Hey everyone! After finishing with the current main Ace Attorney series I figured it’s about time I move on to the first spin-off game released, Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth. The game was released for the Nintendo DS in 2009 and - as the title suggests - features Miles Edgeworth as the main playable character. It later got a sequel on the DS in 2011, Gyakuten Kenji 2, that was sadly never released outside of Japan. There does exist a fan translation online though.

The Investigation spin-offs feature gameplay similar to that of the main series, however you will almost never go to court. You’re basically acting like prosecutors and the police force should as you actually look and find the criminals while still investigating. This does of course mean that investigating has expanded tremendously as you can now actually walk around the areas related to the crime! Witness cross-examinations are now replaced by rebuttals as you try and destroy their theories with your own. Lastly to have a gimmicky feature like Psyche Locks, you get the logic feature. During investigations Edgeworth will pick up clues and write them down in his mind. During gameplay you can try and match these clues and if you found two that go together, you usually get a new piece of information that could be valuable to the case. If you get it wrong you’ll still get the satisfaction of Edgeworth getting it wrong so I would definitely recommend it.

That’s about it regarding the differences with other Ace Attorney games, let’s get into the review!

Graphics - 10/10

The graphics look just about as clean as those of Apollo Justice, with some minor tweaks such as two characters appearing at the same time during talking scenes. The rest of the graphics are very similar. As you walk around crime scenes etc. you’ll notice plenty of details that they added in to make every location feel even more alive. It can range from things like footprints to even full reconstructions of investigation scenes using a nifty device we’ll get to later. Great job here!

Sound - 10/10

They really went all out with the variety of instruments you’ll find in this game’s OST. Every song is a masterpiece that your jaw will literally drop when hearing some of the themes in this game. Among the Ace Attorney fanbase this game is definitely considered to have the best or maybe second best OST out of all of them, which is impressive because they’re all so good.

Depth - 9/10

First of all, this game is fairly long. It takes hours to beat due to the more challenging investigation parts as well as really well crafted alibis and whatnot that you’ll have to destroy. During the game you, as a prosecutor, also team up with a thief, Kay Faraday, who owns the nifty device we talked about earlier. This device, called Little Thief, allows her to reconstruct and recreate a location using the power of virtual reality. This essentially makes it so you can even compare how the scene used to look like and how it looks like now, to find very intriguing contradictions between them. A lot of work was put in to give you a long but pleasurable playing experience.

Addictiveness - 8/10

Ace Attorney games are story based. If you don’t feel like playing the same story twice, this game won’t get you to come back to it. You’ll regret it though, as the story is so fantastic and the gameplay is so much fun that you basically can’t help but keep coming back to it. I mean they kept the trial elements of the main series and made the widely considered “boring” investigation segments so much more fun, what is there not to love? The humor is once again top level so it’s perfect to take a seat as you laugh at the antics of Gumshoe, for example.

Story - 10/10

This game has a fantastic storyline that is split into 5 cases. Not a single element of filler can be found in this game as every case will have something to do with the bigger picture, as you’ll figure out at the end. The backstory for all the characters was created so perfectly that they really stand out from other Ace Attorney characters. The final villain is probably the toughest one to take down in the whole series! I mean hell when you start the game and a murder happens right next to you in your office, how can this story be anything but amazing.

Difficulty - 10/10

This is - in my opinion - the hardest Ace Attorney game out there. The amount of investigating, thinking and probably some honorary guesses you’ll have to do is far above your average Ace Attorney game. That doesn’t make the game less fun though, it makes it truly challenging to figure out and beat. Some of the plot twists that get thrown at you are so unexpected that you’ll most likely have to adapt to them on the spot, or it’s game over for Edgeworth.

Overall - 9.5/10

Very, very much deserved ranking. This game is hard, challenges you to your core, is funny as hell and has such fun gameplay that it’s hard to rank it anything below a 9.5. It definitely has a few flaws here and there but they don’t take away from the experience.
If you played this game before or if you end up playing it at one point, please find the fan translation of Gyakuten Kenji 2 online and play it. It’s a direct sequel to this game and has even crazier plot twists in it. I really wish they would make a new Investigations game for the Nintendo Switch. With the upgraded graphics it would look sick.

Anyway, that’s it for me, hope you enjoyed!