< Ace Attorney

Ace Attorney/Headscratchers


Headscratchers for the series in general go here. Please direct Headscratchers specific to individual games/subseries to Headscratchers/Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, Headscratchers: Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney, or Headscratchers: Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth.

  • In 1-5, we're taught about evidence law, specifically that evidence needs to have the approval of the Police before it can be used in court. So... aren't all the evidence that Phoenix uses from his own investigations from the past 5 cases illegal?
    • It's assumed that they're approved off-screen between the end of the investigation and when you show up in court.
    • In 1-5, we're also taught that any evidence that isn't approved by the police department can be legalized if the presenter can offer a credible connection between the case at hand and the evidence (second rule of Evidence Law). This is probably how Phoenix manages to hide most of his case breakers from the prosecutors.
  • http://larkismyname.deviantart.com/art/PW-COMIC-The-Atmey-Paradox-74843496?q=gallery
    • No real explanation however, it probably happened due to stock sprites being used for characters. Atmey's design for example may have been thought up last minute after the photo was done.
  • Is it true that only the American versions of the game are Twenty Minutes Into the Future? I'm confused by that point.
    • The Japanese version takes place around present day (a year or so into the future). The reason the Western version takes place ten years into the future is the justify the in game legal system being different too that off the current day American system.
  • This series fixation with Men Are the Expendable Gender. There are only two cases in this entire series where the victim is female both Feys. There's a difference between Women in Refrigerators and avoiding killing women at all.us For that matter the lack of female murderers, it totals as three (six if you count Dahlia Hawthorne's murders separately) Considering this series otherwise does very well on The Bechdel Test.
    • Female Victims: There are actually 4 in the Phoenix arc Cindy Stone, Mia Fey, Valerie Hawthorne, Misty Fey/Elise Deauxnim, although none in AJ or AAI, unless you count Cece Yew, whose murder is a minor, but significant part of the plot, but isn't the subject of any actual investigation.
      • Also, some of Joe Darke's victims, but that's just being anal.
    • Female Murderers: There's at least one in each game (PW - Dee Vasquez, JFA - Mimi Miney, T&T - Dahlia Hawthorne, AJ - Alita Tiala, and two in AAI - Cammy Meele and Callisto Yew)
      • Also Mari Miwa in GK 2, Belle Windsor in the manga.
      • There are also at least seven female acommplices-AA- April May and Lana Skye, JFA- Morgan Fey,TT- Viola Cadaverini,Valarie Hawthorne, and Morgan Fey again,AII- Lauren Paupes and Shih-na. None in AJ though
    • There's also a basis in reality that women are both less likely to commit murder and less likely to be murdered.
    • ...wasn't the very first victim in the series female?
    • Oddly enough, there has never been a case with a female murderer and victim, except for one case in the Miles Edgeworth manga.
      • What about 3-4? Dahlia killed Valerie. Both are women.
      • OBJECTION! I can solve this right now. Simply, men commit more crimes in real life and are the victims of more crimes in real life. The series isn't being sexist, it's being true too real life statistics.
  • Is the penalty for killing of ANY kind in the PW:AA universe death? Phoenix frequently says something like "the defendant's life is on the line here!" and it's implied that if Phoenix loses, his client will get the death penalty. This even applies if the death is accidental, or in self-defense (even if the person being killed is a serial killer coming at you with a knife). Prison sentences are never even brought up.
