Ace Attorney Investigations Collection Review – Review

The two Miles Edgeworth games that comprise the Ace Attorney Investigations Collection represent a noticeable departure from the adventures of Phoenix Wright and Apollo Justice. The pair of Investigations titles also mark the final two dominoes falling into place: every Ace Attorney game (barring the Professor Layton crossover) is now available on Switch. Who needs a GBA or DS anyhow?

While still dealing in the facts and truths of legal cases, protagonist Miles Edgeworth brings his own brand of justice and flair to Investigations: Miles Edgeworth and Investigations 2: Prosecutor’s Gambit. The latter is particularly notable for being unlocalized until the release of this compilation, and long-time fans who have been clamoring for more Edgeworth are finally seeing their wishes come true. As someone who didn’t play the first game, which originally released on DS in 2010 (in North America), being able to sink my teeth into not one but two completely new games was a genuine treat.

Whereas Phoenix Wright spends more than half of his time in a courtroom, the Investigations games see Miles Edgeworth doing just that: going hands-on to investigate crimes in the field, often within hours of their occurrence. There’s also a shift from first person to third person that adds a welcome new flavor and a bit more of a dynamic quality to the gameplay. The player uses the control stick or D-pad to move Miles around a crime scene and connected areas to find clues and piece together exactly what happened. And “piece together” is a perfectly apt phrase because one of his signature mechanics is to combine mental puzzle pieces using Logic to gain new information or a fresh perspective on the case. Little touches like visual indicators of an object or scene element having been fully explored helps remove some of the potential repetition that can drag down adventure games. Overall, the investigations in this collection feel different because of the proximity to the crime and the criminals.

The other gameplay type is rebuttals, during which you’ll use evidence collected to find inconsistencies in the testimony of other characters and suspects. Like in the other Ace Attorney games, you can press for more information and present evidence when you discover a contradiction. These segments are quite similar to the courtroom scenes of Phoenix and Apollo, but there’s no judge character to interject or be swayed, which leads to a more serious, mature atmosphere (at least in some places).

Both Edgeworth games contain five episodes, each of which is divided into chapters. You can choose to start with any episode and even any chapter, allowing you to bypass events you may have already experienced previously. The crimes that Miles deals with are more adult and violent in nature; there’s a departure in tone here if you’re coming from the mainline Ace Attorney series, which can feel more slapstick or played for humor. The two Investigations entries are an effective complement to the courtroom-focused adventures, and while the gameplay is still very much point-and-click, the sum of all the small changes (such as the hologram crime scene recreations or mental chessboards) make for an experience that feels fresh. That said, the pacing is more effective in the first Investigations title, so be prepared for a bit of a longer, sometimes tedious journey through the second game, with your reward being a story that coalesces into something great.

Seeing Edgeworth, Dick Gumshoe, and newcomer Kay Faraday have their time in the spotlight makes for a pleasant detour from the affable Apollo and charismatic Phoenix. Ace Attorney Investigations Collection also contains built-in achievements, a music collection, a handful of design documents, 20 save files, and the ability to switch between the original pixel art or the updated HD visuals. If you’re a fan of the Ace Attorney series, you owe it to yourself to give the Investigations Collection a shot, just don’t use a loaded gun or you’ll have Mr. Edgeworth giving you the business.