#give my man Apollo a proper trilogy!!!

[nay-lon]

child of wisdom, child of magic

[escarlatafox]

penny for ur thoughts on aa dual destinies!

You First.

(Just kidding but man. I'm curious on your opinions and feel that anything I can say would be inadequate in comparison djdfjdfjh)

This ask feels intimidatingly broad to me because I rarely think about or analyse Dual Destinies, the game itself, as a cohesive whole, as opposed to being highly opinionated about so many individual but unrelated things underneath this banner of “Dual Destinies” that aren’t related or necessarily about the question of the game’s cohesive story and cases-strung-together in and of itself.

And Really, in my response here, while I certainly talk ABOUT Dual Destinies, it still feels like I haven't really Answered The Fundamental Question this ask you have bestowed upon me requests. I have no unified, cohesive, coherent thoughts. Only reactions and responses, a huge amount of which are just not even mentioned here because I already wrote too much because this game is my undoing <3

My reactions to the game seem to have purely been on two extreme ends of a spectrum of disinterest vs obsession at different points of the game especially during my first playthrough, leaving these two extreme points of view hopelessly biasing me beyond the ability to give a proper rundown/analysis of the game as a cohesive whole and present my thoughts. It feels like for some aspects either I don’t care enough to form much of a solid opinion that I can talk about or coherently word or I’m too obsessed to present my opinion in a manner sufficiently connected purely to the game in-and-of-itself as the topic at hand.

Probably immediately alienating a lot of Dual Destinies supporters right off the bat: the people that call Dual Destinies “boring”… I can’t even like say anything to that necessarily at least when they mean the EARLY cases. Because even when I was really far into my first playthrough it’s just like. Yeah. That was me. I wasn’t really invested.

Like even now I just can't really bring myself to care too much about the storyline contents of the wrestling case and Turnabout Academy and what have you, idk. It comes down to different people have different tastes and the actual content of those cases, on the face of it, just like... I don't really get very interested by it.

I thought Professor Means’ transformation when cornered was pretty fun though. That had my attention.

One thing I don’t really have any real beef with is the fact that the game decided to be its own thing. People point to and criticise Dual Destinies as this point of divergence in the series but – hold on I have some old discord messages I can post here

People point the blame at Dual Destinies as being the point of divergence but with me, the series diverged in 4. 4 is what gave us the massive timeline gap that introduced so many issues. I talk about not being particularly invested in my first playthrough of DD, but I say this as someone who was also not particularly invested during parts of AA4, and undeniably less interested than I was during my playthrough of the trilogy. In my eyes, AA4 had already “broken” a lot of things about Ace Attorney canon, so by the time Dual Destinies rolls around it’s just sort of like “sure do whatever at this point I guess”. An Apollo Justice sequel could have enhanced AA4 and could have been great in its own right. But I wasn’t that invested in the direction AA4 took to begin with, so… I don’t feel any great loss associated with AA5’s determination to be its own things that vocal portions of the fandom feel. I’m totally cool with AA5 trying to be its own mostly self-contained thing. At This Point, Why Not? Etc etc.

One thing I do dislike about Dual Destinies is… That’s Not Edgeworth.

Edgeworth was my favourite character. He shows up in Dual Destinies and he’s dead on arrival. He never was. He might as well not have been before he even arrived. #NotMyEdgeworth who is that????

For all the lambasting of the game and of Phoenix’s characterisation by the fandom it feels like people accept AA5 Edgeworth so uncritically and even just. Somehow manage to build a continuity between Edgeworth from the previous games and AA5Edgeworth and even look to AA5Edgeworth to build a basis of their understanding of his character and I’m always just like ???????

Okay, okay, I have to inevitably talk about The Ending Of The Game. That’s why you’re here that’s why We’re here. This is the big one.

People criticise a) the revelation about “Bobby” being the big bad as being a typical “cheap twist for shock value” villain reveal and b) the reveal that “Bobby” isn’t actually Bobby, but rather “some random nobody” to be “pointless”.

My response to a) is: I don’t care.

To elaborate a little further, my response to a) is: sorry it didn’t Do It for you, but I was having the absolute time of my life. It was thrilling. It was shocking. It was FUN. This trope exists for a reason and I can’t get enough of it – well okay, in the broader media landscape it has been a little overplayed in the present day, I’ve encountered instances where it felt forced or overplayed, and I get that. This is not one of the instances where I felt that way at all. Maybe it’s not your cup of tea, but it’s MY cup of tea and you don’t get to say it’s objectively bad or objectively pointless – of course there’s no such thing as objectivity when it comes to appreciation of tropes or art etc etc and so on. Things become cliches and things fall out of favour and what have you and the cycle goes on. Tropes exist for a reason. People like and dislike aspects of media for a multitude of different complex subjective reasons etc etc etc. I played Dual Destinies blind just as I’d played the other games blind and I got to revel in and relish the full force of the reveal as it happened. 10/10

If someone goes into this game already spoiled about the villain, I Get it. That would take a LOT of momentum out of the impact of the reveal. I’m extremely grateful I got to play it to the end blind. I don’t know how different this game would have been for me if I’d known about the twist beforehand.

