Superboss of the Turnabout
by Super Legenda
It's been less than two minutes, Athena.
by Super Legenda
Spoiler : Screenshot :
It's been less than two minutes, Athena.
Spoiler : Completion Time :
22:46
Spoiler : Synopsis :
A g*mer is being accused of murder, and apparently a really cool crazy trial happened off-screen and we're stepping in to see the end of it.
Spoiler : Review :
STORY
The idea for this case was pretty cool. Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of it happens off-screen, and the writing just kind of pretends you were there and saw everything, which makes for a very disorienting start. After doing a lot of reading in the court record to catch up, however, we're faced off against the titular Superboss of the Turnabout. It's tough to judge this case's story, however, because not only is there no beginning, but there's currently no end, either. The case didn't get finished in time, sadly. We're put in a situation where it's clear who the killer is supposed to be, because we're at the end of a case, so all that's left is to figure out the howdunnit and the whydunnit, which is a part of the story that is currently absent. As such, I can't really say the story particularly grabbed me. There just wasn't enough of it.
CHARACTERS
Despite the lack of story, there were a handful of colorful characters that managed to endear themselves to me in the short time they got to shine. Particularly the defendant and main witness/suspect who are constantly using gaming lingo. It felt like a fun quirk for a character, even if it was one shared by multiple of them. There were also some canon characters used, and while some of them felt on brand, others didn't really express themselves in ways that felt true to their characters, at least in the short time we got with them. The handling of the prosecutor side was about what you'd expect from an Ace Attorney case, though.
PRESENTATION
On the plus side, the use of a custom courtroom, and music choices were on point and helped enhance the tone of this trial. A lot of the presentation felt really cool in concept. But as far as the excution went, it was a bit spotty. For one thing, the dialogue felt very stiff, and there were a lot of minor grammar issues, which is not the biggest deal given that Super Legenda is more active on the spanish side of AAO, so I'm assuming English probably isn't their first language. It wasn't distracting or anything. I got used to it quickly. But more importantly, there were some minor bugs throughout the trial that made it feel unpolished in general. For example, at one point you're asked which part of a line of testimony you want to hear more about, and if you select the incorrect one, nothing happens. It's just not implemented yet. Another thing is that having so many characters on screen on the benches at once, while helping with the overall tone of the case of it being this big epic climax, ends up looking a bit crowded, with characters not always being on the correct layer relative to each other. (e.g. the sprite of a character who should be closer to the screen is behind someone instead of in front of them) But I know from experience that that's a really annoying thing to try to control in AAO, so I don't blame you too much for not worrying about it. Another issue was that at one point, the music just stops, and then when you return to the testimony, it stays stopped, even during press conversations, unless you happen to go back to the first statement. That one in particular feels particularly egrigious, because anyone who played the game normally would encounter that bug, which tells me there probably wasn't time to playtest this case at all.
Overall I liked what this case was trying to do, and with a bit more polish, I can see it being very cool.
GAMEPLAY
The gameplay, technically, consisted of only one standard Ace Attorney testimony, but there was a cool mechanic added (which I did not at all pick up on until I saw it mentioned in the walkthrough) where it shows the prosecutor on the screen, and you can tell whether it's safe to press or not based on their expression. That was a really cool idea, and it was implemented well. It was also really cool before I figured that out, how you would take little chip damage every time you made Phoenix say something stupid. Overall it really helped with that "final boss" feeling. As far as the case logic went, I didn't hate it, but I wasn't feeling it too much. At times, it kind of felt like you were meant to reference things that happened earlier in the trial which the player never saw, in order to understand what evidence was relevant to what. It was kind of like "just present the thing that kind of seems like it's related to that, and Phoenix will fill in the blanks with information that we don't know", which I don't really know how to feel about. That being said, not all of the answers were like that, just a couple. Overall I'd say the case logic was pretty average, although it's hard to really judge it without knowing the ending. I will say that there were slight hints that maybe something more was going on, which left me intrigued.
THEME RELEVANCE
This was a very unique take on this theme. First off, the case is short, putting aside that it's unfinished (it does get pretty close to the end at least), because we skip the first two trial days and go straight to the final showdown, which is a really neat idea in concept. In practice, maybe it was executed a bit bumpily, but overall I liked the idea more than I disliked the execution. A sense of urgency was also established pretty well, using the typical "we've dragged this case on for 3 days already, we can't waste any more time" logic, which makes perfect sense in the world of Ace Attorney. I'm pretty happy with the theme relevance of this case.
