#To this day the only case from trilogy that I never finsihed. And I never will

[prismaticutie]

Ace attorney rant time

Trilogy was peak, everything after was a miss. L

I also love the art style of the trilogy so much. It makes it hard to watch the other games. Aa4 tries to keep the style but has a distinctly different feel, it's a little too different in quality. Like they upped it but that made it lose some of the charm the initial games had.

Don't get me started on the 3d games. They look bad. It works for DGS bc that's different characters n shit but it does NOT work for the og characters

The difference in trilogy Phoenix vs his 3d models is so jarring. 3d Phoenix is in shambles why does he look like that? The 3d games feel so bad in terms of looks. Everything feels so awkward and clunky, none of it has the same charm as the pixel art

I would be more okay w the 3d games if they had just dropped Phoenix and Miles. Characters who never existed in pixel look fine in 3d because we have nothing to compare to, but that's not the case for these two. Their models look so bad it's almost painful, they don't live up to the beauty of their og sprites at all

The "Apollo Justice trilogy" is ridiculous btw. What about Athena? Wasn't she supposed to be a main character? What happened to that?

Not to mention the backstory inconsistencies regarding Apollo. I've only heard tales of it, but from what I've heard it's ridiculous, and writing this bad is uncharacteristic of this series considering how good the initial trilogy was

If I do rewatch aa4, I'm mostly doing it bc I want to learn abt Phoenix more in that era and also figure out everything with Kristoph, but those guys don't get much screen time at all despite being such significant characters. You don't really hear about them outside the first and last case.

Also in my opinion, Pollo is really annoying. To be fair I didn't really care about Phoenix til t&t, I mostly stayed around for Miles and Gumshoe and Larry and Maya and the Fey family, but do you see how those games had so many characters that are unique and fun and quirky and entertaining?

Characters don't feel like that in aa4. You have Pollo, who is unlikeable and doesn't have the same charm as Phoenix. Pollo as a character really deters me from it. I feel like Phoenix strived to make a connection with everyone he talked to. Pollo comes off as a lot less social and generally seems to care less and is just worried about. I don't even know, does this guy care at all actually?

Other characters you're introduced to include Kristoph. He sets up for an interesting and unique character, but then vanishes more or less. You meet Trucy - she's the only character I can really vouch for here cause I do really like her. There's Klavier, who is so nothingburger and also Klapollo is the most baseless ship of all time.

There's no connection. Apollo finds him mildly annoying but tolerable at best. With Narumitsu, Miles and Phoenix have a deeper bond and connection and understanding. But you cannot possibly point to one example of Apollo having any sort of affinity for Klavier. If you really stretch, you could technically view Klapollo as one sided affinity from Klavier. But Klav honestly does not care.

There's also Ema, who fell off. They try to use her to reference the old games, and she's supposed to be "cool" but it really does not land with me. She's not nearly as likeable as she was in game 1, and she's not as friendly as Gumshoe either. And then there's Phoenix, who's a dick in this game but everyone in the community conveniently ignores that. We should talk about it more. Stop trying to have unproblematic faves. He's problematic, and it would be interesting to explore

Obv I can't ask aa4 to accomplish what aa1-3 did. That's one game versus an entire trilogy

With that in mind, I think it's an okay game on its own. It does what it can, and if it were part of its own trilogy or even just had a sequel, it would be banger. If it at least had a bonus trial like RFTA in game 1, that would make things feel a little more cohesive

But the "Apollo Justice trilogy" doesn't even build off itself. Those games are vastly disconnected, so it's kinda pointless. As much as aa4 (as one game) can't compare to aa1-3 (as 3 games), it would be more unfair to include aa5-6. I'm doing aa4 a favor by considering it on its own

With that in mind, aa4 was about as good as aa1 (without RFTA). Which makes it a fair game. But it still gets overshadowed by the trilogy, cause one game alone can't replicate something that took 3 games together to accomplish.

But look on the bright side! At least it wasn't jfa !

This close to rewatching aa4 but knowing I simply don't give a fuck abt any of the characters