People criticise spoiler culture a lot these days and there has been the argument raised that if a work is “ruined” by knowing a certain twist beforehand, then it probably wasn’t very good to begin with and that a work should be able to stand on its own merits regardless of whether spoilers are or are not known beforehand.

I understand the sentiment, but at the same time, while there are works you can enjoy regardless of whether aspects are spoiled or not, the type of enjoyment  - the type of experience you would derive from the work is still DIFFERENT.

And while yes, I think that spoiler culture is pretty Extreme in the present cultural zeitgeist and that some works don’t necessarily really need it, some works are genuinely better to consume blind because of how they function and what they do.

Part of what it comes down to is that I Had Fun. And I had fun largely because I didn’t know the twist was coming before it hit, and the impact of the revelation was fun. And you can pry that fun Dual Destinies twist villain reveal from my cold dead hands.

It’s part of where my investment in the game sort of flipped from 0 to 100. Okay that’s not quite true – there were all these whisperings about a “phantom”. The phantom theme played for a bit prior to the reveal which REALLY adds to hype tbh. The characters were discussing this absolutely incredible person who, in the absence of fear, was capable of making that massive leap high up in the air which would have required a running start. Where they could have easily fallen to their death had they not timed it right. We got to see that glimpse of them in the space centre footage where we just can’t quite see any real definitive facial characteristics. Just enough was being teased about the phantom that really, I was already well and truly hooked and fascinated by these concepts the game was bringing up. The aura of intrigue, of the notion that there lurks a spy amongus,

Yeah. Yeah.

My response to b) “the reveal that “Bobby” isn’t actually Bobby, but rather “some random nobody” is “pointless”.” Is…

Okay, while I wholeheartedly disagree with this sentiment, it’s funny to note first that I was somewhat inclined to agree with it in the immediate aftermath of the reveal. Like, we find out Bobby is dead, that Bobby was sincerely a good person after all it seemed, and tbh my sentiment was sorta like “damn. I wish Bobby WAS the evil one though. That’d be Cool. I want to see evil genuine Bobby. The notion excites me”. We got BAITED with the notion of an evil Bobby, smh (JK)

But anyway, when people try to “rewrite” or “fix” Dual Destinies and just…. Completely ignore Bobby/The phantom/scrap that whole aspect of the game it’s just like…….. It does not Compute. Like at that point, you’re not “fixing” Dual Destinies with its core premise and concepts and plotlines, you’re writing an entirely different game with an entirely different plot! People claim that Dual Destinies had potential and then set about seemingly doing their utmost to erase one of the fundamental aspects of the game that carried the MOST potential. It’s at that point where common ground I could have with that person breaks down completely and I’m simply left scratching my head.

I’ve seen people criticise Dual Destinies for refusing to reveal any of the phantom’s true facial characteristics or information about their identity and it’s like. Okay. Let’s actually examine that criticism realistically for a moment. So it’s the end of Dual Destinies. You learn that the phantom was just some guy called Jackson Morgan all along. The sniper shot happens. Jackson Morgan falls to the ground. We see they’re just some guy with curly brown hair.

What does this revelation realistically add to the game and its themes. What does this realistically accomplish. What do we stand to gain from adding this in.

Or, how would it detract from the game and the themes it raises, as it currently stands? What would we lose from its effectiveness?

We get No information about the phantom… and that’s the point. People argue that that’s pointless, that it’s a cop-out, that it’s whatever-negative-thing-have-you, and I’m just like… No??

And like, theoretically, we could have some sort of phantom-identity-reveal plot, but the simple fact of the matter is that there is not enough room left in the game to do so in any effective or meaningful way. It’s not what this game was for or what it set out to do.

Athena is a brilliant character to be contrasted against the phantom. Fandom loves Athena and they want to keep Athena. But what doesn’t seem to be acknowledged is what a good contrast against someone so centred around emotions like Athena that the phantom is. Athena feels and detects the emotions of others, meanwhile we have the phantom, someone who hardly has any emotions at all.

But fandom does not, for the most part, like the phantom. They consider the phantom a non-character in the strictest sense. They largely refuse to engage with the phantom as a character that Exists in this franchise.

To be fair, to an extent, so does Dual Destinies (and Capcom LOLLL), and that’s one of my criticisms of the game. Like, at times it really feels like the writers really have forgotten the truth behind “Bobby” and it feels like maybe they really did just write Bobby as authentic up until pasting a sudden twist onto the end.

But it’s like damn, you guys all have no idea how much fun you’re missing out on when you refuse to genuinely engage with the phantom as a character that this franchise has presented us with.

The lack of identity and lack of emotions are just such interesting themes. Emotions, identity, personhood, the concept of the self… I’m all about those themes.

