Hallo, alle miteinander, and welcome back to Wright Wednesday. This is the article series where we recap, analyze, and review the cases of Ace Attorney. My name is Roy, and I am a foolish fool.
My name is Sam, and I am foolishly fooling with this foolish fool.
This week we start the first day of trial for Reunion and Turnabout, so let's get right to that.
Pearl shows up as the trial is about to begin, having apparently snuck out and run all the way there from Kurain Village. Maya waxes nostalgic about Edgeworth, mourning that another von Karma would be their opponent today instead of him. This leads Phoenix to reveal to her that Edgeworth has left, and isn't coming back. She's shocked at this, but there's no time to explain; court is starting.
Phoenix doesn't do it nicely, either. He's clearly very upset, and requests she not talk about him anymore.
The prosecutor is an intimidating young woman who introduces herself as Franziska von Karma. She left behind a promising career in Germany specifically to get revenge on Phoenix for imprisoning her father at the end of the first game. When the Judge starts to take issue with her personal motivations, she attacks him with a whip to shut him up. It works.
We will definitely be talking more about that whip in the analysis portion, but I do feel the need to correct your statement of her motivation. Franziska does make it clear she crossed the world for revenge, but she doesn't mention her father at all. That will be important later on.
Gumshoe takes the stand to explain the situation. The Channeling Chamber has no windows, and only one door, which was locked. Only the victim and defendant were in the room at the time. There were gunshots, and people broke in to find the victim dead. The cause of death was a pistol shot to forehead, fired from point-blank range. But before that shot, he was also stabbed in the chest. So chest stab, then headshot to finish him off.
Given the rather open-and-shut appearance of the case, the Judge advises Phoenix change his "Not Guilty" plea, else he's liable to lose. But Phoenix stays the course, which prompts von Karma to, despite her frustration, haughtily call on Gumshoe to Present another piece of decisive evidence. Namely, the clothes Maya wore during the murder, splattered with blood.
More specifically, they bring up the idea of switching from "Not Guilty" to "Justified Self-Defense", which would still protect Maya from real punishment.
He makes a point to note that the victim wasn't fighting back, but Phoenix points out that the channeling robes have a bullet hole in the sleeve. It seems like von Karma knew this, too, and was trying to keep it from coming out. But apparently the implication that Maya was shot at doesn't change anything, and Phoenix then has to prove that he actually did fight back. Beyond, you know, the bullet hole in Maya's clothing. And Presenting the gun with his fingerprints or the screen behind Maya with the bullet hole in it just gets Phoenix penalized. Turns out you have to Present the costume again, despite that having just been denounced as insufficient evidence, because sometimes Phoenix Wright games can be a little unintuitive. But the lack of burn marks on the robe indicate it could not have happened in the middle of a struggle, thus unwinding the narrative that it was a too-close shot in desperation.
I think the idea was that it was obvious by then the victim had used the gun, but the lack of burn marks are proof that the shot came from far away, not in the middle of a struggle. It's really shaky logic, but that's just the beginning of that with this case.
In any case, this sufficiently proves that the victim attacked Maya, but since Phoenix stuck to his "Not Guilty" plea rather than "Justified Self-Defense", this doesn't really matter. But even so, von Karma can't stop herself from arguing that the bullet hole isn't enough even to argue self defense. Gumshoe explains that it seems that Maya initiated by stabbing the victim, who then tried to shoot her in self-defense and missed, after which she took his gun. There doesn't seem to be any evidence to support this interpretation, it's just a reasonably logical set of assumptions, but apparently that's okay when the prosecution does it.
It also doesn't really have anything to do with the actual proving of the murder, y'know, happening. This all feels really useless.
Also of note, von Karma reasons that Maya could have overpowered the comparatively large and strong victim because the Kurain Channeling Technique physically changes the channeler. Apparently "she was possessed, the spirit did it" doesn't hold up in court, but "she was possessed, so she could physically take on a larger, stronger man" works just fine. It is a nice show of von Karma's strength as a prosecutor, though, that she studied up on it.
