Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney/Headscratchers


General (within the first three games)

  • How come a lot of characters bring dangerous objects to court. In the second game, Von Karma has a whip, in the first one, Marshall even brings a KNIFE, and is seen with it at the stand, yet no one says a word!
    • Well, in Franziska's case, she's a prosecutor. Ace Attorney court favors prosecutors to such a ridiculous extent that nobody probably cares if they bring dangerous things in. As for Marshall and anyone else... Well, consider how a lot of other dangerous things have happened in the courthouse (Diego's poisoning, Terry's suicide, etc.) and it's quite likely that the courthouse has crappy security anyway.
  • The very first thing I want to point out is how Phoenix is presented in the series by those who do anything near him, especially in the Courtroom. Phoenix apparently has no skills of his own except to bluff when he never needs to. All the others-especially the female supporting characters-do nearly everything for him in the first three games. Am I the only one here who doesn't quite understand what and how Phoenix is so very important or useful in getting the person off scot-free?
    • Well, we, the players, know that Phoenix relies on his bluffing skills... But in-universe, people are probably impressed by his win record and may or may not actually know about the fact that he relies on Courtroom Antics to get those wins. In case 3-3, I think Phoenix even made a comment towards the beginning about how people are starting to know who he is more often now, or something to that effect. But then again, we also have people like Maggey in-game who claim to love his bluffing (in 2-1, at least), so who really knows.
  • Ok, I'm seriously confused. The whole DL-6 thing gives me a headache. Can someone explain to me exactly how Phoenix's success in solving the DL-6 murder shows Misty Fey is NOT a fraud? (To the public that is. Obviously I, the player, know it's totally legit.) Because the suspect Gregory Edgeworth's spirit accused was in fact innocent... so how is the Fey Clan making a recovery, as Sister Bikini states?
    • I always kind of assumed that, because the guy arrested for DL-6 turned out to be innocent, that people assumed that Misty was just making stuff up as opposed to actually channeling Gregory. When Phoenix proved that Manfred was the killer, I thought that would prove that Gregory had reason to be confused and give false info. Thus, people would have realized that Misty herself wasn't a fraud, and just because Gregory was the one who made the mistake doesn't mean that Misty is faking her skills.
  • Though I know the real reason is due to recycling sprites, do you think there's an in-game reason why the defendants are never given jail uniforms while incarcerated (You'll notice that when you come to the detention center, they'll be in their street clothes)? It seems that many of them are forced to stay in jail for more than 24 hours, so that would mean they'd have to be moved into the general prison population until trial and hence they'd need the proper uniforms. Do they just wear the clothes on their backs when incarcerated?
    • Eh, they probably figured that it's not enough of a big deal to justify adding new character sprites, and there's not really a need for an explanation anyway.
    • But Maggey Byrde was in jail for over a month and still in her waitress outfit, which was a new sprite specifically designed for her appearance in the game rather than a reuse.
    • Forcing defendants to appear in court in a jail uniform might prejudice the court against them. This doesn't explain what they wear at the detention center, but it applies to what they wear in court or right before they go to court.
      • Someone should have mentioned that during the trial of Terry Fawles.
      • Perhaps Fawles was within his rights to request a change of clothes (he remained in the same outfit in which he was arrested, which he hadn't changed out of since escaping), but being mentally ill, never thought to. It seems quite "in-character" for the Ace Attorney court system to place the burden of that kind of choice on the defendant.
  • While I can understand why it couldn't be used in court, why doesn't Phoenix start every case by going Pushing Daisies and having Maya or Pearl channel the victim and ask them what happened? The victim might lie or be wrong but it would be a start.
    • Because channeling the dead Gregory Edgeworth who didn't seem to give accurate information was exactly how Misty Fey fell from grace and caused the Fall Of Kurain. Phoenix or Maya wouldn't want to repeat this catastrophe?
      • They wouldn't have to use it in court, they could just use it to get a hint as to the real killer's identity. Still, I'll admit there are a lot of times when the victim didn't see the killer, it would allow Phoenix to have a more believable reason for his wild accusations such as Luke Atmey, Godot, Damon Gant, etc
      • See Fridge Brilliance. To sum it up, they might very well not be able to -- Pearl is young, as is Maya, and for all of their power, neither of them have mastered that power by the end of the Phoenix arc. They never summon anyone that isn't related to them through the Fey bloodline -- it's possible that doing so is extremely difficult, and they might not be able to control the spirit they summon regardless.
      • I don't think it's all that "difficult", It's probably just extremely dangerous for an inexperienced medium to channel a recently deceased murder victim, especially those who fit the Asshole Victim trope (which is... uh, most of the victims in the series). Their spirit would be likely be very angry, distraught, and confused, and would be near impossible to control (and not at all co-operative). Do Nick and Maya need any more danger in their lives?! It does make a whole lotta sense that summoning relatives would be easier (and safer, unless of course that relative happened to be one Dahlia Hawthorne), though. This explains the need for a super-secure "channeling chamber" in the Fey manor, despite the fact that Maya and Pearl seem to just go off into the next room to channel Mia.