Dual Destinies absolutely could have done a better job handling the themes and by god I wish it did. But I see the solution would be to have a more guided and cohesive focus on those themes building up to the introduction of the phantom revelation, not in seeking to erase the phantom from the story altogether.

People often criticise Dual Destinies for trying to be too many things at once. And yeah, that criticism is founded. There are several different ideas with potential for their own individual games all bundled into one singular game, and in many respects botched and/or poorly executed because they’re just not given enough room to BREATHE. The phantom as a character and the themes and concepts brought up BY the character is one of those things that was just not given enough room, and should have been a more coherent, focused site of exploration throughout the game so that the audience could feel a greater sense of thematic resonance with the reveal(s) towards the end of the game and all it entailed.

It just so happens that I am the ultimate sucker for the themes and ideas brought up by the phantom and their presence in the game. I eat those themes up like you wouldn’t believe, so Dual Destinies in a sense sort of cheated its way into making me completely obsessed in raising those themes in the first place, regardless of how much they were explored. The people arguing the phantom reveal on top of the Bobby-as-villain reveal is “pointless” are seemingly buying into the phantom’s assertion of their non-existence wholeheartedly and uncritically and without seeking to entertain what the game might actually be wanting us to be doing or thinking about with this set-up.

(I’m biased. I’m impossibly biased. I am ADDICTED to the themes the game flirts with. I can’t claim to know what the writers ‘actually’ wanted us to get out of this game at the end of the day. All I know is that I got so much out of it it’s insane. I owe so much to Dual Destinies it’s unreal.)

There’s a few layers to this.

Dual Destinies raises the following questions: what if there was a person who had no identity that they called their own, no emotions, no self. What would such a person be like? What would such a person be capable of? What could such a person do? Is the existence of such a person even possible?

The game doesn’t necessarily answer these questions. But it asks them. It presents its own tentative hypotheses.

These are fundamentally questions that dip into philosophy and science. Setting aside the question of identity for a moment, we can ask ourselves what a human without emotions would be like, what other parts/aspects of their existence would a lack of emotions affect? What does that tell us about the nature of humanity? What are human emotions intertwined with that would be impacted by their absence?

And that’s not to start on a whole host of questions about the topic of identity.

I don’t understand why most of the fandom doesn’t seem to find that remotely interesting??? The phantom is a wonderful theoretical case study. But I can’t see the forest for the trees, I’m too busy eating dirt tbh.

The game has its cake and eats it too because it never demystifies the phantom, leaving them an identity-less endless abyss of a character (which people accept uncritically as “oh so they’re not an actual character then and I should act as if they really don’t exist” without engaging with any deeper philosophical underpinning or significance of what it would even MEAN to be a conscious ‘identity-less being’) meanwhile the game never denies that the phantom really is a person. The game tells us a) they have some emotions b) that massive breakdown they have at the end. The game is saying yes the phantom is just another person at the end of the day. ‘You can’t outrun yourself’…

I have surprisingly few opinions on the way the game itself handled the phantom (besides wanting more foreshadowing and/or retrospective indication that "Bobby" was always being written with the phantom in mind as opposed to the phantom's existence not factoring into the writing process) or how it "should" have treated the phantom in the ending. Other phantom fans absolutely do have opinions about it. The reason for my lack of opinion in this area is my analysis on this front is that when it comes to canon content of the phantom I simply tend to accept their portrayal/scenes in the game as-is, and then proceed to analyse from there, as opposed to asking "what could/should the game have done differently?". I engage on a very Watsonian level in that particular respect, not a Doylistic one.

But I'm always down for hearing other phantom fans' takes on what the game should have done with the character. <3

Anyway I had literally only Just written up a kind of tangential thing today and yesterday so. I’m just gonna stick it here at the end of this post as a random Bonus. I was gonna think about messaging you about it or emailing it to you anyway Shoop ahhhhh <3 it’s not the complete text but it’s a relevant excerpt!

Here, just because your epic:

"The phantom’s claim that they have no subjective sense of self leaves them open to make claims of absolute objectivity – absolute neutrality - and control over expressed behaviour – to them, their entire life is performance itself. They are always mimicking, imitating, portraying the behaviour of others, and never behaving just as ‘themself’; everything intentionally (consciously) mediated.

The phantom’s denial of their own existence is an ontological absurdity on the face of it. While they surely would not deny their physical existence as an organism, they deny having any self at all. A purely Cartesian distinction is insufficient and still cannot account for them having only a body and no “mind” – the fact that there is a consciousness mediating their impersonations is contradiction of that; subjectivity is also an inevitability. It’s always come across to me like a strange/misguided attempt on their part seemingly to deny their own “Cogito, ergo sum”. The phantom is hardly claiming that they are a p-zombie. Even if they were completely incapable of emotion (which is born out in the game to not be ultimately true), they are capable of feeling physical pain and are just as conscious as any other. Not only that, but their very disposition requires them to engage in a complex, high-level way of thinking and awareness – their every move must be calculated. A lack of self is often associated with a lack of awareness and a lack of intent, which is overwhelmingly not the case here. The phantom is required to be far more aware of their behaviour than the average person.

