier fore headed shell. If you enjoyed the previous game, you can do no wrong by adding this title to your library. It's a great game and without trying too obviously stretch out the review to get the four hundred word minimum for submission, one of the best games I have played in a long time (Next to Monkey Island). So get those chords of steel warmed up to scream once again into your DS microphone, Justice is hungry and she wants to be served.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 03/24/08

Game Release: Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney (US, 02/19/08)