Hallo, alle miteinander, and welcome back to Wright Wednesday, the weekly blog series where we recap, analyze, and review the cases in the Ace Attorney series. Last week we started the third case of the first game, Turnabout Samurai, and got our first glimpse at the wonder that is the Steel Samurai himself. I'm Roy, blogger and geek extraordinaire.
And I'm Sam, the Game Professor and geek exemplary!
The trial starts...well, immediately in the trial, which is weird quirk that's shown up twice already in this game. Usually, trial segments start with a scene in the lobby, but instead we're thrust straight into the case at hand. Gumshoe takes the stand at Edgeworth's command and gives a summary of the facts: On the day of the murder, the crew of the Steel Samurai were there to do an action scene. They did a run through in the morning, at the Employee Area, before breaking for lunch. The murder happened at 2:30pm at Studio One, and the only way to get there is by the Guard Station, where Oldbag was working from 1PM onward. He also adds the Samurai Spear to the Court Record.
All stuff we know so far, but the review at the start of the trial is helpful.
What's odd is that it isn't a testimony, but a recap that can be replayed as much as you need before moving on. I don't think that's been done before or since this case.
Yes, I was surprised when I replayed it for that same reason. I'm not sure if it's a nice reminder or just kind of unnecessary, but it seems like a weird thing to throw into one case and never do again.
This game has a lot of that, actually. Lots of Early Installment Weirdness. Anyway, that done, Edgeworth calls his first witness: the security guard Wendy Oldbag. It turns out that she's quite smitten with Edgeworth, to his dismay. He also has a lot of trouble getting her to say her name and profession, something Phoenix points out as a running gag.
In all fairness, if the Phoenix Wright fandom is any indication, just about any woman would have that reaction to Edgeworth.
Oldbag's testimony is fairly simple: she was started guarding the gate at 1PM, and from the until the body was found the only one who passed her was Will Powers. Pressing her reveals that the "errands" she was preoccupied with was watching the action scene run-through, what with her being a huge fan of the victim and all. She also didn't see the victim go to the scene of the crime at all. On the whole, pressing Oldbag testimonies is a lot of fun.
It really is. People tend to either hate or love Oldbag, but it's hard to deny her ranty old lady archetype is fun to prod at in court.
The obvious objection here comes from the photo we got at the end of yesterday's investigation: she saw the Steel Samurai, not Will Powers! She gets defensive at everyone, even Edgeworth, suddenly doubting her reliability, so she gives a new testimony.
Ultimately the entire premise of her testimony is based on such flimsy assumptions beyond the evidence itself, it's not too hard to pick apart.
Oldbag explains that during the morning's run-through, Will Powers sprained his ankle and broke the Samurai Spear. In the picture, the Samurai is limping with the same leg, which is why she claims it has to be Powers. Upon further questioning, Oldbag reveals that she, Powers, and Hammer himself were the only ones to see the accident, as Penny Nichols was busy somewhere else. She also repaired the Spear after it broke, with duct tape.
I feel like that would be noticeable in the episode...
CGI, Samuel, CGI.
If anything, I'm surprised Phoenix didn't confront Oldbag about that when he first found the photo, but I guess he learned his lesson about showing suspicious people his evidence.
HAhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahano. Anyway, while everyone is throwing shade at Oldbag, she finally snaps and calls Edgeworth a whippersnapper, her favorite insult, only to remember...she did see someone else head towards Studio One after all.
Turns out Oldbag throws out photos that don’t look suspicious, and it turns out she threw one out that day. Of course this annoys Edgeworth, since he didn’t know about this. The photo was of a fanboy; Oldbag explains that fans find out about rehearsals and sneak into the studios to watch. Which also makes her cough up the information that there’s a drain that goes into the employee area, despite having said there’s no way in when the gate is locked. And one more important bit of information: it was a kid. Remember when you were a kid, sneaking into television studios?