You may argue the phantom denies not their physical existence as an organism, nor their consciousness, but a “self” more in a social/political/etc sense. But I consider such hopelessly abstract definitions of “self” to be far too artificial and externally imposed to the extent that they are undivorceable and inevitable results of the baseline “cogito, ergo sum.” To exist and to be a living, thinking, breathing, conscious being is to hold beliefs about the world around you in order to facilitate navigation of that world. To hold beliefs is to be of a certain orientation/inclination, and that is to be anything but neutral. Neutrality was never an option. A feeling of a lack of self is a feeling in and of itself. The lack of feeling is part of the constitution of the self to begin with. To have no self and yet to have a consciousness is a contradiction. The consciousness is evidence of the self."

[askaceattorney]

Dear 1,

Juniper Woods: Ace Attorney sounds like a very bad spin-off in my opinion. It would be satisfying, however, to have her as a tutorial to another game, if she had to be one temporarily, and it’s the last case she has to do before she becomes a Judge, and then is the main judge for the remainder of the game. Just a personal thought though.

As for the Original Trilogy, I think it was much more thought out than the second trilogy. It feels like it has more interest, more backstory, less throw aways, less recycled content, etc. I love the Second Trilogy, but I think they could have tried harder. You can’t beat the classics.

Dear 1,

I think a Juniper Woods spinoff might have the potential to be interesting, but only if something happens to her to create a drastic change in her personality -- not something horrible, necessarily, but something that makes her question everything she believes about the legal world.  As it is, I agree that she seems more like a tutorial sort of character.

I also love the Original Trilogy, since it’s what introduced the concept of a courtroom drama in the form of a video game, and even kept it interesting for three whole games.  Given, it had a few rough starts, but it just kept getting better as it went, in my opinion (in fact, I sort of like the newer games better, to be honest).  So if I were to describe it to a friend, I’d say it’s like watching Columbo, Matlock, or another detective/courtroom drama, only you have to solve the mysteries on your own instead of just watching the main character do it.  That’s the main thing that makes it (and the whole series) so engaging.

Dear One,

I’d rather not make a meme. I’ll leave that to the proper memer’s out in internet land.

Dear One,

Meme #1: There’s nothing finer than feeling fine

Meme #2: When your task gets delegated to your junior partner

Meme #3: “Man, I could really go for a meat lover’s pizza right about now...”

Dear Rubia,

I honestly hadn’t given much thought to how few references there are to Japanese culture in the Ace Attorney universe, given Ms. Hsu’s claim that America embraces it more there.  Heck, I didn’t even realize the Amanos were supposed to be of Japanese descent.  It’s sort of ironic when you think about it.

As for Phoenix, I don’t have any doubts that Mr. Naruhodou is canonically an ancestor of his.  Phoenix himself might look 100% American (with an unusual hairstyle because anime), but even if his DNA is less than 1% Japanese, the connection can still be seen between the two of them in their personalities and behaviors.  In fact, Dai Gyakuten Saiban might have been Capcom’s way of trying to counterbalance the lack of Japanese people and customs by having it set in Japan, as well as showing how Phoenix is (though very indirectly) connected to it.  I also remember wondering if Susato might have been an ancestor of the Feys.  She has both intelligence and the sass that most of them are known for, after all.

I agree that things turned out all right the way they are, but it does make me wonder how Ace Attorney would’ve been received in America if the first game had been set in Japan, or if the characters at least traveled there at some point.  I’ve never been there myself, but I imagine it’s a country with as much charm, excitement, and criminal activity as America.  If Spirit of Justice taught us anything, it’s that lawyers are needed wherever people exist.

Also, while we’re on the topic of foreign races in games, I recently watched an episode of Extra Credits that made me realize how seldom races other than American and English are represented in games (and Italian, in a kinda-sorta way).  It’s true that they’re easier to relate to for us Americans, but it’s also sort of sad that we can get used playing as entirely made-up fantasy races, but other human races tend to be used much less often.  That’s another wasted opportunity, in my opinion.

But I find it even sadder when clever lines are lost in translation.  Why would you do that to us, Capcom!?

Dear Mouthmouth(?),

Well, I erased your entire name and email by accident, so I guess we’re even.

I’ve seen your name on a few of the letters we’ve received, so there’s a chance that some of them made it through.  We delete the ones we can’t answer for a variety of reasons, so there’s no telling exactly why we deleted yours if we did -- it might have been because of inappropriate content, or because of something entirely different, so there’s no real need to apologize.

In any case, thanks for reading the submission guidelines!  It’s become pretty clear that not everyone does that.

Dear Sonia Nevermind,

Dear Anonymous,

As of right now, there are 2,339 letters in the inbox, and counting.  I wish we could give a definite answer to your second question, but all I know for sure is that it takes somewhere between 3 and 4 months for us to reach a letter after it’s been sent.  Hopefully someday soon we’ll be able to remedy that issue, but that’s how it goes with ask blogs as popular as this one.