  • First of all- How does Phoenix make a living? He only takes one case every three to six months or so, and has at least once spoke of working for free. Still, he seems to not be starving, and he never says anything about working another job. On top of this, apparently he's taking care of Maya, who can theoretically eat her weight in food.
    • Perhaps he's living off some vast inheritance, courtesy of Mia? There's also the fact that he did defend two very famous celebrities (Will Powers and Max Galactica). I imagine the two of them were quite generous after their acquittals.
    • In the second and third games it's hinted that he does take cases quite frequently -- he's become quite famous as an attorney, in fact -- but we only see (and play) the more important of them.
    • Assuming that the only cases Phoenix takes are the ones we play in-game is the same as assuming that Link can cross the country in only a few minutes in LOZ or that people all look the same in RPG's.
      • Note, however, that Maya makes fun of him in-game for only taking one case at a time.
      • Right before Phoenix becomes the attorney in case 1-4, the accused says that Phoenix has only been in three trials up to that point.
      • There are official mangas showing him taking other cases.
    • Also, an attorney can make money without dealing with cases. All sorts of things require legal advice or opinions, and Phoenix can probably make enough money to stay alive off of that (keeping in mind that the game does frequently imply that his finances aren't so healthy, of course.)
      • It seems Lawyers get paid very large flat fees in Phoenix Wright. Max, Edgeworth, and a few other Phoenix Clients are quite wealthy. While Larry didn't pay Phoenix, it's likely Phoenix might have gotten paid very large fees (10,000 or more) from them for their successful acquittals.
        • Speaking of salaries, how is it that no matter how many times Gumshoe's pay is cut, he somehow manages to get by with minimal food and lack of other necessities?
        • Gumshoe is currently paid so little that it's likely that his landlord takes pity on him and lets him 'forget' the rent. He is also mentioned to be buying cheaper and cheaper noodles, and he's always wearing the same clothes (he likely sold his dryer and lets his clothing air-dry, his fridge because noodles don't need to be refrigerated, etc.). Which is sad, really. Poor Gumshoe!
        • Yeah, Ramen Noodles are like, what, 16 cents a pack?
        • Alternatively, Edgeworth may help him a bit, but he keeps it in secret.
    • I think that ever since the fourth case of game 1, Phoenix has been living off Manfred Von Karma's money, which he was able to steal because Von Karma gave out his ATM number in the middle of court.
      • I think I love your theory. It can even spare Franny; she's a good prosecutor on her own, so she doesn't need daddy's inheritance! (though she may get a little bit p*** ed)
      • What, no one in the gallery jumped at the chance first?
        • You guys forgot the card.
    • Even if the only cases Phoenix takes are the ones we play (which is unlikely), he's still defended some pretty rich people- Edgeworth, Lana, Max, Engarde and DeLite. He could have just gotten a lot of money from them!
    • Not from Engarde, of course.
      • Maybe from Engarde. Phoenix might have sued him.
      • Getting a guilty verdict doesn't mean you don´t have to pay your lawyer.
      • Suddenly, the ending of JFA has become even sweeter. Burn, Matt, burn.
        • Adding fuel to that fire, consider all of the massive purchases that are made at the end of that cases, and where the money had to come from to pay for it all. Burn indeed.
    • Has nobody even considered that even though we might never see them, there might be other lawyers working at the Wright and Co. Law offices, and that as manager and owner, Phoenix gets a portion of the profits from their cases?
      • Rather unlikely. Because, well, we never hear or see anything from them. Or from Phoenix hiring anyone. Wright & co. could just be him and Maya (and Pearl) after all.
    • Iirc, at the beginning of the second game or maybe the third, Phoenix said himself that he had no cases at all since the end of the last game and the time that passes between games is roughly 6-12 months I think.
      • In game 1, there are a few offhand remarks about Phoenix only having done a few cases, but, well, those are his first few cases and he's still a rookie. Presumably he started taking cases more often after that.
    • If you want a theory that has no direct evidence for it in the games and seems sort of unlikely but is fully consistent with the games: Maya could have sued Redd White. The plaintiff's attorney usually gets about 30% of the settlement, while the referring attorney who directs the plaintiff to the lawyer who represents her gets about 5%. Given that Maya could have conceivably gotten millions from White, either percentage would be a tidy sum.
  • Sure, Matt Engarde was a special case where it didn't work. But why doesn't Phoenix in the second and third game just whip out his magatama at every suspect and ask them if they committed the crime? If psyche-locks showed up when they said no, he'd know to look harder at that person and find all the evidence that they did it.
    • Well, Wright almost always makes a big deal out of implicitly trusting his client. That doesn't explain, however, why he doesn't use the magatama during the trials. Sure, he'd look kind of weird waving around a piece of weird jewelry, but that's positively normal compared to some of the other lunacy going on.
    • Or maybe the Magatama isn't perfect and doesn't detect every lie.
    • At one point, I think it's explained that the Magatama only works against people that have secrets in their hearts. Not all secrets are held in the heart, perhaps. Plus, there's the implication that Phoenix is the only one that can see the results of the Psyche-Lock, since Maya and Pearl never comment on it. Finally, it seems as though using the Magatama is dangerous, since if Phoenix runs out of energy while using it, he's told he has to stop, or his spirit will shatter. Waving it indiscriminately probably wouldn't help that.
