Lurker > Paratroopa1

9/10

I love this case. I wish Athena was given a little more of her own agency here but otherwise the murder is hilarious and the cast is A+. Nahyuta is at his best here by far. I love Uendo. Geiru is great. MURDER WEAPON IS UDON DOUGH is so fucking stupid it makes me laugh and the rest of the murder is pretty fun. I like the stupid Owen 4th/Whet no 4 thing, what an amazing localization. I don't care that this case is complete filler - there are other cases in the series that are also filler! This one does still at least tie into the game's overall theme of succession and passing the torch from master to student, which I think is important. Honestly I don't have anything bad to say about it, it's a funny case that blows by really quickly and I really enjoy it. I was on the fence between 8 and 9 since I gave 6-3 a 9 and 6-3 is better than this case but oh well whatever, I just love this case lol

Tears of the Kingdom is, in my personal opinion, the highest technical achievement in any video game to date, not just on Switch

Whirlpool Division
35 Eevee
32 Kabutops
28 Skarmory
15 Kingdra
10 Axew
7 Palossand
-5 Sudowoodo
-30 Elekid
-46 Gorebyss (Tiebreaker?)
-46 Castform (Tiebreaker?)

String Shot Division
32 Goodra
31 Jellicent
27 Goomy
2 Gourgeist
-1 Skorupi
-2 Carnivine
-12 Hakamo-o
-13 Electrike
-29 Vanillite
-35 Stonjourner

Star of the Day: Jellicent
Honestly if you asked me to guess I would have assumed Jellicent would be competing to not be eliminated, and it nearly topped Goodra for the division.

Dud of the Day: Electrike
I dunno who to give this to today. I'm surprised that Electrike and Hakamo-o were duking it out to not be eliminated here - I figured they would both be fine.

Final Fantasy VI (Super Nintendo)
Dynamite Headdy (Sega Genesis)
Uniracers (Super Nintendo)
Panorama Cotton (Sega Genesis)

Also, I kind of wish Phoenix lost the first case on something more substantial, it feels like he just sort of ran out of time and Nahyuta was just like 'no you'. Like if Datz's testimony ended up revealing something even more damning and Nahyuta turned it on him or something. Kind of a minor complaint though. I'm really finding little things to nitpick here because this case is so close to perfection.

9/10

I have exactly one problem with this case, and I think I've mentioned it before, but I have written fanfic to demonstrate.

May 11, 2:03 PM
Detention Center

Phoenix: (Well... looks like this is it.)
Phoenix: (Maya's been found guilty, and now I'm subject to penalty under the DC Act.)
Phoenix: (I've been locked up in here for hours. Nobody's coming to my aid.)
Phoenix: (I'm sorry, Maya. I couldn't protect -)

Rayfa appears.

Phoenix: (...It's her. What does she want?)
Rayfa: You're free to go.
Phoenix: ...! Wait, really?
Rayfa: Yes. Under the condition that I am to accompany you everywhere you go, of course.
Rayfa: This is a direct order from my father. He has granted you a stay of execution.
Rayfa: Rejoice! Yours is the first pardon a lawyer has ever received under the DC Act! You should be honored!
Phoenix: Justice Minister Inga ordered this? But why?
Rayfa: (smiling) Ooooh, it would have been awful, Barbed Head! They were going to lock you in a cage and have Warbaa'ds pluck out your eyes!
Rayfa: A fitting punishment for someone who uses their bewitching words to make people see illusions and deceit, if you ask me.
Rayfa: However, I spoke to my father and convinced him to show you but a small fraction of the Holy Mother's infinite mercy.
Rayfa: I have saved you from a terrible fate. Am I not a kind and benevolent princess, who offers second chances to even the most pathetic of lowlifes?
Phoenix: I have to admit, that's a surprisingly nice thing for you to do for someone you hate so much, Your Benevolence.
Rayfa: Hmph! Don't act as if it was merely for your sake. You have called my Divination Seances into question twice, now.
Rayfa: I cannot allow you to face your fate until I have proven to you, once and for all, that my insights are superior to your lawyerly tricks!
Rayfa: And then, you and that vile criminal Maya Fey will get what's coming to you. And there will be no third chances, Barbed Head!
Rayfa: So, let us make haste for the crime scene!
Phoenix: ...Ah, I see how it is. You had fun yesterday, didn't you?
Rayfa: (surprised) What?
Phoenix: That's why you begged your father to let me out, isn't it? So you could tag along with me on my investigation?
Rayfa: (getting angry) You... you... that is a PREPOSTEROUS notion! As if I don't have better things to do than lead you around like some mangy dog!
Rayfa: You'd best watch your tongue, Barbed Head, or I'll personally see to it that the Warbaa'ds pluck that out, too!
Phoenix: (In other words, I hit the nail on the barbed head. Guess I shouldn't antagonize her any further, though.)
Phoenix: My apologies, Your Benevolence. Let's go.
Phoenix: (Still... what could the Justice Minister be thinking? Did he really listen to his daughter?)
Phoenix: (I hope this isn't some kind of trap... but I guess I don't have any other choice but to take this chance to investigate!)