Dear Anonymous,

AAAAAHH, NOT A GAME THEORYYYYY!!!

*ahem*  Anyway, that’s definitely an interesting theory, but there are at least a few objections I have to raise in response.  First is that the poker games he took Trucy to were played in a room that used to be a hideout for criminals.  I doubt he would’ve brought Trucy with him if he suspected any of his card game opponents to be wanted for anything.  Secondly, while clearing Phoenix of his forgery charges wasn’t the main goal of the final case, it was accomplished indirectly when Apollo exposed Kristoph’s ties to Drew, and I imagine Phoenix was expecting him to connect those dots somewhere along the way.  And finally, while the jurist system was pretty much a one-time thing, I feel like Phoenix’s reason for using it was because it was the only legal way to put an end to Kristoph’s crimes.  It was underhanded to be sure, but I wouldn’t say it was as unscrupulous as Simon Keyes’s way of seeing justice done.

Of course, there’s no way to say for sure what the motives behind Phoenix’s actions were in AJ.  In fact, I wouldn’t be too surprised if they were partly fueled by his hatred for what Kristoph and Zak had done to him.  He seems like a nice guy overall, but everyone experiences hatred.  It also seems strange that he would take something from a crime scene, but I think it’s just as likely that he wanted to make sure he had it before the police confiscated it.  Whatever the case may be, I think it’s too early to call him a delusional narcissist.  If he were, poor Ahlbi (along with many other defendants) might not be here today.

-The Modthorne and Co-Mod

[gyakutengagotoku]

GSvsAA - Spirit of Justice - Character Profiles

Following the AJ and DD ones, here’s the last of the second trilogy. From here, I’ll be jumping back to AAI and I’ll see how I’ll tackle it later. Perhaps it’ll be easier if I go in order of the files and work out the in-game sequence afterward. We’ll see.

Master post. I’ll update it later when I have time.

Since there’s already a thread for these names on Court-Records, I’ll be brief with the entries this time, unless I find some extra trivia to add. And while it’s atypical of me, I’ll share my speculation on the origin of some less obvious puns for the English names too.

Spoilers ahead.

Main cast

Rayfa Padma Khura’in (レイファ・パドマ・クライン) rei is “spirit”; while the reibana (霊花) is an alternate name for the higanbana (彼岸花), aka the Lycoris Radiata, an ominous red flower that grows in Buddhist Hell and is said to guide spirits into the next reincarnation. It’s frequently seen in funerals. Fyi, the higan refers to the "other side” of the Sanzu River, which is similar to the River Styx. padma means “lotus” in Sanskrit. Khura’in was taken from the Kurain we know, which in turn has been taken from the Klein Bottle. Trivia: Her Song of Ceremony is sung completely in Japanese. By that logic, we could have expected an English dub, but I guess Capcom US wasn’t interested, since they only gave us subtitles instead. A few internal game files have given her name as “Honfa”. I can only guess it’s referring to how she’s the central (hon) character to this game. Also, she’s the kind of girl who would be pretty “serious” (honki) about her roles.

Edit: Added a link to the official source of “Kurain”.

Nahyuta Sahdmadhi (ナユタ・サードマディ) Previously, we thought nayuta was the Sanskrit word, meaning “myriad” (or in some East Asian languages, “10^26 or 27), but as it turned out, it’s just the name of someone Yamazaki knew from his university. It was originally a placeholder name, but Eshiro liked it so much it came to be. His last name is based on the phrase hotoke no kao mo sando made, “Even the Buddha will get angry if you brush his face thrice,” or in other words, “Even the Buddha has limits.” It also may come from the Sanskrit word samadhi, a state of meditative consciousness. Trivia: Throughout the game are scattered references to the classic Chinese novel Journey to the West, and he gives us three. Three times he gets to bind a defense attorney, referring to the three disciples of Monk Tang, the novel’s protagonist. Apollo is bound on the head; Sun Wukong is restrained by a magical crown that shrinks when a certain sutra is chanted. Athena's arms are bound; Zhu Bajie has been bound several times throughout the story due to his lewd and disrespectful tendencies. Phoenix’s favorite arm is bound. While there aren’t any particular instances of Sha Wujing’s arm being bound (that I can recall), he’s always been the most responsible of the disciples and is somewhat gullible compared to the other two. :3

Ahlbi Ur’gaid - Bokuto Tsuani (ボクト・ツアーニ) His name comes to “boku to tsua- ni”, or “on a tour with me”.

Shah’do - Mitamaru (ミタマル) mitama is “soul”; maru is a common ending to a boy’s name. He’s a “soul[ja] boy”! I’m sorry, I won’t do that again. His English name, literally “shadow”, may refer to how he’s always tagging along by Ahlbi’s side. Trivia: Shah’do is in fact the only non-human character in the entire series to play the part of the main cast in a game. He even got his own character entry, complete with quote, on the official site! Sadly, I have no idea what he actually says.

