After six years of waiting, western Ace Attorney fans finally don't have to wait much longer to experience the missing pieces of Capcom's beloved adventure game series. The Great Ace Attorney series will be releasing on PC, PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Switch on July 27. These two games mark a very important shift in the Ace Attorney series, as they focus on Phoenix Wright's ancestor Ryunosuke Naruhodo, making them fresh new prequels to the entire series.
To new fans, however, these may or may not be perfect titles to jump in with. These games are separate from the main canon of the Phoenix Wright trilogy, but also draw on fans' expectations and knowledge of the past games in order to be truly appreciated. With that in mind, here is where The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures, and The Great Ace Attorney 2: Resolve, fall in the main Ace Attorney timeline.
What Is The Great Ace Attorney?
The Great Ace Attorney is set during Japan's Meiji Era, and focuses on Phoenix Wright's ancestor Ryunosuke Naruhodo. They're joined by his assistant Susato Mikotoba as they work with Herlock Sholmes (yes, that is this game's name for Sherlock Holmes) and Iris Wilson (a 10-year-old girl who is Dr. John Watson/Wilson's daughter) to solve crimes in Victorian-era England.
Gameplay is kept familiar to what fans are used to from the main Ace Attorney series. Investigation sequences see the player gathering clues from crime scenes and other areas of interest, while also interviewing suspects associated with the crime. The courtroom sections are where the Ace Attorney games shine, and in The Great Ace Attorney the player must influence a jury, which can interject proceedings at any time to attempt to hand down a "guilty" or not "guilty" verdict. This is on top of the cross-examination gameplay that the series is known for, where the player must use evidence to find contradictions in a witness' testimony.
While the new setting and characters are enough to separate The Great Ace Attorney from the Phoenix Wright and Apollo Justice titles, what makes the series especially unique for fans is that they are the most recent entries to be written and directed by series creator Shu Takumi. Takumi originally planned for the Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney games to be a trilogy, but after supervising and writing Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney, decided to leave the series to work on the underrated Nintendo DS gem Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective.
After creating this title and the Professor Layton crossover game, Takumi created the Great Ace Attorney series while another team at Capcom developed titles like Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Dual Destinies and Spirit of Justice. This means that for new and returning western fans, these are the first new Ace Attorney games led by the series' original creator in quite some time.
Should You Start With The Great Ace Attorney?
Fans looking to start with The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles will ultimately have to decide for themselves if it is the right time to jump into Capcom's nearly 20-year-old, genre-defining visual novel series. The games are standalone in that they do not tie into the overarching plot of the main entries, however they do rely on fan-service for certain characters and their connections to the main series.
Fans looking to jump into the Ace Attorney series can get started with the Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy on Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One, which includes the first GameBoy Advance/Nintendo DS entries in the series. This should be enough to get newcomers up to speed for the fan service and inside jokes featured in The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles.
For those looking to experience the whole series before The Great Ace Attorney, the order of the main series goes from starting with the Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy. Then playing Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney, which is currently only available on Nintendo DS, 3DS, iOS, and Android, followed by Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Dual Destinies and Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Spirit of Justice, both of which are only available on Nintendo 3DS, iOS, and Android.
Optional spin-offs include the Shu Takumi co-written Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, a spin-off co-developed by Level 5 and Capcom that brings the two puzzle series' together in a surprisingly fleshed out, narrative driven crossover, and the Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth games. These titles focus on the investigation gameplay segments alone and follow Phoenix's rival prosecutor Miles Edgeworth. So far, only the first title has been localized for Nintendo DS, iOS, and Android, with the second game still Japan-exclusive.
Regardless of which entry you jump in with, The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles is made to be enjoyed by fans both new and old, and hopefully it's enough to allow the franchise to finally take off the way Capcom always hoped it would. Regardless, players can decide entirely for themselves if they wish to jump into the series with these newest installments or make their way through Phoenix, Apollo, Athena, and Edgeworth's adventures first.
The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles releases on July 27, 2021, for PC, PlayStation 4, and Switch.