Story/Characters: The story as it currently stands is incomplete, but leaves off in a very interesting point and has already provided a lot of questions, answers, and more questions about what exactly is happening. This is overly simplifying it a bit, but there are basically two big concurrent mysteries going on: the mystery of what exactly the setup mentioned in the synopsis means due to the many questions it raises, and the mystery of the crime that needs to be solved (as well as how the two are connected). Also I lied, there's a third mystery too but you'll have to read the game to find out what it is. It's a bit difficult to talk about the actual plot without delving into spoilers, so all I'll say is that I was very invested in finding out exactly what was going on and how Mia ended up in the bizarre situation she was in.
The characters can roughly be divided into two groups: the returning canon cast, as well as the OCs involved in the crime. The canon cast is given a lot of depth, with a lot of interesting interactions between Mia and the other characters. In particular, The Turnabout that Shouldn't Exist uses its setup to explore some really interesting angles with Mia and the rest of the canon cast, particularly Phoenix and Maya. The OCs so far are a lot simpler, though that's not a bad thing and definitely intentional. Characters that are meant to be unlikeable are good at that, so while the OCs have simpler personalities they work well in their roles and don't feel out of place thanks to some snappy dialogue. I am interested in seeing what the third part does with the OC cast, because there's definitely room to do some very interesting things with them (particularly the character shown in the screenshot of this review)... But I'm not sure which direction Spongesonic will take just yet.
There are certain parts in the story where I went "wait, hold up, I feel like this needs more time to linger and everyone is accepting this too fast" but for the most part it keeps a good pace. The game trusts that you respect its core conceit, I can see someone else being bugged by it a lot more but basically if your reaction to the synopsis I posted was intrigue, then I think you'll happily suspend your disbelief to see where the story goes. For the most part I enjoyed the writing, with only a few instances where I felt like the tone was sort of off (this is mainly in terms of a few references to other AAO cases feeling a bit weirdly handled, but that may just be me).
Oh yeah also there's this mystery character that Spongesonic has teased a lot in screenshots. I found this character quite interesting, but going into any sort of detail would be ruining the surprise. So just imagine that this character is Elephant Luigi. I liked Elephant Luigi's portrayal quite a bit.
Presentation: For the most part the presentation is solid, utilizing the right mixture of canon assets with custom assets courtesy of the Your Art section. Typos are infrequent and everything is word wrapped properly, I also didn't run into any bugs while playing. I will say that I'm a bit more split on the music. In addition to songs from canon Ace Attorney, this case also makes use of tracks from other videogames, some of which I found fitting, some of which I didn't (there were also instances where I changed my mind, such as initially not vibing with the testimony music but then it grew on me). I found this split to be more noticeable in the trial part which utilizes more non-Ace Attorney pieces (or at least I think it does). With that said, music taste is extremely subjective and it might work better for other people. It all works together to help The Turnabout that Shouldn't Exist have its own identity regardless, being recognizably Ace Attorney while still managing to do its own thing.
Gameplay: The Turnabout that Shouldn't Exist currently consists of part 1, which is an investigation, and part 2 which is labeled as "trial former", with the as of yet unreleased third part planned to finish things off. The first part is more or less a standard investigation in terms of core gameplay, with some rooms that require the use of the Examine function to gather all the evidence in the background. It's intuitive enough, though there is one piece of evidence that gave me trouble and made me pixel hunt a bit. The investigation contains a good amount of flavor text, with present dialogue being written for most profiles/evidence that you would expect to elicit a unique reaction and only a few parts where I was like "huh I genuinely thought that would get me unique dialogue". I am the type who presents absolutely everything to everyone on the lookout for obscure dialogue so I was met with the generic present dialogue in a lot of cases, but the stuff that feels like it SHOULD have dialogue for the most part does (the primary exceptions are later into the investigation, where a few profile presents that feel like they should have had dialogue don't, but this isn't a major issue).
As for the trial, it's mainly what you would expect in terms of trial gameplay, with a couple of added cues from The Great Ace Attorney being thrown in as well. For the most part, the trial feels fair on a testimony to testimony basis, though I'm not a big brained mystery buff so I could usually only think in terms of what the game was asking me at the moment. There is one specific moment where I completely whiffed on what the game was expecting from me, but the actual answer did make sense. I had to retry a bit, but I didn't find myself fishing out the guide for help. The gameplay works well for the story.
Theme Relevance: This case utilizes at least two interpretations of the theme, with one of them being spoilery to talk about so I'll talk about the other one instead. Throughout the entire story, Mia Fey's very presence is called into question and she continually has to justify having any sort of role at all. I found this to be quite an interesting take on the theme. I know that Spongesonic had some worries about the theme relevance not being obvious until later in the story, but for me this other interpretation of the theme suited me just fine and would earn a passing grade on its own. Unfortunately, due to this case being incomplete, I can't fully judge everything about the theme relevance just yet... But what's here is a take on the theme that I enjoyed quite a lot. Oh also there's a Super Mario Bros. reference which has nothing at all to do with the theme relevance but I thought I'd mention it because I thought it was funny without being out of place.
Overall: I really enjoyed my time with this case and I look forward to the third part. While the story is unfinished and currently ends on a cliffhanger, the first two parts already have a lot of sharp writing and I'd definitely encourage people to play the first two parts once they're publicly released. What's here is already quite substantial.
Spongesonic 
DJJ6800
CodingAnt
XavierWright
TimeAxis & 
Bannedfrom7
MasqueradeDemure
Spoonmaster12
that1stickman
Puppy Dance 9
skyem