      • Oh, and Phoenix isn't exactly practiced in the use of the Magatama. He's genuinely surprised when a Psyche-Lock appears, at which point he then has to wave the Magatama to break them. Probably not how it's supposed to be used...
    • What bothers me about the Magatama is why Phoenix, all the way up to the last case of game three, keeps assuming that someone is telling the truth just because of lack of locks, when he's met Matt, who avoided being found out through a wording snag, and Atmey, who was able to outright lie to the thing.
      • Because a) he believes in his clients, b) he's naive enough to assume people are telling the truth, or c) he's so confident in the times that the Magatama works that the times it doesn't slip his mind. Pick one.
      • Phoenix never acknowledges realizing that Luke Atmey basically tricked the Magatama in the third game.
    • Perhaps the Magatama only detects the lies that are addressed to its holder. In court, the witnesses lies are addressed to the judge, not Phoenix Wright specifically, and so the Magatama doesn't pick up on them.
      • This troper believes there is a proximity limit to it. That, and it can be also be cheated like your average lie detector.
        • Has no one even brought up what Pearls says: "The Magatama only works in consignment." Using it in a packed courtroom would mean that the secret wouldn't be able to be detected.
  • Why does Larry call Phoenix "Nick" unless its his middle name it has nothing to do with his name or personality.
    • Are you sure it has "nothing" to do with his name? He's just saying the "-nix" part but in a more sensible name thing. It's not like it isn't a common way to nickname the name "Phoenix".
      • Thank you very much. It's strange how things as simple as that can bother me so much and be so obvious.
  • In the "Turnabout Big Top" episode of Justice For All, both Phoenix and Franziska say that Edgeworth never went to another case as prosecutor after "Turnabout Goodbyes" in the first game. However, how is that possible when the credits that roll directly after Turnabout Goodbyes show at least one instance where Edgeworth is again arguing with Phoenix in court? Something just doesn't add up here.
    • You've got me there. And why didn't they bother rewriting the DS remake of Justice For All a little to compensate for "Rise from the Ashes", the bonus fifth chapter of Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney?
      • Okay, I checked the exact line. Phoenix's EXACT line is the following: "But after "that" case was over... He "vanished"..." A short time later, he says "After that case, Edgeworth was in a peculiar state, and he got worse everyday. He never set foot into court again... And then one day, he just vanished." Note that at no time does he actually say the case IS Turnabout Goodbyes. You did see a picture from that case when Phoenix thinks "But after "that case was over..." But I do not believe that at any time they specifically said which case they were referring to. The picture shown makes you think of Turnabout Goodbyes but I do not believe the dialogue ever stated it was that case. Back in the GBA version, they were referring to the case with Manfred, but in the DS version, with "Rise from the Ashes", it's clear they were referring to "Rise from the Ashes". Bottom line: The picture shown is a bit incorrect, but the dialogue never contradicts "Rise from the Ashes".
    • It doesn't seem like what Phoenix thinks about Edgeworth in Justice For All makes sense either way. Phoenix finds out in the first game that Edgeworth became a prosecutor and was so aggressive in getting convictions is because Von Karma murdered his dad and manipulated him. He's already clearly turning a new leaf even before then since he raised an objection to keep the Steel Samurai case going and find the real criminal. It makes even less sense if you take the Rise From The Ashes case as canon, since it reveals Edgeworth wasn't responsible for any forged evidence.
      • First of all, Phoenix is undoubtedly upset with Edgeworth for writing such a misleading and depressing note. Second, Phoenix misinterpreted the reason for Edgeworth's depression (thinking that it was because his perfect win record was tarnished). Third, even if he never forged evidence, Edgeworth hid things from the court and was practically helping the culprit in case 1-2. In Trials and Tribulations, you learn that Edgeworth also hid things from the court in case 3-4.
    • Regarding the original question, that scene with Phoenix vs Edgeworth in the end credits could be from the Nickel Samurai case. I think it was just a symbolic We Will Meet Again thing.
  • Why is being a kid's TV actor such Serious Business? Apparently, Matt has somehow become a millionaire from playing a character who is, essentially, a Power Ranger.
    • It's mentioned that Matt and Juan's rivalry's been going on for a long time, and that their kids' shows are just the latest part of it, so presumably Matt's been in show business for a while.
    • But apparently a sign of Hammer's failing career was that he had to play the villain of 'The Steel Samurai' rather than the hero. It's as though somehow playing the Red Ranger is a sign of a healthy career, whereas playing Lord Zedd will get you completely ignored. It's just a little odd.
      • Correction: It was a sign of his failing career that he was in The Steel Samurai at all. The fact that he had to do it opposite a relatively inexperienced actor who was beloved by children all over the country was just salt in the wound.
      • What about all the movies he appeared in before then? Each one featuring a Samurai? Are they all supposed to be more serious samurai flicks?
    • Super Sentai (Power Rangers in Japan) and other shows of this format like Kamen Rider, while essentially being a kid's show (even though the plots are often far more serious and complex as our Power Rangers) is very successful. It's been going on for what, 60 years now? So yeah, being the star of the newest season is probably a pretty big thing.