This scene, or something like it, really should have happened after the end of the first trial day. It would establish that Rayfa has a soft spot for Phoenix, reward Phoenix for cultivating his relationship with her, and give him a genuinely plausible out in an otherwise hopeless situation - and at the same time, it would be foreshadowing to the fact that Inga himself has a soft spot for his daughter.

Instead, THIS SCENE NEVER HAPPENS. Phoenix is just standing around at the temple with absolutely no explanation of why they set him free! It totally takes me out of the urgency of the guilty verdict on the first day that they didn't even arrest Phoenix or anything. Drives me completely nuts. They had this little character moment perfectly set up between Rayfa and Phoenix and just skipped it! I don't understand!

Otherwise this case is basically perfect, it's a top 5 case in the entire franchise, the murders are brilliant, the twist is brilliant, the payoff to Maya's return to the series is awesome, it's one of the most exciting cases and probably the best middle case ever, BUT THIS ONE THING REALLY BOTHERS ME

Anagram posted...

This is unrelated, but I just remembered: was there any reason why 1-5 is the only case without Turnabout in the name?

No, there is no reason

NIGHT DAZE
+3 Slither Wing
+2 Sentret
+1 Virizion
-1 Beedrill
-2 Mime Jr.
-3 Granbull

Very stacked division at the top, I wanted to give my regards to Leavanny but could not. Slither Wing is just too great and I have a really big soft spot for Sentret

HORN DRILL
+3 Koraidon
+2 Tropius
+1 Yamask
-1 Roselia
-2 Noctowl
-3 Sceptile

This is an 11 mon division with 0 mons that I dislike, lol. welp! just doing what I can here

Sorry, I know I'm a day or two behind on results btw, they're coming soon

I mean I do like Retinz a lot but not nearly enough for it to come even close to 6-3 or 6-5

Did everyone on reddit get a nosebleed after they saw Betty and then passed out and forgot to play the rest of the game. that's literally the only way I could possibly explain this

"Generally considered the best SoJ case"

what the FUCK?

Mighty Morphin Power Rangers (Super Nintendo)
Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3 (Game Boy)
Bust-A-Move (Arcade)
Mega Man X (Super Nintendo)

LeonhartFour posted...

Actually, maybe the best way to do it would have been to do both of Phoenix's cases back to back. You get a good first impression of Nahyuta because he actually beats Phoenix in his first appearance, and you lay the foundation for Apollo vs. Nahyuta in this case.

also changing the case order maybe lets Phoenix get home in time to see Trucy's show

I have more to say about this but I'll talk about it when we get to 6-3

NFUN posted...

Have Nahyuta show up shortly after Payne is introduced to show him utter contempt and kick him off the case, so at least one person in the country recognizes he's trash. You still get Payne and his new gimmick but also something completely unique for the series happening and a cooler intro for the prosecutor

Yeah, I would like this a lot better too. I dunno, I just desperately think that Nahyuta should have been introduced in his home country and that he needed more pizzazz to his introduction. They should have made Nahyuta intimidating and he's just not.

There's part of me that wishes this game bucked tradition and put Nahyuta as the prosecutor of the first case. Like just, fuck it, no Payne this time, Phoenix just getting thrown straight into the fire with a scary and formidable prosecutor. I feel like having Nahyuta be introduced in 6-2 takes the edge off of him a little bit. 6-2 would be a better case if it was Klavier or Simon instead of Nahyuta, and just don't have 6-2 be a case about the new prosecutor and have it be focused on Apollo and Trucy instead. I dunno, I know this is kind of a radical rewrite of the game, but I just dislike the way they used Nahyuta.

I do have some issues with the murder as well. A big complaint I have is that the whole time, I was really confused about the timing of the murder. I didn't really understand why it was impossible for Retinz to have committed the murder - the whole time I thought that Mistree might have actually been alive and Retinz just went in after everything happened and murdered him then, and the game never really explained to me why that was an impossibility and why the murder HAD to have occurred during the show. Nobody really confirmed that Mistree was 100% dead at that time! I think if the game had been more careful about laying out the 'locked room' mystery here it would have been a lot more interesting to think about, but the whole time I just assumed that Retinz could have murdered him when he actually arrived at the scene later so it didn't feel like much of a puzzle to me.