The idea for this case was pretty cool. Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of it happens off-screen, and the writing just kind of pretends you were there and saw everything, which makes for a very disorienting start. After doing a lot of reading in the court record to catch up, however, we're faced off against the titular Superboss of the Turnabout. It's tough to judge this case's story, however, because not only is there no beginning, but there's currently no end, either. The case didn't get finished in time, sadly. We're put in a situation where it's clear who the killer is supposed to be, because we're at the end of a case, so all that's left is to figure out the howdunnit and the whydunnit, which is a part of the story that is currently absent. As such, I can't really say the story particularly grabbed me. There just wasn't enough of it.
CHARACTERS
Despite the lack of story, there were a handful of colorful characters that managed to endear themselves to me in the short time they got to shine. Particularly the defendant and main witness/suspect who are constantly using gaming lingo. It felt like a fun quirk for a character, even if it was one shared by multiple of them. There were also some canon characters used, and while some of them felt on brand, others didn't really express themselves in ways that felt true to their characters, at least in the short time we got with them. The handling of the prosecutor side was about what you'd expect from an Ace Attorney case, though.
PRESENTATION
On the plus side, the use of a custom courtroom, and music choices were on point and helped enhance the tone of this trial. A lot of the presentation felt really cool in concept. But as far as the excution went, it was a bit spotty. For one thing, the dialogue felt very stiff, and there were a lot of minor grammar issues, which is not the biggest deal given that Super Legenda is more active on the spanish side of AAO, so I'm assuming English probably isn't their first language. It wasn't distracting or anything. I got used to it quickly. But more importantly, there were some minor bugs throughout the trial that made it feel unpolished in general. For example, at one point you're asked which part of a line of testimony you want to hear more about, and if you select the incorrect one, nothing happens. It's just not implemented yet. Another thing is that having so many characters on screen on the benches at once, while helping with the overall tone of the case of it being this big epic climax, ends up looking a bit crowded, with characters not always being on the correct layer relative to each other. (e.g. the sprite of a character who should be closer to the screen is behind someone instead of in front of them) But I know from experience that that's a really annoying thing to try to control in AAO, so I don't blame you too much for not worrying about it. Another issue was that at one point, the music just stops, and then when you return to the testimony, it stays stopped, even during press conversations, unless you happen to go back to the first statement. That one in particular feels particularly egrigious, because anyone who played the game normally would encounter that bug, which tells me there probably wasn't time to playtest this case at all.
Overall I liked what this case was trying to do, and with a bit more polish, I can see it being very cool.
GAMEPLAY
The gameplay, technically, consisted of only one standard Ace Attorney testimony, but there was a cool mechanic added (which I did not at all pick up on until I saw it mentioned in the walkthrough) where it shows the prosecutor on the screen, and you can tell whether it's safe to press or not based on their expression. That was a really cool idea, and it was implemented well. It was also really cool before I figured that out, how you would take little chip damage every time you made Phoenix say something stupid. Overall it really helped with that "final boss" feeling. As far as the case logic went, I didn't hate it, but I wasn't feeling it too much. At times, it kind of felt like you were meant to reference things that happened earlier in the trial which the player never saw, in order to understand what evidence was relevant to what. It was kind of like "just present the thing that kind of seems like it's related to that, and Phoenix will fill in the blanks with information that we don't know", which I don't really know how to feel about. That being said, not all of the answers were like that, just a couple. Overall I'd say the case logic was pretty average, although it's hard to really judge it without knowing the ending. I will say that there were slight hints that maybe something more was going on, which left me intrigued.
THEME RELEVANCE
This was a very unique take on this theme. First off, the case is short, putting aside that it's unfinished (it does get pretty close to the end at least), because we skip the first two trial days and go straight to the final showdown, which is a really neat idea in concept. In practice, maybe it was executed a bit bumpily, but overall I liked the idea more than I disliked the execution. A sense of urgency was also established pretty well, using the typical "we've dragged this case on for 3 days already, we can't waste any more time" logic, which makes perfect sense in the world of Ace Attorney. I'm pretty happy with the theme relevance of this case.
Spoiler : Overall :
PROS
- Cool take on the theme
- Fun original characters
- Spotty presentation
- Feels too unfinished
Happy Holidays, everyone. We'll get back to you when we've got a winner and an award ceremony to share with you.