  • Manfred mentions he has a granddaughter (bringing up her dog) at one point, I haven't heard any mention of Franciska (or Edgeworth for that matter) being a parent. Her given age means she is still a minor, the only thing that comes to mind to explain her on non-existences is law school (very plausable) but where does she fit in?
    • Word of God says that Franziska has an elder sister, who has a daughter of her own.
      • I always thought he just made that up in order to give an example and make some fun of Phoenix in the meantime.
  • Prior to Apollo Justice, Phoenix really must have been the luckiest attorney around. Isn't it a bit distressing that his clients would have been found guilty if not for the fact that the contradictions were clearly visible? For example, in the second game's first case, Phoenix initially proves that the victim didn't write the killer's name with his right hand by showing evidence that he was left-handed. So, if the victim actually had been right-handed, the defendant would have been found guilty? Or if he hadn't received a glove? (It gets worse in the fourth case. Maya would have died if a) Adrian hadn't set a glass down on the dresser, or b) she had been as tall as Matt.)
        • It would not have still stood. If you don't point out the wine glass, Matt is found guilty. If you don't point out the height difference in the photo, Matt is found guilty. Both only give you one chance, and the dialogue says that if you can't find something wrong, then there's no choice but to declare Matt guilty. If neither discrepancy was visible, the case would have been unwinnable. But that's only one example. My point is, the only reason why Phoenix kept winning in this heavily prosecutor-biased world was that he managed to get all the cases where the contradictory evidence was right in front of him and easily pointed out. And Apollo Justice is devoted to the notion that this simply doesn't work.
  • In 2-4 and especially in 3-5, Phoenix and other characters spend a lot of time worrying about whether Maya is dead, and in the Bad Ending of 2-4 Phoenix seems to be slightly uncertain whether she was really released alive or not. Surely there would be a really, really easy way to tell if this was the case? "Hey Pearl, could you channel Maya for us? You can't? Okay, still alive!"
    • For most of 2-4 they weren't worried that Maya would be dead, just in danger, as De Killer was keeping his word, and for most of 3-5 Pearls was unavailable, and when they found her she though that her powers had dissapeared when she couldn't summon Dahlia, besides Phoenix wouldn't let her do something like that because suddenly discovering that Maya was indeed dead would surely traumatize her.
      • There's still the 'I never saw Maya again' stuff in the Bad Ending, though? I mean, in a situation like that, surely Pearl would rather know one way or the other, even though it'd suck.
        • I've always assumed in the Bad Ending that it was * Phoenix* that never saw Maya again, not so much the world itself. That is, Matt was found Not Guilty, Maya is released, but is so disappointed in Phoenix for allowing Matt to go free that she cuts off all contact. Presumably, this includes Pearl as well since Pearl is more loyal to Maya than Phoenix. One presumes Phoenix could just go to Kurain Village to say hi, but maybe he knows that she wouldn't see him.
        • More likely, Phoenix was too ashamed after the trial to ever see Maya again. He ran out of the courtroom after the verdict was handed down, remember?
    • In case 3-5, Pearl thought that she had lost her power as a channeler. Phoenix could test that by asking Pearl to channel Misty once he found out who the victim was, but that would require admitting to Pearl that Misty was dead.
  • How is it that all the photos we get in the first three games are black and white? I believe we are in the future, surely we have excellent quality cameras to take excellent quality crime scene photos. And then we wouldn't waste time speculating whether something is a splotch of paint or blood...
    • I've heard this somewhere before a long time ago, so I might not be exactly correct: A Black-and-white photo can sometimes be better than a color one because you can see things better. Especially in the dark.
      • Black and white photographs have sharper images and are prone not to fade. Though if they are better in the dark I'm not sure about.
  • Where do all the chains go after all a person's Psyche-Locks break? Do they get re-used again in other sessions?
    • Em...those chains aren't real you know, they just disappear after they are done for.
    • They're just mental imagery. If they were real chains, the person being examined would see them. Which they don't. Since they don't exist, it doesn't really matter what happens to them.
  • Why is Will Powers playing the Pink Princess? That's just creepy.
    • I dunno, but the weird thing is that apparently the Steel Samurai is a major player in Pink Princess. So unless they got another guy to play the Samurai, it would be assumed that Powers would have continued to play as the Steel Samurai. My personal theory is that Global Studios just went with Oldbag to play the Pink Princess on the show, because that would be hilarious.
      • While it's stated that Pink Princess was a sequel to the Steel Samurai, was it ever stated that the Steel Samurai was actually a main character in the Pink Princess? I always kind of assumed that, because it's also stated that Will is the Pink Princess, the Steel Samurai was a minor character at most who they could have a stunt double play.
    • Real life toku heroines have often been played by male stunt actors under their suits, though this has become less common recently due to more women getting into stunt work.
  • Why do people not believe in spirit mediums when the channeller obviously, physically changes into the channel-ee? In particular, Misty Fey in DL-6; why was she considered a fraud because the guy she testified against was found not guilty (on an insanity plea, at that), when anyone in the courtroom could have seen her turn into a man?