Episode 1

Pees’lubn Andistan’dhin - Potdino Nikawas (ポットディーノ・ニカワス) pottode means “coming out of nowhere” and niwaka means “suddenly”, likely referring to how he appeared in the intro out of the blue to join this country’s religious practitioners. din in Arabic means “religion” or “way of life”. Also, DEEN, pronounced with a long e-sound, is the name of a well-known Japanese rock band. Trivia: According to a tweet from Eshiro, this guy’s name is officially “Nikawas”, but for the longest time he and some others mistook it as “Niwakas”, which made it into the final release.

Paht Rohl - Miima Waruhito (ミーマ・ワルヒト) mimawaru is “to patrol”, so his name becomes “patrolling person”. Aslo, waru can mean “bad”, so he’s also not such a good person as he seemed.

Episode 2

Bonny de Famme - Nanano Mimi (菜々野 美々) If you flip the kanji in her last name, they make yasai (野菜), meaning “vegetable”. mimi is “ears”. de Famme probably comes from “defame”, given her and her sisters’ machinations behind the scenes. 

Betty de Famme - Nanano Kiki (菜々野 輝々) Kiki is named like her sister, though kikimimi means “ears poised for listening”. Also, the sound a bat makes is often romanized in Japanese as a ki sound.

Roger Retinz - Shinoyama Kanenari (志乃山 金成) It’s custom in Japanese TV production slang to switch syllables of a name or saying around, so we switch his name around. Shinoyama becomes yamashino, and Kanenari becomes narikin (金 can be pronounced kin). Thus, yamashi no narikin means “a swindling nouveau riche”.

Mr. Reus - Mr. Menyo (Mr. メンヨー) menyou (面妖) is “strange” or “suspicious”. I’ve heard speculation from other fans that Reus can be switched around to make “ruse”, as he is a masterful magician. His real name, Manov Mistree, is originally Fushigi Naohito (伏木 直人). fushigi na hito means “a mysterious person”.

Episode 3

Tahrust Inmee - Marmer Ahtam (マルメル・アータム) marumeru is “to make bald” and atama is “head”.

Beh’leeb Inmee - Sahra Ahtam (サーラ・アータム) sarasara is onom. for “silky” or “flowing”, in this case referring to her hair.

(Between these two, I can’t quite make out why they would choose these names, since they seem like very generic puns for witnesses in a case. Perhaps that’s the point?)

Puhray Zeh’lot - Ogam Mainiche (オガム・マイニーチェ) ogamu is “to worship”, and mainichi is “every day”, so it’s “pray every day”. His real name is Reehl Neh’mu, and its Japanese counterpart is Fon Myo, from honmyou, “real name”.

A’nohn Ihmus - Nanashiino Gonbe (Tent.) (ナナシーノ・ゴンビェ（仮）) Yes, the “tentative” is part of his name. nanashi no gonbee (名無しの権兵衛) is an anonymous or unidentified name, like “John Doe”.

Datz Are’bal - Datz Dinigel (ダッツ・ディニゲル) His complete name comes from datto de nigeru (脱兎で���げる), or “fleeing as fast as I can”. Interestingly, his English name gets to keep the same first name, thus making “that’s a rebel” or “that’s horrible” (the latter probably regarding how he first looks on his wanted poster, but I’m not as sure about this one).

Lady Kee’ra - Torihime-sama (鳥姫様) It literally means “Bird Princess”, but it’s not an actual name. I was surprised to learn that she got a name in the English version. Her real name is Ihmsan, which is the same in the JP version. I’m not sure about the whole pun here, but imu is a verb meaning “to avoid, shun”, like a taboo. It’s supposedly taboo to say her name.

Edit: Okay, so it’s actually based on imu, 仏, in this case meaning, “a dead body” and the honorary suffix san. It’s referring to her killing spree. (The same kanji when pronounced hotoke is referring to the Buddha or someone with such imagery, though it applies less to her.)

Plumed Punisher - Torisaman (トリサマン) It’s an offshoot of Tonosaman, aka The Steel Samurai, but with tori for “bird”. Btw, Tonosaman comes from tono-sama, “lord”, and the word “man”.

Episode 4

Bucky Whet - Uchidate Susuru (内舘 すする) uchitate is “freshly kneaded”, while susuru is “to slurp”. His English name is from “buckwheat”, the kind of dough commonly used to make soba noodles. Interestingly, the embroidery on his lapel reads 上戸, ueto, but pronounced as jougo, it means “hard drinker”.

Taifu Toneido - Senpuutei Bakufuu (旋風亭 獏風) senpuu is “hurricane”; bakufuu is “blast”, like of wind or from an explosion. The tei (亭) is an honorary suffix that’s added to the pseudonym of a rakugo performer.