I'll get into that in the analysis section, but I do feel like her studying the technique is a key moment for her. And as for the possession defense, Phoenix never even tries using it because his position is Maya didn't kill anyone, even while possessed.
Through a series of sort of wobbly logical claims, Phoenix establishes that Maya must have been attacked first, and was shot at as she cowered in the corner by the folding screen. Rather than keep trying to refute this, von Karma simply calls in the next witness: Lotta Hart.
To her credit, Phoenix really hasn't proven anything damaging in the slightest to her case. During the recess, Phoenix, Maya and Pearl talk about what's happened so far and mention Mia, who Pearl barely remembers. She didn't even know that Mia was a lawyer, or that she was Phoenix's mentor. Clearly this mention of her has no real purpose, it isn't setting up anything at all.
Maybe it's summary for anyone starting on this game. I forget if Mia has been meaningfully mentioned before now.
She hasn't, I was being obsequious, the reason for the conversation will quickly become apparent.
Ah yes, my tendency to read right through sarcasm strikes again!!
Anyway, Franny calls Lotta to the stand. The southerner doesn't appreciate being whipped, but no one else gives a damn so she gives her testimony. She tells the court that she and Mr. Wright were waiting outside the Channeling Chamber when they heard a gunshot, Phoenix broke down the door, and they found Maya inside, holding the gun. She also claims there was no one else in the room, for sure. Pressing every statement is necessary here, and it's pretty funny that doing so frequently leads to Phoenix having to back-up Lotta's testimony since, well, he was there too.
Most of this essentially comes down to, "Yeah, I guess that's right, that's what I saw too," until you flounder around long enough for the game to have mercy on you and move forward on its own.
I'm a little more charitable towards it, if only because Phoenix sheepishly admitting to breaking down a door by himself, followed by the Judge complimenting him on it, is pretty funny. It's also of note that, when Pressing Lotta about the room being empty, she holds to that 100%. You can ask her about specific areas, such as behind the folding screen, and she'll say she looked behind there and saw no one. That is obvious bullhonky considering we were there and saw that she did no such thing, but whatever. With all of that examined, Phoenix is asked if he has anything he can Present to help. There's no right answer though, and it looks like the case is over.
Which means it's time for another cameo from our favorite deus ex machina!
Yep. At first, it seems like Phoenix is just hearing Mia in his head like he did in Turnabout Goodbyes, but nope! She's possessed Pearl, and that is a whole can of worms we'll unpack later. She reminds Phoenix that Lotta took two shots, but only one has been Presented to the court. Phoenix requests to cross-examine Lotta further, but the Judge insists he's already ended cross-examination and there's no need. But Franziska intervenes: there's no point in defeating Phoenix Wright if he didn't get to fight at full strength, so she makes sure Phoenix can ask that question.
Always the downfall of a cocky enemy.
Lotta's new testimony is pretty boring: she entered the room, saw possessed Maya, took the picture. Phoenix Presses and asks about the second picture, having seen her take it himself. When Phoenix starts putting pressure on her about the photo, Lotta defends herself by revealing that Franziska asked her not to submit it as evidence. This is a pretty serious allegation, but Franny insists that there's nothing malicious, she just felt the second photo was redundant. This second photo shows "Maya" from the front, which makes it clear that isn't what Maya looks like. The Judge objects to this, but Franziska shows the court another new photo...one of Phoenix Wright talking with "Maya Fey" in the Detention Center the day before, when Mia was possessing her.
Having proved that the Kurain Channeling Technique actually works and rendering any objection to that irrelevant, Mia brings up that the photograph was taken illegally, and cannot be considered evidence. That suits Franny just fine, as she wasn't Presenting it as evidence, just showing it to people, mentioning how there's now no way for the Judge to deny the truth. Now, in real life court, doing something like that would get the trial thrown out and a new one made with different people involved who hadn't seen the illegal evidence, but this is Phoenix Wright world where trial speed trumps all other concerns.
We're definitely playing fast and loose with the rules on this one.
