Regardless of whether or not you’ve played the games, most any internet savvy gamer knows Phoenix Wright and his trademark “Objection!” So famous is the spiky haired lawyer that he’s already had a musical made about him (Composed of an all-female cast), with a sequel on the way. How does a video game character, let alone a defense attorney, win such fame and adoration? It’s all about the perfect balance Capcom seems to have found, both in gameplay and story.

Let us first discuss the gameplay, which is essentially Japanese visual novel meets old school point-and-click adventure. For those of you who are less that informed on the subject of visual novels, they are essentially PC versions choose-your-own-adventure stories with an anime flair. Sound boring? That’s okay, because Phoenix Wright is more about the pointing and clicking anyways.

The basic gameplay of a point-and-click is split up between court chapters and investigation chapters. Investigation chapters have Phoenix, surprise surprise, investigating scenes and interrogating people, finding evidence to use in court. Once you’re in court, you get to the item spamming part of a point-and-click. Once again, for the benefit of the uninformed, allow me to explain. Many point-and-clicks will require you to use the right item on the right person or other item to progress. As a result, the usual solution to being stuck in one of these games was to simply rub every item against every other item/person until something happened. Sometimes this was a result of the game being obtuse and difficult to figure out, other times it was a result of the gamer missing an obvious clue. Regardless, spamming items until something happened was something that plagued the genre, and Phoenix Wright is no exception. Although the train of thought in Phoenix Wright is easier to follow than in most others, once stuck, you are sure to resort to this tried and true formula. The game tries to discourage this through a health bar, which decreases every time you make a wrong guess, but once you figure out you can just save every time you present evidence, and reset should you turn out wrong, it renders it rather moot.

In spite of this, the court chapters are easily the best parts of the game. They make you feel smart, even if it took you thirty damnable minutes to figure that latest part out, and few things beat the cheap thrill of yelling “Take that!” into your DS microphone. The creators realized this, and in the second and third games added ‘Psyche Locks’. Psyche Locks show up when a person is hiding a secret, and play out like mini court battles, spicing up the otherwise tedious, though humorous, investigations.

Now, as already apparent, I love the Phoenix Wright trilogy, as do many others. It has inspired a musical, been popular enough to get a sequel to the trilogy starring a brand new defense attorney, and even Edgeworth is getting his own spin-off game. The games are great. However, they are not immune to what we in the biz call ‘dick moves’. The most memorable of these instances occures in the first game, where, to progress, you have to talk to someone who is part of the background scenery. This isn’t ‘sorta’ in the background, this is so far in the background he’s blurry, poorly outlined, and doesn’t even get his own character portrait. You’ve never had to do it before, and you never have to do it again. Figuring out how to progress at this point will often take many gamers at least an hour, assuming they don’t cheat. Protip Capcom: Don’t pull this kind of shit. We will find you.

As you’ll recall, I said earlier that Phoenix Wright was part visual novel. As a result, you do a lot of reading, so the game had damn well better be an interesting read. Well, luckily it is. You play as, who else, Phoenix Wright, a defense attorney who’s every client is accused of murder, and it’s up to you to get them off the hook. However, in the wacky world of Phoenix Wright, the suspect is guilty until proven innocent, and the only way to prove them innocent is to prove someone else as guilty. To make matters worse, trials last no longer than three days, so you’re kind of in a rush, and that’s only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the odds being stacked against you. But, be honest, if they weren’t, would it be any fun?

The game finds a clever balance between silly and serious, coming up with surprisingly dark cases, while never forgetting to make you laugh out loud. Very rarely does the humor ever feel forced. Further coloring the world and narrative are a slew of unique characters, all of which have their own role in the story. You have the childhood friend who grew up to become a prosecutor, thus pitting you against each other; the kind-hearted, easily swayed judge; the spirit medium in training; and even a prosecutor with snow white hair and a infrared visor covering his face. Even their names are great: Larry Butz, Ini Miney, and Wendy Oldbag, to name a few. I don’t doubt that I could devote an entire review to discussing the myriad of people you’ll grow to love and hate while playing this game.

But how does the game look? Well… Great! It is no secret that most 3D graphics on the DS look horrible, or, failing horrible, at least sub-par. As a result, most game directors seem to have caught on that if they want a nice looking game they’d better stick with 2D sprites. As the art is thankfully in pixels, not polygons, they were able to devote a fair amount of effort to making it memorable. The image of Phoenix, mouth agape after Edgeworth reveals the latest flaw in your defense, is one that will stay with you for a long time, nor will any of the character designs themselves quit your memory. Most amazing of all? It was all originally on the GBA, Meaning you’ve got a previous generation game keeping up with the current games.

The music is also excellent, not just for how it sounds, but for how well it works. No bit of music feels out-of-place, and the scenes and music compliment each other in such a way that simply hearing the music can bring back memories of your last turnabout. Similarly, recalling a scene will also bring back memories of the tune that played at that moment. DISCLAIMER: The soundtrack of the second game is definitely weaker than that of its siblings.

If I had to describe the games in one word, the word would be ‘cohesive’. This wasn’t a game put together piece by piece. A game is an experience, and one that you can’t simply break down into its individual parts. This game was made with that concept in mind, and it makes for an experience unlike any other.