    • No one's sentence is ever shown or even implied apart from Manfred's. Although even his sentence is never stated as being death, it's just said that he's "not around any more". When Phoenix talks about the defendant's "life" being on the line, he's talking about how their life will be destroyed should they be found guilty. I mean they will be sent too prison and it they would be labelled a killer for their whole life, so their life IS on the line. Self-defence is pretty much stated too as being a legally justified killing and thus you won't go to prison for it. The reason Phoenix was determined to prove away the charge of self-defence was because it was basically admitting that the defendant HAD killed someone and, even though they won't get charged with anything, they would be labelled a killer which would basically ruin their life. Plus, despite people wanting to believe that the law can't punish a kid for accidental killing someone while in a life or death situation, the fact is that it can. I mean, you can call what Edgeworth did (in case 1:4) different things like self-defence, manslaughter ect, but it's clearly shown in case 2:2 that some one who commits a self-defence killing is still put on trial and prosecuted. It's just that, most likely, the defendant isn't given a sentence. Plus let's not forget that people seem to be forgetting that this is a VIDEO GAME SERIES. A bit of difference too the real world is only expected. You can't expect it to be 100% accurate.
  • OK, so the justice system of the U.S./Japan has gotten to the point where trials always take three days...but what the heck happened that allows people like the Von Karmas to not only be prosecutors, but do things like whip the judge and witnesses?
    • Simply...IT'S A VIDEO GAME. The game's harsh legal system and tendency to have prosecutor's abuse go unpunished are both Take That's at the Japanese legal system prior too 2006 when the old system was still in place. Said system was infamous for it's harshness against defence attorney's and laid back way of court proceedings.
  • Is there a solid (non-meta) reason no one references the events of "Rise From the Ashes" in Justice For All?
    • Nope. The only reason is that Justice For All was written as a GBA game before the DS update of the first game was written.
    • It struck me as highly unfair for Phoenix to assume that Edgeworth left only because of his broken winning streak when he had, in 1-5, admitted to feeling guilt about his past actions and doubt over whether he could continue. Perhaps Phoenix not remembering this is proof that 1-5 was made later.
    • Probably one of the main things that confuses people on this is the fact that, at one point when Phoenix talks about Edgey leaving, when he says "that case," a picture of Edgey at the stand and von Karma at the prosecuting bench shows up, obviously referencing 1-4. If that had just been changed to show Edgeworth at the prosecution bench and, say, Lana or Gant on the witness stand, then we'd have a nice, clear reference to 1-5.
    • In other words, to answer the original question: Rise from the Ashes was made and written after Justice for All.
  • What is considered illegal besides murder and theft? In Farewell, My Turnabout Adrian is definitely guilty of perjury and tampering with a crime scene In The Stolen Turnabout she hasn't spent much (if any) time in prison.
    • According to the fourth game smuggling and forgery are crimes.
    • Why do people assume that because it's not been stated, it doesn't exist? Perjury is mentioned several times,
  • What's the point of having detectives around if the lawyers do all the investigating? Maybe they're not supposed to, but that doesn't stop the evidence from being accepted in court.
    • The prosecution generally relies on the police - Franziska gets irritated with Gumshoe in the second game for not noticing the hole in the sleeve, Godot gets upset that he wasn't told about the ketchup stain in the next game, etc. Also, even the defense occasionally needs someone to run extra tests for them, like with the analysis of the small bottle in the Tigre case.
      • Plus it's for gameplay purposes as well. It'd be pretty crappy if you couldn't investigate right? Also in Japan, attorney's DO have authority to investigate.
  • What's with the strings of flags? They are attached to the blow up Steel Samurai in game 1 case 4, at that shack in game 3 case 5, and Valant Gramarye pulls them out of his cane when shocked in game 4. Any reason behind the recurrence of this prop?
    • What are you evening pointing out here? That flags have been features three times in the series? So what?
  • Basic one. This is in regards to the English translation...they say America moved to the new court system (three days, no trial by jury, etc) to streamline trials because the caseload was too high. Okay, that's a weird rule in light of American jurisprudence and civil rights issues, but hey, this could be a dystopian near-future. Problem, though: people who confess to their crimes (4-2, 3-2, 1-4, for instance) still get their day in court and still have to go through the motions of a trial. This implies the functional abolition of the plea bargain. Since between 80%-90+ % of all cases (depending on jurisdiction) are resolved by plea bargain, and of the cases that do go to trial most are already finished within a few days (although with much more lead-up investigation than in PW) anyway...how is this in any way functional? Justice and civil rights have already taken a beating, but even the argument of efficiency is now trashed.