    • I'm pretty sure she did it privately, not in court so while the cops who asked her may believe her, the public doesn't and they probably can't say so without losing their jobs. The real question is why it took a psychic to tell them that the one person in the room who was armed and not a ten-year old did it..., or why his being 'crazy' at the time caused her to be seen as wrong. They didn't ask why he got shot, just who shot him. even if he was wrong... I think it's mainly just so Phoenix can't just have Maya/Pearl summon the victim and have them tell what happened.
    • Also, Edgeworth refuses to believe in it despite the number of times he's been in court when Maya magically morphs into her dead older sister right in front of him. Even weirder since Franziska does know it's real.
      • It's somewhat implied that Edgeworth's disbelief isn't so much actual skepticism as it is the fact that he doesn't want to think it's real, because of the horrible connections the Kurain technique holds for him.
    • It's also heavy implied that when a spirit is channeled not everyone can see that spirit, only those either that believe in spirit channeling or those that have a strong bond to the spirit. This is implied heavy seeing as how when Penny Nichols she's Mia she exclaims "is that girl the same person as before?" not "That girl IS a different person from before." She also very quickly and easily drops the issue even though anyone with working eyes can clearly see that they were not the same. I could be that Penny was actually seeing Maya (Phoenix only being able to see Mia her because he had a strong bond to her)however the way Mia's spirit made Maya's body stand/look in terms of posture was what made her ask. Also, when Godot see's Pearl turn into Mia in the middle of the trial he doesn't react in the way you would expect him to react if he saw his departed girlfriend standing before her (shouting out "OH MY FUCKING GOD!" etc). he is a only little shocked which could implying that Godot in fact saw Maya standing in a Mia like way making him think of Mia or something like that. That would explain why Maya could transform into the victim of the current trial right in front of anyone with out them so much as questioning it or bringing it up. Also when Phoenix first see's Maya transformed into Mia he sees her in Mia's old chief cloths, implying that what people see is not what is visibly there. About the photo in "Reunion and Turnabout" showing Mia being channeled, it is possible that, seeing as how Fransiska apparently has no trouble in believing the channeling the photo was taken from her minds point of view.
      • But what about Victor Kudo? He doesn't know Mia (or Maya), and has no reason whatsoever to believe in spirit channeling, yet his reaction to Maya channeling Mia is pretty obvious. All he knows is that there is a much more adult stranger standing where a younger stranger was standing before.
      • And what about Maya channeling Dahlia in 3-5? Presumably not EVERYONE had a connection to the one being channeled…
      • IIRC, Godot does react to Pearl and Maya summoning Mia. He just doesn't freak out about it, and staying cool seems in-character for him. He does seem surprised when Mia is first channeled in 3-2. So it's probable that other people notice even if they don't directly comment on it. And while I can buy Franziska being able to see Maya channeling Mia because she supposedly studied up on the Kurain technique for 2-2... Why would that make the photo itself different? Unless camera magically gets altered...
  • If Larry, Phoenix, and Edgeworth were all not only childhood friends, but also in the same class, why is Larry an year younger than them? For a long time, I had assumed that Phoenix was 23 during the first case because I also assumed he would be the same age as Larry. Maybe Larry was just a few months younger than Phoenix, but it seems that game developers don't really pay that much attention to age save for flashbacks and aging everyone up for sequels. The only other explanation I could think of was that Larry somehow managed to skip a grade... but that seems unlikely.
    • ...maybe that's why he's so slow? Since he skipped a grade and was thus at the bottom?
    • He probably has a late birthday. Its not unheard of.
      • Or, Phoenix and Edgey could have earlier birthdays, like the OP stated. In my school, I'm at the average age for my grade, but I have friends who are older than me because they were born months earlier in the same year as me. This is always what I've assumed.
  • Where on earth do Phoenix/Maya live? They obviously don't live in the law firm (since Phoenix actually comes in to visit Mia in 1-2) and I don't see Maya renting out an apartment or something so...
    • OBJECTION! ::pointing:: Think back to the phone conversation that opens 1-2... ::slams desk, Theme Music Power-Up:: where Maya mentions that she is getting used to living in her own place! ::speed lines:: She does indeed have an apartment (or similar)!
      • You win. Anything and everything, forever.
  • So Edgeworth leaves the prosecutors office for a year, making people think he'd died, and in Investigations it's revealed he'd been gone for at least a month to study law overseas. Here's what I want to know: What about his frigging dog?! It's a known fact that he HAS one, so who's been looking after it while he's been gone? Surely if they thought it's owner was dead, poor Pess would have been sent to the pound or something. It's not like he brought Pess with him, so what happened to the dog? The only thing I can think of is Gumshoe, really, but I doubt he has the funds to look after himself, let alone a pet.
    • The only person who thought Edgeworth had died was Phoenix, along with anyone who got the information from Phoenix. Even then, this was an exaggeration on Phoenix's part; he simply thought Edgeworth to be dead because he'd rather think that than believe Edgeworth just gave up. Furthermore, it wouldn't have been too unlikely for a guy like Edgeworth to just pay Gumshoe to watch over his dog. Or someone else, for that matter. There ARE dog sitters in the world.