Oh and I need to get this off my chest

WHY DID PHOENIX SCHEDULE A TRIP TO KHURA'IN DURING TRUCY'S BIG TELEVISED EVENT? WHAT THE FUCK PHOENIX! YOU DIDN'T EVEN NEED TO BE IN KHURA'IN YET! YOU GOT THERE LIKE THREE WEEKS EARLY!

7/10

Bonny and Betty are my waifus. That alone puts this case up a point for me.

It's almost really good but something is just slightly missing. I think what's missing is a really good dynamic between Apollo and Nahyuta. I really hate that they chose to save the reveal for what their relationship is until later in the game just to surprise us - if I could have it my way I would have established their relationship earlier so that they can actually have a dynamic in this case. It's so fucked up and weird the way that they hint that they have history in this case but NONE of it gets hashed out here until the end of the game. It's a missed opportunity.

Roger Retinz is great and a fun villain, and I think the murder is good, though I think Bonny and Betty were underutilized. I really appreciate that this case gives Trucy something to do, since she's been kind of a hanger-on... really as long as we've known her, to be honest, so it's nice that she gets some development. Apollo also gets development here - this case feels like it's really designed to make the 'passing of the torch' official by having him save the Wright Anything Agency, even if that plot point does feel a little bit forced. Also Ema is back and Ema is great! The cast of this case makes it.

But yeah, there's just something that's missing. It's a good and fun case overall but it's not quite that top tier middle case that it could have been.

METRONOME
+3 Bombirdier
+2 Goldeen
+1 Larvitar
-1 Hippowdon
-2 Tinkaton
-3 Infernape

I don't particularly care about anything in this division at all except -3ing Infernape, the rest is a big ol' meh

BLAZING TORQUE
+3 Heatmor
+2 Iron Bundle
+1 Delibird
-1 Tangrowth
-2 Magmortar
-3 Simipour

This division is stacked on the other hand! Aside from the bottom 3 which I hate and I'd give them all -3 if I could. I feel bad that I couldn't + Tirtouga or Venonat

I think a big difference for 6-1 for me is that Andistan'dhin fell flat for me. I just didn't find him funny at all and him singing and everyone joining in made me cringe. This case was lucky to get a 3 from me.

I feel like that one is answered! He needed someone to sign the contract, and he knew that Aria would be really easy to manipulate into it because she was so infatuated with him that she'd override her usual danger sense to do anything he asked.

I do still LIKE case 5, because the main character arcs all pay off really nicely, the whole setting and the setup for the murder is cool (I can't imagine it's easy to set up a case that has proper finale-case levels of gravitas, but this one pulled it off), and yeah, the battle with Eris is just awesome, 10/10 stuff. But it had potential to be like 2-4/3-5 levels of good and it doesn't quite stick the landing on that for me, which is a shame. It's like an 8/10.

Super Metroid (Super Nintendo)
Star Wars: TIE Fighter (PC)
Streets of Rage 3 (Sega Genesis)
Policenauts (PC)

Susato does not

Kazuma essentially does

Franziska also doesn't work as she gets accused in E1-5.

Oh, yeah, I forgot that Gumshoe does become the accused in E1-4 for a little bit.

Does Gumshoe ever get accused in the AAI games?

3/10

The pacing in this one is really brutal. Maybe I'm being too harsh, because this case is really doing its best to establish Khura'in, but it's a LOT of 'oh no, the DC act!' and 'death! death! death!' and it takes its sweet ass time getting to the point. I don't really like Andistan'dhin that much - I get that despite the oppressive atmosphere they're not trying to be super serious, but even then, he's just a little TOO silly for my tastes - the metal singing really fell flat for me. I find it a little strange how they're trying to make Khura'in seem like a hostile, foreign place, but the first two villains we run into here are both foreigners that Khura'in is just super chill with.- I guess the point isn't that Khura'in is racist, it's ONLY that they hate defense attorneys, but something about it still strikes me as really odd.

That all said, this case does have its one ace up its sleeve, and that's the Divination Seance. Every Divination Seance is extremely fun and cool and the fact that this case has one keeps it from being a bottom tier case.

I actually did play it for like 150 hours so I got quite a bit of playtime out of it but I really hit a WALL with what I felt like I could do with the game, I was just completely done with it afterwards and I don't think I'll ever return to it (maybe after like 10 years or something). Like, it was a good game and I enjoyed it a lot, and the good aspects of the game will stick with me for a while, but it never quite hit that next level for me.