    • Plea bargains still exist, Franziska was saying Phoenix would be asking for one within 10 minutes at the start of the 2-2 trial. Which means that it's up to the attorney to decide to go for one, even if the client wants to confess and that's why it hasn't come up in any of Phoenix or Apollo's trials.
  • Why does Franziska continue to idolize her father well after everyone and their mother found out he was a batshit insane murderer?
    • It's not her father that she idolizes, it's her family name. She confesses that she doesn't really give a damn about what happened to Manfred, so her pursuit of perfection is likely the result of indoctrination and her sense of honour.
      • By getting caught, he's no longer perfect and is a disgrace to the family name, so she thinks very little of him these days.
  • Where was Miles living and with whom after DL-6? The games state that von Karma took Miles "under his wing" but deliberately avoid any reference to his adoption or foster care, and in Investigations Edgeworth implies that he wasn't living with the von Karmas prior to his first case. Even if he had stayed with the von Karmas, what was he doing during Manfred's six-month "vacation"?
    • By first case, do you mean the one that didn't end up happening in Investigations, or the one where he faced Mia? Assuming the former here... If I'm remembering correctly, the implication isn't so much "Edgeworth wasn't living with the von Karmas" as "Franziska wasn't living with Edgeworth". I'm guessing that Manfred was training Edgeworth at the time and Franziska was in boarding school in Germany. She says she's in America for "summer vacation".
      • I'm sure he was living with the von Karma's. But during his first featured investigation it's shown that Franziska is here on vacation like the troper above said. So yeah, I'm sure he was under Mandfred's wing, so too speak.
  • Something about the fandom bugs me a lot: the fact that they all refuse to accept the strangeness of certain situations just because the game, when ported out of Japan, was moved to "America". For example, everybody is making a big deal about Phoenix not having anyone from the past by his side in Apollo Justice; but since he couldn't prove his innocence, or didn't care enough to do so, he would appear to go against his own principles by presenting forged evidence. This would have been the most awful thing ever in the eyes of his friends and everybody else, so it's kind of obvious why they severed ties with him... in Japan, at least. And yes, Maya wouldn't dare, even in Japan, but she's busy with the Kurain deal now, isn't she? (the others don't have a similar excuse) Another thing in AJ is the fact that someone above declared that allowing a foreign celebrity in "our country" to do jury duty is awful. I repeat: it's NOT America, it's Japan, and very few fans seem to understand this.
    • Why do people assume that Phoenix didn't keep in contact with his friends in Apollo Justice? In fact there's evidence too the contrary in the game itself. Examining the DVD stack in next too Phoenix's hospital bed in case 2 prompts him to say how a "kid" he knows keeps sending him Samurai DV Ds to right reports on (obviously Maya) so he DOES keep in touch with people, its just not shown because it doesn't NEED to be. That's what I HATE about the fandom; why do people think that Apollo Justice had too feature Phoenix Wright characters when it's meant too be APOLLO'S GAME.
    • Besides said "foreign celebrity" wasn't foreign at all. She just thought she was. She was probably born in the same country as everyone else. Thus she could very well perform jury duty.
  • Is there no such thing as "conflict of interest" in the game's legal system? Aside from Phoenix defending in cases where the victim is his employer or the defendant is his employee, we have Manfred von Karma prosecuting his adopted son, Edgeworth sitting opposite his "little sister" Franziska in 3-5, and in 4-4 we have Apollo defending in a case where he discovered the body, and Klavier prosecuting a case where both the defendant and the real guilty party are both band mates of his.
    • There isn't, I don't think. I think we just have to accept that that's another factor of the game's ludicrous legal system and move on lest we tie ourselves in knots trying to explain it.