Oh yeah, best days of my life. There’s already talk of how a kid couldn’t wield the spear, and the Judge calls a 5 minute recess to consider this new information. Of course at this point, with no helpful information and an impending guilty verdict, it’s time for a classic Wright and Co. Law Offices move; accusing someone Phoenix is pretty sure didn’t actually do it for the sake of stalling for more time! In this case, Wendy Oldbag. Well, you can also choose to try and target the kid or Penny Nichols, and both surprisingly lead to long dialogue chains that are worth a read.
See yet again, I only did it once because despite being almost done with the court day, getting penalized still scared me too much! Oldbag tries to cast suspicion around a little more, but it’s ultimately fruitless, and the Judge delays the verdict by another day to look a little further into the case. But before they can adjourn, Oldbag decides enough is enough, and testifies about other people at the studios who had told her not to mention their presence. Specifically, the director and producer; they were in the trailer in Studio 2. Edgeworth, of course, is livid, and the Judge delays the case by another day to allow investigation into who these people are, where they were during the murder, and why they told Oldbag not to talk.
Before we move on, I think we should mention the fact that, when you try to prove it could have been Oldbag, Edgeworth raises no objections. It is quite funny.
Oh for sure; turns out it's possible for someone to get on Edgeworth's nerves enough that he doesn't even bother defending them for the sake of his verdict.
So, what did you think of this day if trial analysis-wise, Professor Sam the Gaming Man?
Well it's... simple? I honestly don't have much to say about this one in terms of important narrative developments or thematic importance; it's basically just Oldbag remembering things poorly and keeping secrets. It doesn't really introduce any new concepts or characters, it's just kind of here to push the story on to the next plot point.
Well, this is the first case in the series to have three days of investigation and trial, and I think that shows in this day of trial. Like you said, it feels a little thin. Oldbag is the only witness, and despite having five testimonies she doesn't say very much. Well...she actually says a lot...but...you know what I mean!
Oh yeah, her rambling is a defining character trait, but really all we figured out in this trial is, "There were also other people that we haven't talked to." It's pretty short as most trail sessions go, but it also just doesn't cover much ground; even the tutorial case took a complete 180 in a single trial, simple though the case was. Honestly I feel like this courtroom session could have easily been cut, replaced with talking to Oldbag during investigation, and nothing would have been lost. Aside from some delicious Edgey tears, at least.
Well, I wouldn't entirely agree there. While this trial segment isn't the most exciting or informative, I think a bomb like "there were other people there and we were all paid off not to mention them" is too big for an investigation. I really wish we'd gotten an actual testimony with Gumshoe, but the larger issue here is endemic to this case: it's a mystery with VERY few clues.
I guess I can see that; it feels to me like one of those things that works better the first time than on replay. It works as a twist, but replaying it now it feels like the game kinda wasted my time by plotting things out to basically delay any actual mystery-solving until the middle third of the case.
On the one hand, I like that this is a case where everything isn't really stacked against Phoenix. The evidence against Powers is almost entirely circumstantial, but the issue comes from figuring out who else could possibly have done it with the limited information we're given. On the other hand, there is such little evidence right now that it makes you wonder how exactly they can justify bringing this conviction to court. They literally have Oldbag's testimony...and that's it. He's the suspect based on a lack of other possible suspects.
Yeah, I guess that's what made it feel thin to me. I can appreciate that it's doing something different by starting with so little to go on, but it just ended up feeling to me like we spent the first third of the case feeling around blindly, and the only thing we really accomplished was finding out what we should even be doing to begin with. I guess it's kind of a mixed bag for me. Don't get me wrong, Phoenix Wright is still fun in general, so it's not like this was some torturous experience. It just didn't work for me nearly as well for me as the cases leading up to it.
We're only a third into the case, Sam, let's save the review for when it's done. Who knows? It may surprise you. Anyway, that's it for this week, check back next time when we'll be covering the second day of investigation. Auf wiedersehen.
Later!
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