Geiru Toneido - Senpuutei Puuko (旋風亭 風子) I think Puuko was just chosen for its cuteness. The first kanji in her name is the one for “wind”, and ko is a common ending for a girl’s name.

Uendo Toneido - Senpuutei Bifuu (旋風亭 美風) bifuu, written as 微風, is “breeze”. His other personalities are named after rakugo characters. Kisegawa is the same in both versions. Her name is from the story Omitate (”The Choice”). Patches is Ippachi, and Owen is Sadakichi. Both appear in various rakugo plays and are well known stock characters; Ippachi as taikomochi (a male geisha) and Sadakichi as an apprentice. Trivia: Patches and Kisegawa speak in nonstandard dialects. I’m not quite sure which, though, so if someone could lend a hand, I’ll be happy.

Jugemu (ジュゲム) He’s named after the titular character of the rakugo play, Jegemu.

Episode 5

Dhurke Sahdmadhi (ドゥルク・サードマディ) It’s probably from Druk, the Bhutanese thunder dragon and their national symbol. There was even lightning behind him when we saw his silhouette in the anime prologue. Not to mention, Druk is also the “king” and “protector” of Bhutan; kinda like how this guy was nominal king of his country too.

Paul Atison - Kiyoki Masaharu (清木 政治) kiyoki means “proper” or “clean”; the kanji in his given name, when read as seiji, mean “politics”. It’s also this alternate pronunciation that makes it into his email. For comparison, in English, his full name is “Paul Atison Wimperson”, thus making his initials in his email “PAW”. (Coincidentally, he is kind of a “dog”, and not the kind I love. >:3c )

Archie Buff - Sanagi Fumiaki (佐奈樹 文明) sanagi is “pupa”; and the kanji in his first name, read as bunmei, mean “civilization”.

Sergeant Buff - Sergeant Sanagi (佐奈樹 軍曹) aka Armie Buff - Sanagi Philnelia (佐奈樹 ヒルネリア) Her name is probably from hirune, for “afternoon nap”. She’s a shut-in and is seen wearing her pajamas even well into the afternoon. (The colors are actually based on the Japanese air self-defense force uniform, but they look like pajamas.)

Ga’ran Sigatar Khura’in (ガラン・シガタール・クライン) garan is a Buddhist temple; namely, the “seven halls” that make up temple grounds. Her middle name may come from shi, kataru (死、語る), meaning “death speaks”.

Inga Karkhuul Khura’in (インガ・カルクール・クライン) inga means “karma” or “cause and effect”; karakuru is “to manipulate”. The rest of his name falls into the joke with Jugemu (wiki page linked above in Jugemu’s entry). (If someone could also help me break down his incredibly long full name in Japanese, that’d be great. I’m hoping it has a little more substance than “How could this name be any longer and more pompous than it already is”.)

Nayna - Baaya (バアヤ) Her name isn’t so much a name as it’s Rayfa calling her “granny”.

Amara Sigatar Khura’in (アマラ・シガタール・クライン) amala (阿摩羅) is a number, 10^23, and also a Buddhist term: Amalavijñāna, the highest level of “consciousness”. amara also means “immortal” in Sanskrit, having survived two assassination attempts. In her case, her middle name also refers to shi wo kataru (死を騙る), “faking a death”.

Jove Justice - Odoroki Sousuke (王泥喜 奏介) It’s almost the same as Apollo’s name, but the hou replaced by sou (奏), for “play music”. So, “Surprise! Here’s a music boy!” I mean, I couldn’t exactly use “play boy” since that sounds wrong...

DLC Episode

Ellen Wyatt - Outsubu Shizuku (大津部 雫) outsubu means “a large amount”, particularly of something small; shizuku is “a drop”. So, yeah, lots of tears.

Sorin Sprocket - Haguruma Raito (八久留間 来人) haguruma is a “gear”. Raito sounds like “light” as well as “Wright”, as in the Wright Brothers. (It has nothing to do with Nick or Trucy. Nick is forever earth-bound anyway.)

Pierce Nichody - Juumonji Kazuharu (十文字 一治) The kanji in his surname make up “character for ten”, which is 十, a cross. It’s likely referring to health organizations like the Red Cross. The kanji of his first name are “one” and “heal”, respectively; referring to his hard choice while he was still a surgeon.

Dumas Gloomsbury - Yonekura Seiji (米倉 静次) nekura is “gloomy”, “dark”. Perhaps his first name is from seijou (清浄), meaning “clean”; as in, he was innocent of the crash incident.

Edit: Okay, so Ash has told me that I made a wrong guess. The only other idea I can surmise is seji (世事), “ways of the world”, so that it works as nekura na seji to make “a gloomy world”.

Edit 2: And another wrong guess. Okay, I’m out of ideas. As I mentioned above, seiji as 政治 is “politics”, but the only connection I can make with him is how the Sprockets are indirectly tied into it and how he’s been made a scapegoat.

Selena Sprocket - Haguruma Hikari (八久留間 ひかり) hikari is “light”, to match her brother’s name.