    • Being related isn't a problem as long as they aren't involved in the case. Von Karma wasn't actively involved in Edgeworth's case until it turned out he was behind it all at the very end. Franziska and Edgeworth might be siblings, but neither one of them was actually involved in the 3-5 case. As for Apollo Justice, that particular case was a special one. It was implied that they wanted the case over and done with as quickly as possible, which is why they allowed for someone who found the body to defend, and someone who was a part of the case to prosecute. As it stands, Apollo was the only one who would defend Machi, at any rate.
      • Still, sometimes Phoenix would have been more useful (*cough* 1-2, 2-2 *cough*) if he was not the defense. That way he could testify as an 'unbiased' witness for the defendant.
        • The same goes for Apollo in 4-3. But that case also reveals a problem with the setup: the court was hesitant to accept Lamiroir's testimony at face value because she was a friend of the defendant. Wouldn't they say the same thing about Phoenix testifying on Maya's behalf?
  • Steel Samurai seems to have a massive following both among kids and adults during its run time, a lot of publicity events and a ** theme park** . Why spend so much on all that only to cancel it after 13 episodes?
  • So, testimonies and cross-examinations. What's the deal with them? It always seems like the witness first gives the testimony, then everyone talks about it for a bit, then you get to cross-examine... in which the witness gives the same exact testimony again only you get to butt in with "Hold it!"s and "Objection!"s. And often, when you press things (especially those statements that often come at the beginning of testimonies that don't give you any information) the characters talk as if the cross-examination was the first time hearing the testimony. What's going on here?
    • Acceptable Breaks From Reality, just go with it. It's a video game after all mate...
  • If the trial was cancelled in "Turnabout Beginnings" due to the defendant being dead, why didn't the same thing happen in "Turnabout Reminiscence"?
    • It wasn't cancelled but Von Karma says that it has been put on hold indefinitely, which amounts to the same thing actually...
  • Will the rules of presenting evidence/profiles ever be consistent? In the first game, you could only present evidence unless a person is requested. The second game allows presenting a person's profiles. The third game covers Mia's first two cases, before Phoenix ever took up the mantle, but she was allowed to present people as well. Apollo Justice goes back to the rules of the first game. Who makes the rules?!?
    • Acceptable Breaks From Reality...It's not the law of what can be presented. It's that in game 2 and 3 they added presenting profiles then in game 4 they took it out again because it made it too complicated. That's all...
  • One of the odder new aspects of the third game was the heightened tendency for characters to cross-examine the defendant, mostly because this forced the defense attorneys to point out contradictions and thus hurt their own case. This continued in Apollo Justice, to the point that calling upon the defendant to testify is the final solution to case 3. So how does this mesh with the constant tendency in Investigations for the opponent to dismiss every immediate suspect's statements on the grounds that they'd say anything to protect themselves? If that's true, then no one should have cross-examined them at all!
    • Well, in real court systems, the defendant is allowed to speak in their own defense. They may not be believed, but they can do it.
      • Plus the prosecution is simply trying to get a theory across. It's not like it's illegal too call a the defendant too testify if they lie you know, seeing as how they are not a prosecution witness and thus were not promoted by them. In court, they call the defendant and get the defendant too reveal stuff that's negative too their case. In Investigations, they are dismissing the suspect being allowed too testify because what they will reveal is positive too their case.It makes sense in court that the defendant's won't lie about something negative so it makes perfect sense that they should be believed.
  • What is Edgeworth's hair color? In the sprites, it's grey, but, in the pictures, it's brown! What the heck?
    • Even weirder, in some of the sprites, Edgeworth's hair looks like a dark enough shade of gray to pass off as black to this troper.
  • Why is the defense lawyer's word taken just like any other testimony against the prosecution? In multiple cases, Phoenix rebuts the prosecution's argument with something like, "The defendant was at place X that night, and he was seen there by the most reliable witness I know: myself!" But surely the defendant's lawyer would be considered to have an agenda here; the prosecution at the very least should point out that Phoenix might as well be lying to protect his client.
    • This actually gets brought up in Apollo Justice: in Turnabout Serenade, Apollo is the only one who heard Mr. LeTouse's last words, and Klavier points out that Apollo could well be lying about that to help his case, since there is no evidence for what he said, save for Apollo's word.
