"Objection!"

Let's face it, most of us have seen someone use that phrase somewhere on the Internet before. While that may be the most recognizable symbol of the series, it's by far not the only thing you do in the entire game. Actually, there are two very different stages in Ace Attorney. There's a court stage(where Objections are yelled, all the time) and an investigative stage. There are five episodes in the DS version forward, and four in the GBA version. While this may not seem like much, the first takes maybe half an hour to complete,the second episode takes about an hour to finish, and the other three take over 2-3 hours, maybe a bit less if you're good at spotting things.

The court stage mainly consists of finding all the contradictions in each witness's testimony, and supporting it with evidence. Sound simple, right? It gets hard rather fast if you don't know what you're doing. Plus, if you start just guessing, you'll get a penalty from the Judge. Get 5 penalties, and it's game over. Minute details quickly become the only way forward in this battle of you versus the false story. This part of the game is rather fun, and(although this might sound odd), action packed, to a point. You must find the correct turn of events, must protect your client, and must prove each of your points with evidence in this part of the game. But, as I said, this is only half of the game.

The investigative mode is where the game gets really slow. You're moving around, talking to people, gathering evidence, and trying to figure out what truly happened and who the real murderer is, but this gets boring quite fast. This area of the game is also fairly simple, and it'll catch you off guard when you need to actually figure something out. You're very likely to overlook something in this segment of the game, which might've been the developer's intention, but it's annoying nonetheless. There are a few points that the investigation get interesting, but those moments are usually right after and before a boring segment of getting stuck and solving typically easy puzzles.

While Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney may sound like simply saving your desperate client and convicting the true murderer, it also has an enjoyable deep story. I'm not going to give away any spoilers, but for at least most of the episodes, the true story is unexpected. The first couple episodes may not have such deep a story, but the later ones are fairly deep.

Conclusion

In conclusion, Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney is a good game, but it has its flaws. The great stories, mood-setting music, and fun court stages are all interesting and yet, unexpected. I guess that in some ways, it's the sort of game that you either like or hate, but either way, there's still some aspects that you've gotta like.

Overall score: 8.25/10