  • Since when does a defense attorney have to find the real guilty party to clear his defendant's name? I mean, in several of the cases, you make it clear that your client couldn't have done it, but even so, your client is found guilty unless you find who the real killer is. Law does not work like that.
    • It has been pretty much established that Phoenix Wright works in the worst legal system in all of history. In fact, the only real legal right the accused still has is the right to a speedy trial, generally three day or less trial one or two days after the crime. Even if the victim has not been identified.
  • Why do the killers happen to involve themselves with the case when the prime suspect is someone else? For example, in game 2 case 2, Ini Miney could have just not said anything at all. Her testimony was used to throw even more suspicion on Maya, but if she had kept her mouth shut, no one would have ever suspected that she was involved in any way. But for some reason, she just had to be a witness and provide testimony, and that's what made her plans fall apart. A similar thing happens in game 2 case 1. The real murderer was, as far as everyone was concerned, just a random passerby. He could've just recovered the phone and skedaddled, with nothing linking him to crime at all. Idiot Ball indeed.
    • OBJECTION! In 2-1, it's revealed that, thanks to his involvement in a ring of con artists, Richard Wellington had pretty much lost his ability to make rational judgements due to paranoia. The fact that Dustin Prince was still in his police uniform when he arrived did not ease matters much for him. And he couldn't have grabbed his phone after the accident because he didn't know where it was, and since his glasses were currently underneath Dustin Prince's body, he couldn't see well enough to look for it.
    • And as for Ini/Mimi Miney, because she didn't want anyone to discover that she was actually still alive, she actually had decent reason to stick around and give testimony. The main reason she cooperated with Morgan was so that her secret wouldn't come out, so of course she'd make sure that Maya gets declared guilty.
  • Two words: reasonable doubt. What is up with that? I get seriously bugged whenever a case drags on well after I have poked notable holes in the crucial witnesses and evidences of the prosecution but still have to do their job for them. I understand that it is supposed to be about how the Japanese court system favors convictions massively but it feels insane how far you are made to go. I wish they would just let you play the prosecutor ( not the detective cough Miles Edgeworth Investigations cough).
    • Yeah, that's right. Reasonable Doubt and the judge given the ability to dismiss the defense for any reason makes no sense. The defense has to be able to protect its clients to their fullest ability and that the Judge is SUPPOSED to take ALL information-prosecutor and defendant-with the same weight. What the hell?
  • Why does Gumshoe call everyone 'sir', even when the person is a girl? This is really noticeable, especially when talking to Franziska.
    • Verbal Tic? Gumshoe's not very high up on the food chain, so it could just be that he constantly addresses people as "sir" in an attempt to be respectful.
  • What is up with the Feys being able to read Phoenix's mind? Is it a mistake with the writers (not distinguishing whether Phoenix is talking in his mind or not) or is it something that comes with spirit medium powers?
    • I always assumed that when Phoenix's dialogue is in brackets, he's not necessarily thinking, just not talking to anyone in particular. Mia and Maya can pick up on his thoughts in court because he was just saying them under his breath.
    • My thought is that it's a bit of a joke. Phoenix is so bad at keeping a secret that you can practically read his mind just by looking at his body language.
    • Also, during case 1-2, wasn't it mentioned towards the end of the second investigation, in Mia's notes on her investigation on the DL-6 case, that Mia has ESP? That explains her, and it's probable that the rest of the Feys have ESP too as part of their spirit powers.
  • Why is it that whenever you point out a contradiction in the witnesses testimony that makes them look guilty, they (or the prosecutor) looks like they just took a hit?
  • I know it's like their religion or whatever, but... how much of what the Feys believe is actually true? Clearly, spirit channeling is real in the AA universe, but some of the other things they believe in don't seem to hold up. A blatant example would be how in the final case of the third game, they go on and on about the importance of the demon warding hoods. Those don't seem to work at all, considering that they're supposed to "protect against evil spirits", but in fact an "evil spirit" wore one (or so she and Godot said)! The charms written on the walls of the Main Hall didn't seem to help much in preventing tragedy either. Phoenix's opinion that the "special training course" in that case is a scam doesn't exactly seem to be disproven either. "A block of 'spirit ice?'" Chanting the same "spell" 30,000 times? No one ever casts a spell in the games (aside from Pearl enchanting the magatama) and all the magicians in the series are illusionists. Another example relates to the urn that was first introduced in the second game and also makes its appearance in the third game. This urn is supposed to contain the spirit of Ami Fey. Pearl suggests that breaking the urn would cause the spirit to leave the urn, something that I'm assuming represents an actual Fey clan belief. Yet no one seems to notice the difference, even when Pearl has its legitimacy checked at the village in the third game.
    • As you said, they believe it is true. Every religion has its beliefs, some are supported by facts and some aren't. Chanting the same spell over and over under ice does what it does in real life by enhancing focus and I think that hood is more a symbolic thing, like the symbols. And for breaking the urn with Ami Fey's spirit, it's practically a Fey tradition at this point. The urn was probably just a symbol of power, and her spirit probably was long gone.