      • As stated above. Plus I only recall this happening once, on this one occasion so I don't know what you're on about...
  • One thing that occurred to me was that in all of the games (well... the first three, anyway. Haven't finished the fourth yet), you can't see your client when they're being taken in for questioning. Are the clients not allowed to request for a lawyer (i.e., you) to be present during the questionings? If so, why haven't any of the clients requested this?
    • Take's place in Japan. Questioning is restricted too detectives or prosecutors in Japan.
  • In the third case of Apollo, and fifth of Investigations, how did the killers do so much moving around of bodies and other evidence without anyone seeing? I can buy that Alba could have just told everyone to vacate the Rose Garden when he dropped Coachen's body into the pool, since being able to order everyone to get off his country's soil seems to be one of his ambassadorial powers, but how did Yew retrieve the body at the other end without anyone seeing? Was no-one fighting the fire from the ground? And what did she do with the Steel Samurai's cart afterwards? Plus, how did no-one notice the giant length of wire that was shot between buildings? And in Apollo, I could see that it would be possible for Daryan to move the body, guitar, and Machi without anyone noticing, but it's such a big risk; why would he even try? The only thing he had to gain from doing it was matching the lyrics to throw everyone off; hardly an essential part of his plan. Also, what did he actually do to Machi? Hit him over the head? Chloroform him? What?
    • In terms of case 3 in Apollo, Daryan only just found out that his crimes (stealing the guitar case, burning the guitar, murder) had coincidentally followed the lyrics so he JUST got the idea too move the body. He needed some way to throw the lyric thing into the 180 so he moved the body to match the last part of the lyrics. In terms of how no one noticed in case 5 of Investigations, I'd guess the EXACT timeline of events would explain it. I think the fire that made the body smuggling possible was the first one which was on the upper floors. Let's not forget that it's stated there was hours between all the events that happened. It's possible Yew stayed in the passageway until the fire-fighters had gone (between the first fire and second fire occurring) and made a dash then. As for the wire that no one saw, you'd be surprised how hard it is too see a length of thing wire, especially one that's high up several floors.
  • Gumshoe's profile identifies him as a homicide detective; this makes sense given the series tradition for Always Murder. But then... why is he put in charge of a theft (3-2), and why is he involved in a kidnapping case (I-3)?
    • I think Phoenix actually asks Gumshoe this very question in 3-2, but I'm not sure what his response is.
    • Simply put: It's not uncommon for homicide detectives to take up other cases if the police are short of hands. And in response to the comment above, Phoenix actually asks Gumshoe why he is on the case and he replies by saying that "they needed all the help they could get with casing Mask*De Masque".
  • Not as much an It Just Bugs Me as an I'm kind of curious: Do you think Maya and Ema will ever be in the same game besides maybe brief cameos (since they both appeared in Ace Attorney Investigations). I just think it would be interesting to see them interact. I can't be the only one right?
    • That'd be awesome
      • Exactly. Imagine Ema's reaction to Maya's unscientific channeling technique. Oh sure, she may have heard about it from her sister, but that's totally different from seeing it. How would someone who believes so closely in science react to something like that.
        • Studying it very closely and trying to determine the principles behind it. It may be Measuring the Marigolds, but contrary to a common viewpoint, science is not about dismissing the supernatural.
  • Why is it that only Phoenix, Edgeworth, Mia, and Apollo are the only ones given vocals for their "Take That"s and "Hold It"s? Why is it that the secondary characters just get the bubbles? I know they're only secondary characters, compared to the four playable ones mentioned above, but it would be awesome to give everyone a voice.
    • It would take the surprise out of the moments when someone yell's "HOLD IT!" or "OBJECTION!" and they have the epic shocks on everyone's faces before finally revealing who it is that saved the day.