Extra: Locations

Tehm’pul Temple - Ji-in Temple (ジーイン寺院) ji’in is “temple”, so the name is a repeat of the same word. Hence the English name.

Penrose Theater - Trompe Theater (トロンプ劇場) It’s from the French “trompe-l'œil​“, the art technique that creates 3D optical illusions from realistic 2D images. Penrose is likely from the impossible triangle, popularized by mathematician Roger Penrose.

Take-2 TV - Nidomi TV (ニドミテレビ) nidomi (二度見) is to “look twice” or “double take”, as in surprise. How convenient that in English, “take” has another appropriate definition.

Kurukurutei (来来亭) It means “Come Come Place” (the tei actually means “pavilion” in other contexts). Incidentally, that tei is also a suffix to denote a place as a restaurant. Trivia: Ash@C-R has noted that there’s a ramen restaurant chain in Japan with the same name but different pronunciation, but it’s probably a coincidence.

Alright, with that, I clean my hands for tackling AAI in the coming several days, but I expect delays over this weekend. I’ll be heading out of town for a day.

[edgequill-moved]

for the aa ask meme: 31, 36, 37, and 45?

HI ANON thanks for the ask!!! my replies got hellishly long so i’m gonna put them under a readmore.. sorry i can’t shut up

31. Did you like what they did to Phoenix in Apollo Justice?

actually it’s hard for me to answer this question because i (accidentally) played AJ:AA first!! when i first decided to start the series i went to gamestop and asked for a used copy of PW:AA but they gave me the wrong game cartridge, haha. so my first introduction to phoenix as a character, besides seeing fanart from the trilogy that sparked my curiosity, was ~hobohodou~ in all his dickish glory. i think that shaped my interpretation of phoenix while i was playing the earlier games -- i always saw him as a bit more cynical and world-weary than he let on as a younger man.

as far as whether or not i like the choice that shu takumi made for him.. it’s hard for me to say, but i thiiiink my answer is yes? i mean he definitely bothers me in a lot of ways, even into dual destinies and spirit of justice, but i appreciate that shu takumi wanted to see his glory days through and then pass the torch onto someone else. (even if the dual destinies writers had other ideas. lmao.) it also leads to an interesting contrast between phoenix post-disbarment and edgeworth during the seven year gap -- like, with phoenix becoming more bitter and “morally grey,” compared to edgeworth turning into more of an optimist and trying to right the wrongs of his past.

so yeah, tl;dr i think the change adds a lot of dynamism to phoenix as a character even if there have been several times i wanted to deck the man in the face just like apollo. ALSO IT GAVE US TRUCY SO LIKE??? CAN I REALLY COMPLAIN??? NAH

36. Do you like where the franchise is heading or did you prefer the atmosphere in the original trilogy?

i will always always always cherish the feeling i had when i was 13-15 playing the original games and clicking through court-records.net and listening to the original soundtrack... but i also understand that All Good Things Must Come to an End. and as much as i miss shu takumi on the writing staff, i gotta give the new team some credit -- there have been some really good thematic elements in the latest games, especially in spirit of justice. i’m not so fond of the new gameplay (lots of the investigation elements seem unnecessarily complicated or redundant) in recent games, but my affection for the new characters kinda overrules that in my mind.. so... i guess i like it? it’s different. but i’m devoted to these characters no matter what, so i’m putting up with the changes in spite of some of my Differences In Opinion on how the series should be developing.

however..... i might have a different answer to this question if all the plot points left hanging from AJ:AA aren’t addressed in the next game. or if they ever try to make certain nasty ships canon (which i doubt will happen, but still). DON’T LET ME DOWN AFTER I’VE ALREADY SOLD MY SOUL TO YOU CAPCOM

37. Capcom suddenly announces that Phoenix will no longer appear in the Ace Attorney franchise! Your reaction?

i’d be sad as hell but that would also probably mean that we’d finally move on to a proper AJ:AA sequel so it might be a fair tradeoff tbh. i mean if he were dead i’d be really upset and probably like, in mourning for a while bc he’s always been very important to me... but i can’t realistically see that happening. ace attorney isn’t that kind of series. we’ve never had any major characters die -- the closest was mia, and she was only in a single case before she was fridged. so if phoenix wasn’t going to be in the franchise anymore i expect he’d just be off living a nice peaceful life with his husband and daughter while apollo gets up to khura’inese hijinks without him

45. One thing you think the Ace Attorney games can improve on?

FUCKIN?? CONTINUITY?????? i doubt i rly need to go into details here bc it’s such a common feeling in the fandom but like.... if the DD/SoJ writing team could properly address character development that happened as a result of events before the seven year gap my life would be complete. actually if they could address things that happened ONE GAME AGO i’d be happy. what i’m saying here is *bangs fists on table* WAS CLAY TERRAN EVEN AN ACTUAL THING OR DID THE WHOLE FANDOM COLLECTIVELY HALLUCINATE HIM