This just in from Court-Records.net, which is actively translating the original article from Famitsu as I type this.
Ace Attorney 5, which was announced by Capcom back in January with no details other than “it’s a thing for the 3DS,” will once again feature the be-spiked defense attorney in the lead role—possibly with a mysterious new teenage girl as his sidekick.
Details are still pretty scarce; here’s what we know:
- The game takes place one year after Apollo Justice.
- The first case involves an explosion at the court house, and a client named Shinobu (the girl in yellow?) who is prone to spasms.
- The prosecutor for the first case is Winston Payne’s brother, and he has awesome hair.
- The graphics seem to be a mix of 2D character sprites (as in the other Ace Attorney titles) with 3D backgrounds (which are legally required in all 3DS games). Whoops! Just a fuzzy photo; the graphics are fully polygonal.
- Series runner Shu Takumi is not “fully involved” with the game, as he’s busy with Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright.
- The last time he was not fully involved with an Ace Attorney game was Investigations.
- The game will be playable at this year’s Tokyo Game Show.
- Maya is not in any of the screenshots, and if she’s not in the game at all I will legit throw my 3DS out a window.
- Nobody cares that Apollo Justice isn’t in any of the screenshots.
YOU MAY ALSO LIKE:
Paul Franzen is the founder of GameCola.net and the writer/designer of Life in the Dorms, an actual videogame. Learn more at paulfranzen.wordpress.com. 
AHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!
That’s all.
Agreed! ^.^
1. Obviously, they can’t have Winston Payne in this game, ever since Turnabout Cola.
2. Are we happy or sad that Mr. Phoenix Wright isn’t 100% working on this? He brought us the original trilogy, but he also brought us Apollo Justice.
3. Spoiler alert: Apollo Justice is not in any of the screenshots, because he lost his job as a lawyer, and he is now a drunken piano bum.
Spoiler alert!!!
I know! If they put Payne in, I’d have to re-write the entire thing!
2. That’s true, but I’ve also secretly been wondering if the reason the writing in Investigations seemed “off” was due to his lack of involvement, and not necessarily cheap-o localizers.
Don’t you mean “Apall-O” Justice? Amirite?
No, I’m cool with the yellow coat lady, actually. She doesn’t look too young, and in my books, I think Phoenix needs a companion more in his sort of age bracket anyway.
What worries me is the lack of involvement from series creator Shu whatsisface, and the fact it’s set *after* Apollo Justice. I think they should have either left Apollo as a spin-off, or ignored it completely. But saying that it happened means they’re saying Phoenix Wright as a hobo actually, well, happened.
Now that the news has sunk in and I can think rationally, I agree completely. Although Maya not being in the game will break my heart, what worries me more is the news that Shu Takumi is not fully involved. I also hear where you’re coming from about Apollo, I too think it’ll be awkward dealing with the differences in time, as well as the whole hobo thing. I mean, are classic characters such as Gumshoe, Larry, and *sniff* Edgeworth even going to make an appearance? We all know that Phoenix kind of fell of the face of the earth when he became a hobo, so it’ll be interesting to see them jump over that hurdle.
And about yellow-coat girl, although she will never take the place of Maya, it will be interesting to see a new character develop. Heaven knows I know what that’s like.
I don’t get your comment about needing someone his own age. Maya is 17 at the beginning, and he’s 24. By the time this takes place, She’s at least 28 and he’s at least 35. They’re in the same age bracket, even if Maya is always drawn like a little girl, and he is always drawn older.
My “prediction”: turns out that that protagonist was dead all along. And guess what that means….
Yes, thank you! I’ve been saying all along it’s a totally legit age-pairing.
Wow, I’m possibly the only one who doesn’t want Phoenix wright to be the lawyer that we play. I feel like he should be the mentor or chief of something. Don’t get me wrong, it’s good to see Phoenix back again but I think that his hobo years should at least made him a bit more wiser? I still think Apollo should have a second chance * dodges cola cans thrown at me*.
Also, if Maya can’t be the sidekick, it should be Trucy!
I think I might be the only person who wants Phoenix to have Lotta Hart as a companion and assistant.
I agree with Thapersonwhoeveryonehates (nice name, by the way ^^). It’s nice to see Phoenix reclaim his former glory but the Fey family plot line has already been rapped up. Capcom needs to finish what they started with the Gramarye (or however you spell that) plot line, then maybe we can start a new plot. I have to say, Capcom has some real balls to just sort of through away Apollo Justice. One could argue that fans were unhappy about the whole “Phoenix is a drunken hobo” thing, but clearly, as it was hinted at the end of the game, they were leading up to something with that. I’m sure that Ace Attorney 5 would’ve been taken in a much different direction if everyone hadn’t completely lost their shit about it. But that being said, I’m glad that the Ace Attorney series is back in full swing. It’s nice that Capcom has realized that the Ace Attorney fandom is still alive and strong. But this means I’ll have to buy a 3DS. Grr!!!
Actually, I think there’s still a pretty good chance that Apollo will be in the game. They haven’t told us much about it, other than the premise for Case #1, and the fact that the girl in the yellow coat will play a major role. There’s still plenty of room for Apollo to show up.
Whoa whoa whoa! Is PAUL defending Apollo Justic? 0_o The apocalypse is coming!!!!…..*bad pun alert* the Apollocalypse
Certainly not, and I take great offense to that!! No, I just mean it’s definitely still possible (and even likely) that he’s in the game, and Capcom just hasn’t mentioned it yet. Whether I’d actually WANT him to be in the game is a different story.
2012 really is the end of the world.
As a joke can we all accuse Paul of being an Apollo/Phoenix shipper? :)
(On the games darker tone) ‘”(Payne’s brother) He’s a little bit more villainous than his brother,” Yamazaki said, “the sort of guy who isn’t afraid of using dirty tactics. Sort of a ‘dark Payne,’ in other words. The theme of this story overall is ‘dark days in law’. Phoenix was talking about this in Apollo Justice a bit, along the lines of ‘Dark days are coming for law, and we have to do something to fix it.’ Partly because of that, this game begins with a courtroom bombing, to sort of symbolize that.”‘
I honestly have no idea how I feel about this.
Since we all know for sure that we are getting the game, I am personally not going to hunt down for every single detail of the game’s story, because when we finally get the game I want to be surprised. From now on, I don’t want to hear a word of disscussion about this game.
Same here.
And if I do… I will personally give you
A boot to the head.