  • Why do the four mentioned feel the need to yell "Take That" at everything they point out? I know it's more exciting that way, but, for example, at the end of 3-2, Phoenix shows Ron why Dessie would stay with him by showing him the urn. Does he need to yell, "TAKE THAT!" at him?!
    • I'm now imagining him mumbling about how he never wanted to take such a worthless object at all
    • I always thought the whole thing was a Gameplay and Story Segregation given that at one point in 1-5, Phoenix was supposed to present an evidence to the judge. When you presented the wrong evidence he yells "TAKE THAT" and yet Phoenix doesn't say anything out loud and the judge penalized him for taking too long.
  • Does the courthouse have any security or surveillance whatsoever, aside from the courtroom bailiff? I'm looking at three specific situations here. 1) The very beginning of 2-1, in which a witness strikes the defense lawyer over the head with a fire extinguisher in plain sight in the defense lobby, and no one witnesses it. 2) In Apollo Justice's fourth case flashback, 3) In Investigations case 4, the only witness to anything happening in the courthouse hallway is a judge using the bathroom in the opposite wing. Admittedly, you can't always prevent these kinds of things from happening in the courthouse, but these events go almost completely unnoticed.
    • In case 2-1 it's possible that it happened in a resting place for attorney's. Sure it's still a court but it's not TOO far of a stretch to imagine that a attorney lobby would not have camera's. Besides this, it was based on the Japanese courts which are a lot more lenient on security then American courts due to lesser crime levels. Also it's a game about solving stuff. It would be no fun if you there was no mystery to it all.
      • It says "Defendant Lobby No.1" in the setting text. Phoenix is attacked there, and meets with Maggey in the same location.
        • Well that aside, it's a game about investigating crimes. I'd be no fun if you could just watch the video to see what who the killer is.
  • In Ace Attorney's world, how does cross-examinations and rebuttals look like? I mean, gameplay-wise, you have the witness's testimony, and you scroll piece by piece trying to find the contradiction, but for the people on trial, do they make them repeat the same thing over and over again? Just to have some guy in a suit to yell at you? That sort of makes attorneys seem like royal jackasses.
    • 1) This same question has been asked before. 2) Acceptable Breaks From Reality. Deal with it people.
  • This one is in the manga, not the games, but in 'Turnabout Showtime' (I think that's what it's called) the culprit (Raymond Splume) confesses so easily when all Wright did was outline what happened using circumstantial evidence? Am I missing something, but what was the decisive proof?
    • Most of the case until then had focused on accusing Julie because she was the only one who could use her hands. Phoenix, by pointing out that costumes could be removed by oneself, that they could be worn backwards and that because Raymond saw something that should have been behind him and Flip did a back flip instead of a front flip, they were wearing them backwards, disproved some of the assumptions that cast suspicion on Julie. Thia, apart from her breakup and the false testimony about her putting a knife into the costume, was the only evidence against her, and as Raymond's plan to frame her was falling apart while he started to look more suspicious with the new information, he broke down.
  • Why does the court always act so surprised when a defense attorney accuses a witness of being the actual guilty party? Considering it's the only way any defendant in the entire franchise has ever been found not guilty, you'd think it would be acknowledged as a standard defense tactic by now. Not doing so would be seen as not even trying to do their job.
    • I always assumed that the cases that get showcased in the games are probably the most dramatic and unusual examples. Even Phoenix Wright probably does other cases than the ones we see--his practice would be pretty much unsustainable otherwise, considering that he doesn't even seem to get paid for half of them...
      • A defence attorney doesn't HAVE to win a case by accusing someone else. In several cases, it's shown that a defendant can be declared innocent even while there are no other suspects. Plus I think the above troper is right, the cases that are shown are the most dramatic and strange cases, as evidenced when the Judge says that "Somehow the case's with you in them are the most strange Mr. Wright."
        • Then by all means explain why case 3-5 didn't end as soon as Dahlia was exorcised and Iris's involvement in Misty's death was found to be nothing more than helping move the body. Godot literally says that the trial can't end until the actual murderer is determined.
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