With all that that having happened, the Judge is still ready to insist on a verdict, unless Phoenix can Present evidence that pokes a larger hole in the prosecution's case. He insists that, channeling or not, that isn't actually Maya at all in the second picture, and as evidence he points out the lack of a hole in the sleeve in the photo. Without that hole, it contradicts what we already know. Things are looking bad for Franziska, with her having hidden this photo, but she points out that the bullet hole was discovered during the trial, so until that connection was made she wasn't aware of the contradiction and therefore didn't think the second photo was necessary. With this contradiction established, the question is exactly what it proves. Phoenix insists once again that this means that shooter in the photo can't be Maya.
I love how, for a moment there, she wasn't even arguing to convince the Judge of her case. Just to save her own skin. She clearly thought it all through too well to have actually not known about any of it.
The options given to the player on how, in a locked room mystery, someone other than Maya could be the shooter, are that there was a third person in the room, Maya left the room, or that he can't explain it. These are dumb options, as you're clearly trying to prove both of the first two, but whatever. The right answer is that Maya left the room, which is proved with the Key. It's very existence is a contradiction, and Maya should have had it on her when she was arrested, but it was instead found in the incinerator by Pearl. There's no evidence of that, Phoenix just explains it to the court and asks them to believe him, but they do. With this undeniable contradiction, the Judge decides to give everyone an extra day for investigating, and ends the court session.
That dumb question is really just one of a bunch of shaky logical jumps the player is supposed to make in this segment, so frankly I am happy it's over.
The segment ends with Phoenix, Pearl, and Maya talking about that Mia summoning and some jokes about how out of touch Pearl is with the outside world. That done, what did you want to start the analysis with, Sam?
Well, since it's just the first court segment, there's not a whole ton in the way of advancing the case's overall themes. What we do get, however, is the introduction of the prosecutor, who has bearing on the whole game's meaning.
The main thing I came away from this segment from is that von Karma has something to prove, unlike Edgeworth who was simply stoic and confident. She plays dirty, but even when her schemes are unmasked she insists that Wright have every opportunity to beat her. This is mostly just establishing character stuff, but it'll be important later.
I don't think her introduction here is nearly as good as Edgeworth's last game, but it does have some highlights. Just from this segment, I think we have a good idea of what separated her from Edgeworth. His biggest strength was his courtroom skills, his ability to pull the case back in his favor with quick thinking. He set some traps, to be sure, but nothing like von Karma. Her case is made of detailed investigation and planning, and it's only through Phoenix poking the right holes that he's able to win the day. Comparatively, she reacts far worse until pressure than Edgeworth does.
She definitely does come across as very skilled but less experienced and principled, which is a good change of pace. Too bad this case's idiosyncrasies get in the way of how that comes across.
Her study of the Kurain Channeling Technique is another good point of demarcation between the two. Edgeworth always feels like he has a very limited world view, especially when it comes to the Fey's. We saw a bit of it last game, but the trauma of the DL-6 Incident has led to his rejection entirely of the idea of spirit channeling as a real thing, no matter what he actually experiences firsthand. You can even argue that Manfred von Karma also felt like he had a similarly closed world view. But Franziska averts that entirely, as once again her researching and preparatory skills take precedence. If she looks at the facts and sees evidence for this magic existing, then she uses that.
Even if its legitimate application in court is...inconsistent, at best. It seems like the Judge is just kind of asleep at the wheel where these subjects are concerned, letting von Karma argue however she wants and not bothering to actually understand any of the spiritual topics being discussed. It's technically a way of letting her use that knowledge against Phoenix without necessarily submitting it as evidence, but it feels kind of sloppy.
Speaking of sloppy, let's talk about her whip. This is a really messy, complicated subject. On the one hand, her whip and the way she uses it actually has have thematic heft for who she is and why she does what she does, though the exact how and why is better saved until much later. But it's also violence, real actual violence, that she perpetuating on other people. It's assault. And for a lot of people, it's impossible to get past those actions to see the depth of her character. That's fair, it is reasonable to see her as villainous because of it.