  • I don't think this is wildly known, but Word of God said that Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective took place at Ace Attorney's universe. Good so far. But I must wonder: Do the Fey know about the Ghost World or the Temsik Meteor? I mean, those ghosts are so powerfully they can alter reality to their will. They can switch things out of place. Heck they can change history itself. The Fey are supposed to be the best mediums in the world... it's strange to think that they wouldn't care about ghosts altering the course of history to save someone. Also brings up the question: Why not simply revive Misty Fey or Mia with Ghost Tricks? I can understand if the Temsik radiation is the only way to get ghost powers, but there must be someone else with these around the globe, and the Ace Mediums are bound to notice it at some point. There were lots of pieces of the Temsik spread when he crashed, that not counting other pieces that were not shown.
    • If Ghost Trick takes place in the future, then such powerful spirits probably don't exist in the AA timeline until Apollo Justice, where there are no mediums.
  • What exactly are spirits capable of seeing when they aren't being channeled? Mia, even when she's not being channeled, seems to have the ability to see what Maya sees in case 1-2. Sure, there are plenty of reasons for Mia to know a lot about that case, but how did she know without being told that Redd White had said that he saw the lamp stand? Unless she heard Maya tell Phoenix about Fey spirit mediums, why did Mia act like Phoenix should already know about her family's spirit powers when Phoenix said Mia never told him? Lotta even takes a photo in that game showing Mia's ghost, implying that a spirit can have a location in the physical world when not being channeled. If that's the case, why does Mia have to wait for Maya to channel her in the second game when they're trying to figure out where Shelley De Killer took her? Furthermore, in the third game, why can't Dahlia spy on people in case 3-5 before she's channeled to figure out where they are?
    • And as evidence to prove that the writers didn't change the rules of channeling in later games, Mia's first line in 3-2 continues a report card running gag that was used repeatedly during the cross-examination before she was channeled.
    • Spirits probably just exist in a spirit realm until they are needed. But since Mia died right in front of Phoenix, it makes sense that they share a bond even without blood. That's why she could talk in his head earlier and why she appeared in the photo. Later on, since she's just being dead, she doesn't know what's going on until she's channeled and presumably filled in mentally. Dahlia died alone in a prison, so the only ones she has any connection to are her sister and possibly her mother.

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney

  • I don't expect her to murder him or anything, but you think Maya would still have a much more noticeable and violent hatred toward Redd White. He murdered the only member of her nuclear family that she knew, so it would only make sense she lets something slip in the later games about it, right?
    • On a related note, she should also be really, Really, REALLY freaking depressed. She's too happy for someone who's in her position.
      • Bear in mind that as a spirit medium, she knows for a fact that Mia's spirit is still out there. She even gets to see Mia again in the second game. I imagine that would take the edge of the death of a loved one somewhat.
      • If you present Maya's profile to Mia in 2-2, she says she can tell Maya is often "sad and lonely". It's thus possible that she's something of a Stepford Smiler, like she is after 3-5.
  • Why was Misty Fey disgraced by the events of DL-6? She said Yanni Yogi did it, and the investigation and trial showed that he did (although he didn't) but he ended up getting off on an insanity plea. This should mean that to the general public Misty Fey was right.
    • My impression is that the insanity plea was that Yanni could not have been the murderer because he became too insane to even hold the gun.
    • Why the hell did they need to go to her in the first place is what I want to know. The case seemed pretty freaking clear to me!
      • The case was probably hard to crack because there was a period of time where the scene was left "undiscovered". Remember, von Karma was shot, meaning that the elevator had arrived at its floor and was open. Since von Karma obviously did not alert the authorities (to distance himself from the crime), it means that as far as the police knew, anyone could have greeted Edgeworth Sr. with a gun between the time of the elevator opening its doors and the police discovering it. There was no proof that the murder occurred INSIDE the elevator after all.
      • It was told that when Misty summoned Gregory Edgeworth, his ghost told everyone that Yanni Yogi killed him, but we later find out that the ghost lied because he thought that Miles Edgeworth, his own son, killed him because that was the last person he saw when the gun went off. Gregory had no idea that Manfred Von Karma killed him since he did not see him when he was killed. If you look back to case 2, remember the scene where Marvin Grossberg admitted that he sold out Misty Fey to Redd White for money. Redd White then exposed the police's use of a channeler, thus the public dubbed her as a fraud.
      • There would likely have been at least two sets of prints on the gun, too--Yanni's and Miles's. Von Karma wore gloves, but didn't wipe it.
        • I'm not positive that Gregory actually thought Miles killed him. The only reason he would have to think that would be if he'd have heard when the gun went off the first time, then passed out immediately afterwards. The only person who suggested that Miles' father lied was Grossberg, back before anyone knew who the real killer was.
        • Remember that it was totally dark in the elevator, and that Gregory died after the second shot, so it's possible he had no idea, and thought that the gun that was thrown had discharged twice.
          • I'm pretty sure Gregory was unconscious by the time Von Karma showed up, so he just remembered he was fighting with a crazy armed guy, heard a gunshot, was unconscious and then was dead.