I basically agree with this take, I think the lack of variety in Hades hurts it a lot despite the core gameplay working really well

I live in Washington state and support the only set of teams basically anyone from here does, so it's not very hard to guess

Rad

Changing a double

- Advance Wars 1+2: Re-Boot Camp | Sensei's Theme (CO Power) | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xIPBxvhkSI
+ VIVIDLOPE | Vividviolence | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-eAjxC32QM

Castlevania: Bloodlines (Sega Genesis)
Wario's Woods (NES, SNES)
-
Tekken (Arcade)
Mega Man 6 (Nintendo)

Samurott did well enough that I'm questioning the common wisdom about Dewott being the most popular of its line

- Mega Man X5 | Dark Dizzy Stage | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnZ3DFHkAi8

+ Ex-Zodiac | Remnants of Celestial (Stage 3) | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1QFSBh2pJAM

THOUSAND ARROWS
+3 Stunfisk
+2 Dubwool
+1 Wattrel
-1 Nincada
-2 Geodude
-3 Blipbug

WEATHER BALL
+3 Diancie
+2 Drakloak
+1 Amaura
-1 Sableye
-2 Machamp
-3 Heatran

X-Scissor Division
56 Kyogre
36 Meowscarada
20 Forretress
5 Nidorina
-5 Iron Treads
-10 Minior (Tiebreaker?)
-10 Masquerain (Tiebreaker?)
-12 Furfrou
-20 Manaphy
-60 Phione

Sucker Punch Division
34 Grovyle
28 Omanyte
25 Great Tusk
21 Tentacruel
1 Jumpluff
-2 Wingull
-5 Monferno
-20 Nuzleaf
-38 Brionne
-44 Alomomola

Star of the Day: Kyogre
As a general rule, legendaries have not put up dominant performances in this contest so far. Kyogre is an exception.

Dud of the Day: Manaphy
Manaphy is not an exception. Even with Phione in the same division sucking up most of the negative votes, Manaphy still couldn't advance, which is pretty embarrassing.

1

It sucks.

Like, it's not even that it's a Layton plot explanation, although it is that, and it's kind of ludicrous, but I did know that that was what I was getting. But it just takes SO LONG to get through it all, and I found the emotional core at the heart of the story completely lacking, especially compared the previous case. And the actual Ace Attorney part of it is like... bad? You spend a LONG time on it but there's not really anything to prove at the end of the day aside from Darklaw carrying Espella up the tower I guess. But by the time you feel like you're starting to unravel the mystery it all comes out that the whole thing was fake anyway. It kinda makes you feel like you wasted your time. Especially cross-examining the goddamn guards, which are just like... oy.

Yeah, I don't know. I want to like it because like, I love the setting, the court looks super awesome, and everything's set up for an exciting finale and there's just nothing there. It's a huge letdown that takes like 10+ hours to slog through. I hate it.

Donkey Kong Country (Super Nintendo)
Earthworm Jim (SNES, Genesis)
Mega Man 6 (Nintendo)
Darkstalkers: The Night Warriors (Arcade)

+ Bomb Rush Cyberfunk | JACK DA FUNK | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=duqb8xP3Ptk

- Tyrion Cuthbert: Attorney of the Arcane | Last Stand | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPOHRsCvCw8

I dunno, probably like, 4

WHIRLPOOL
+3 Gorebyss
+2 Skarmory
+1 Eevee
-1 Palossand
-2 Sudowoodo
-3 Elekid

+3 to Gorebyss? sure, why not

STRING SHOT
+3 Goodra
+2 Goomy
+1 Hakamo-o
-1 Electrike
-2 Stonjourner
-3 Jellicent

Goodra and Goomy in the same division wtf

Gothitelle is definitely not popular, lol, at least not here

Feminine and humanoid aesthetics tend not to do that great! especially when the result is kinda ugly

Votals were on the low side.

Another tiebreaker for Aria to decide who advances!

Snarl Division
52 Typhlosion
42 Mismagius
13 Quaxly
8 Shuckle
1 Shiftry
-12 Kirlia
-20 Dipplin (Tiebreaker?)
-20 Dugtrio (Tiebreaker?)
-27 Nymble
-37 Raticate

Explosion Division
41 Breloom
21 Dragalge
14 Azumarill (Tiebreaker?)
14 Staryu (Tiebreaker?)
10 Persian (Tiebreaker?)
10 Genesect (Tiebreaker?)
-5 Lombre
-9 Poltchageist
-44 Gothitelle
-52 Calyrex

Star of the Day: Breloom
A good performance by something not as obviously popular as most division winners.

Dud of the Day: Dugtrio
I figured Dugtrio was a shoo-in to advance here, but...

Case 5 I completely agree that if some of the serious issues with this case were ironed out TC would stand up there with the good AA games, the fact that this case just stumbles is what puts it in mid-tier for me instead