But for me the bigger issue is how it is played in game: as a joke. While other, later prosecutors also use slapstick in court, those are much sillier: a mug of coffee, a hawk, magic beads. This is a whip, a real actual weapon, being used as physical comedy, despite the clear pain it causes others, or rather, because of the pain. I would argue that if this was a man doing this to a woman, the game would not be portraying it as funny, but as a heinous act. An unfortunate aspect of misogynist culture is that women causing men pain is often seen as funny rather than genuine assault, because how could a woman hurt a man? And unfortunately, this game, and this character, add to that harmful trope.
It was never a difficult thing for me to get past because it's clearly played as a joke, and it hardly feels out of place in the exaggerated world of Ace Attorney, but none of that erases the kind of icky things underlying it.
There might be something to be said here for how the games tend to sexualize their female characters too, like we couldn't have an intense and commanding woman as an antagonist without also getting some dominatrix imagery into there. Another thing that isn't necessarily bad, but I'm not sure reads as well as it could.
Speaking of sexualization, Mia possessing Pearl. That's...Sam, why don't you start on that one?
Oof. Well...Hoo boy.
Look, it makes sense. Those possessed by a spirit with the Kurain Channeling Technique change physically to look like the spirit. The clothes do not. I understand the logic behind it.
But Pearl is like... ten? At most? And when Mia is possessing her the child clothes very obviously don't fit, and there's a lot of cleavage, and I guess it looks like the body of an adult, but it's not. And that is just... not great.
Also, frankly, I'm tired of Mia at this point. She really only exists as a deus ex machina, and for no other purpose. We didn't need to do this to begin with.
Actually, she's eight at the time of this case. And later on we see sprites of Mia facing forward in Pearl's body and...wow is it more fanservicey.
We both agreed last game that Mia's fridging and frequent resurrection was already a little annoying, but Turnabout Goodbyes felt like such a natural point to drop that. Maya wasn't able to do that anymore, Mia appeared to Phoenix in his time of need, it was a good cap to her. But no, she remains for the rest of the trilogy, saving them and having little to no personality beyond what we already saw of her. It just feels like such a terrible choice.
We both mentioned some rough logic in today's case. What are your overall thoughts on that, Sam?
Mostly just that this case segment had a good few moments that felt like...stretches. Needing to Present the same piece of evidence twice in a row for completely different reasons is a confusing gameplay choice, and many other moments were similarly confounding. Add to that the weirdly inconsistent way it uses knowledge of the Kurain Channeling Technique and it just...doesn't come together very well as a mystery or a courtroom drama.
That's a shame too, and it's the first time the series was tapping into a variant of a fairly standard mystery type: a locked room mystery. Victim and defendant, in a room together, locked from the inside with no other way in or out. It's a great premise, but nothing is really built on it. The first half the case is all about the blocking and order of events, none of which is based too much in fact. Both Phoenix and Franziska back up their points with logic like, "Well, he'd been stabbed, so he couldn't stand up!" The logic being thrown around is so detached from evidence, so wishy washy, it doesn't feel good. And the second half of the case is a mess of odd contradictions and lines of reasoning. We aren't picking on this stuff to poke holes in logic, we have usually hate that stuff. But this is a mystery game where the player needs to feel like they're working to solve a murder through logic, and when that aspect falters, it doesn't feel good at all.
Especially because the game relies on your ability to put things together logically to progress. Phoenix Wright games aren't the type of game you expect to get through without resorting to a walkthrough now and again, but even so, there are many moments in this case where the logical process is so obtuse that it often feels like the game hasn't adequately prepared you to make the logical conclusions it requires for you to continue on. Especially when this old-fashioned "make too many mistakes and you have to go back to the last save" system is in place, it just really doesn't work well.
Was there anything else that stood out to you regarding this case, Sam?
I think that's about it for me. It just overall was not a great first court session, and here I was hoping replaying this case would leave me feeling better about it than I remembered.
Well then, next week we investigate once more, and hopefully learn the truth hidden in this case. Auf wiedersehen.
Later!!
