The Case of the Bleeding Radio

[davidn]

(20:55:47) David Newton: I had dismissed him before because... he's a radio. (A radio that sweats blood when stressed - that was an unusual motif.)
(20:56:07) Kjorteo: Oil. I suppose you wouldn't know, but it's not red. :)
(20:57:34) David Newton: Oh, isn't it? That was an extra treat for me, then. What is it really?
(20:58:52) Kjorteo: Sort of light greyish brown...kind of like motor oil, I think.
(20:59:20) Kjorteo: probably not motor oil because it's a radio, but...you know...some sort of oil/lubricant of some sort.

I can't actually remember the last time my colourblindness caused me to completely misinterpret something. Usually it's something that I don't even consider an abnormality because variants of it are so common, with the only real disadvantage being that I can't play Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo or other games where colour is a crucial feature with absolutely no secondary backup. But this time it caused a scene from near the end of the second Phoenix Wright game to become positively Shining-like.

I've now finally completed it, after a couple of months - lupineangel, you really weren't kidding when you said that the last stages of it turn everything on its head and make you feel amazingly guilty if you do anything wrong. The above conversation was something that happened shortly after I admitted it had done me in by seeking advice for getting past the final decision of the game, because I didn't have the heart to do it by trial and error. I don't think I've been anything near that tense about a game before - even though there are no time-crucial sections it feels like things are going too fast to keep up. There's a decision shortly before it that would be of sheer Granstream Saga levels of cruelty if it wasn't nullified shortly afterwards, and the bad ending is positively tragic... at least, it would be if they hadn't managed to suddenly ruin it all with the mangled line "The miracle never happen", a quality of English translation that hasn't been seen since the early 90s.

In fact, that's the one complaint that I have about the second game compared to the first - it's peppered with sometimes very jarring typos and spelling mistakes, sometimes dissolving scenes that are meant to be tense into accidental comedy. Otherwise, I'm half glad that it was slightly shorter, because after going through the end sequence and enjoying the sense of relief that it had finally given, I decided that I could do without the stress of it for a while.

And as soon as I had typed exactly that, Whitney handed me this from the library, in a bout of incredible irony. I don't think I've read a graphic novel since Tintin and Asterix, and it's quite a mental challenge having to read text from left to right while reading panels from right to left and often pages from top to bottom. It's like reversed controls for your eyes.

Comments

[kjorteo]

Personally, I thought that diabolical question that they then nullified had one of the better-handled payoffs I've ever seen--Mia's "whatever you were going to say, that's what being a lawyer means to you" line and accompanying flashback. If you chose Guilty, it just makes you feel better about yourself in retrospect, like you can look back on the situation and hold your head high because of how you were going to answer. I chose Guilty at the time because I believed in the truth above all else, and because de Killer offing Maya because I didn't cooperate would have been something I'd have felt guilty about, but not nearly as much as if I had directly set up Ms. Andrews myself. Because of this, that line was basically like saying "hey, remember that time you stood up for your principles despite all that was in your way, and fought for the truth above all else? Yeah, that's what being a lawyer means to you." It was like the game was congratulating me for undergoing my own metamorphosis the way Edgeworth had, and it was glorious.

On the other hand, I imagine that if you had picked Innocent, that line might have been twisting the knife a bit. Fortunately, I didn't....

Anyway, I do believe JFA has the least-proofread dialogue--I don't remember anything particularly egregious about T&T aside from the usual insistent use of "alright" that is rampant in all four games. You'll definitely have to keep going--there's a reason T&T was on my most emotional games list and JFA was not, and as you no doubt noticed and I agree, it's not because JFA isn't emotional! T&T, at the very least, is the only example I can think of of a game that makes someone's death retroactively more tragic, taking someone who was killed off almost immediately in one of the earlier PW games (much too quickly for you to have become attached at the time) and exploring their life beforehand and the consequences of their death now, basically making it sink in more and more. It also has another Edgeworth in JFA-like "drop a mystery early on, let it stew for a while, and then deliver a massive payoff in the final case" mystery with an even more powerful payoff, a prosecutor who just might (depends on who you ask, but I actually think so) be more compelling a character than Edgeworth, and a finale that absolutely blew me away in terms of how well it could tie the entire series and just about everyone in it together.

However, after the emotional roller-coaster that was JFA's final case, I can certainly understand wanting to take a bit of a break first!

[lupineangel.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the final story is *amazingly* good. I'm afraid I lost my nerve and had to resort to GameFAQs on the final cases of both Ace Attorney and Justice For All, on the same grounds as you, not trusting myself enough to make the right decision when so much is riding on it.

I always thought it interesting, though, that the game registers it as a 'wrong' choice if you present the evidence to his real persona, rather than to the radio (I don't know how to do the spoiler text, so I've tried to make the reference as oblique as possible!). I went back and tried that, after completing it, but it seems that brings up the bad ending.

And all of this has reminded me I *still* need to hunt down a copy of Trials and Tribulations.

D.F.

[kjorteo]

Point 1: spoiler text can be done like this: <span style="color: white; border: 1px dotted gray;">it was his sled</span>. That is admittedly a very complicated command, so I usually just copy/paste that when I need to actually use it.

Point 2: Presenting the evidence to John Doe doesn't work because, as absolutely painfully obvious as it is to the player, it was technically never revealed to the characters that John Doe is Shelly de Killer until Phoenix has that in-hindsight "That butler...!" reaction when talking to Edgeworth, and by then he had long since ran off. If you do not accept that little outburst as having established the link to the characters, then trying to hunt down John Doe is nonsensical because you're proposing showing the video to a random butler who has nothing to do with this. If you do accept that the characters should know this, then proposing it is still nonsensical because you have no way of tracking down John Doe in person, since he ran off and all, whereas you have Shelly de Killer on radio contact.

Point 3: For the love of God, yes, Trials and Tribulations is the best game in the series by far, and I say that knowing full well how amazing JFA's last case was.

[davidn]

I found it quite strange that the two were recorded as separate characters at all, in fact, although when you put it like that it does make sense from the point of view of Phoenix himself...

Didn't he at least catch a glimpse of him at the very start, just before he led Maya to that fictional phone call and started the whole thing off? I know that he was only around for a couple of minutes, but I feel I'd certainly remember someone with that hair, a monocle, and who sported a giant seam stitched down the middle of his face.

[kjorteo]

He did, and even had to go on to deliberately try to make everyone else overlook that in the segment where Will Powers was testifying and Phoenix had to drag the trial on. "A football has stitches! Are you saying footballs are suspicious!?"

[lupineangel.livejournal.com]

Ahh, riiiiiight! That makes more sense now. Thanks, man! Also, thanks for the spoiler text ability; as with the previous list of LJ commands and special symbols in html, it's always good to know someone who understands this sort of stuff. You should write a non-copyright-stealing equivalent of The Internet For Dummies, or something; it'd be awesomely helpful. :P

I'm gonna have to hit up eBay now, aren't I? :P

D.F.

[kjorteo]

Man, I just incorporate and copy/paste what I've learned from others. I didn't have that spoiler text trick until terrana told it to me as directly as I'm telling it to you now.

[davidn]

I thought you were going to do that when I posted about the first game :) Though it's difficult to appreciate just how much more available games are here, until I think about it - not only the way that more games are ever released here, but being able to get them from an online rental service is very useful, even if it's also very slow.