    • I got the impression that the very idea of the police hiring a spirit medium to crack a case was so controversial that it made Misty a laughingstock in the court of public opinion, and she left Kurain Village so that the media wouldn't drag the rest of the place down by its association with her. Sort of like if the LAPD had asked John Edward to solve the O.J. Simpson case for them.
    • Based on the second game, it is likely that there was a certain person who was trying to make sure that DL-6 did as much damage to Misty's reputation as possible. This is just a guess, though. DL-6 damaged the technique's reputation, which hurt everyone at the village including the person who would have wanted to trash Misty. Still, the third game says that after DL-6, there was a rumor even among channelers that Misty's powers were a sham. A certain person could have been encouraging this. *nudge* *nudge* Morgan Fey *hint* *hint*
  • In game 1 case 2, Mr White says he entered the office a week before the murder, at the beginning of September, however the murder took place on September 5th, meaning there is a maximum of 4 days he could have entered, someone who speaks with Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness would not use "week" to refer to a period of time that is at most 4 days! Yes I know he is lying about this bit, but it still just bugs me.
    • Maybe he meant a work week? 5 days.
    • Or maybe he meant during the week before the murder.
    • Plus, he kinda butchers the language.
      • This. Unlike the other verbose characters in the series (in cases 2-1, 3-2, and 4-2), who seem to actually know what they're talking about, Redd White just makes up words in an attempt to seem smart and impress women. (Granted, the verbose character in 2-1 is less educated than he claims and is constantly using Insane Troll Logic and suffering from You Fail Logic Forever, but he still seems genuinely knowledgeable more so than Redd White.)
  • Game 1, case 4: Gregory testifies through Misty that Yanni Yogi shot him. But since the elevator was dark, there's no way he could have seen that! Any competent defense attorney could have destroyed his testimony in about two minutes of cross-questioning, and Robert Hammond was more than competent.
    • How was anyone supposed to know the elevator was dark? There were only three people that knew that: Gregory, Edgeworth, and Yanni. Edgeworth was in shock over the possibility that he shot his father, Yanni was, well, more than a little crazy (enough for a judge to declare him legally so), and Gregory was dead. So no one would really know that it was dark.
      • Uh, power outage?
      • I would think there would be the possibility of emergency lights.
    • The flash from the gun.
    • I believe lighting isn't relevant; he just didn't know the other possibilities. Yogi went rather violent on him, probably slamming him against the elevator wall hard enough to make him faint (remember his dead pose? And that air was already rather scarce?). Then, Gregory could have believed he was killed immediately after with the gun by Yogi. He didn't testify to hearing a shot nor hearing von Karma's demonic yell. The reason he said "Yanni Yogi shot me" would be, then, that he fainted while struggling with the man. ALSO, he testified in secret with the police and, arguably, the prosecution; defense attorney Hammond had no chance to cross-examine, so nobody could have brought the lighting to the case... Mmm... TL;OMG!
    • I don't think Gregory Edgeworth ever actually testified in court in that case.
  • Why were Hammer and Powers doing their rehearsals with real lethal implements? You'd think Hammer and Vasquez of all people would've been wary of doing such a thing, considering that Jack had already killed someone during filming.
    • Just because a prop is not a real lethal spear it doesn't mean it's not sharp. The spear was probably made of metal yet had a blunt end so it wasn't OVERLY lethal. However even a blunt weapon can kill someone in a strong hand.
  • Since apparently the Kurain style of channeling involves body transformation...does that mean that when Misty channeled Greggory...she turned into a man?
    • Maybe there's a difference between 'communing with' and 'channeling'.
    • There's a text-only flashback to the channeling where Gregory blames it on Yanni Yogi - admittedly the beeps are the high-pitched "female voice" ones, but I do like to think that Misty's appearance changed. There was some fanart I found once of Maya channeling Gregory to help Miles on a case... it was hilarious. Wholesome Crossdresser, anyone?
      • Hold It! Do you mean... This fanart, by any chance?
      • If this is the case, we can safely conclude that Miles wasn't present at Yanni's trial. After all, he admits in the third game that he doesn't know about or believe in channeling.
        • The reason he doesn't believe in channeling is because the testimony Gregory gave while being channeled by Misty was false, not because of Edgeworth's (lack of) exposure. Also, in 3-5 Edgeworth mentions in passing that he met Misty Fey in person in the aftermath of DL-6.
      • Not to mention that if Misty had become Gregory in court, no one would have called her a fraud, regardless of inaccurate testimony.
    • The real craziness is when Pearl channels Mia and approximately doubles in body mass. Hello, conservation of matter?
      • I'd put it closer to quadrupling.
      • I'm more confused about the fact that an adult woman is able to wear a 9-year old's clothes and the only skin shown is a pleasant amount of cleavage...
        • Presumably, being aware of the bodily transformation bit, their clothes are designed to accommodate various body sizes without undue embarrassment.
        • Note also that Maya wears knee-length clothing and Pearl wears ankle-length clothing.
        • Actually, I'm pretty sure Pearl's clothes are knee-length too.
        • It's also worth noting that Pearl's clothes have the same loose, flowing look as Maya's on Pearl herself, but are positively tiny on Mia--she ends up with short sleeves, for instance.
      • Well, if you look closely at their clothes, you can see how exactly they work: The robe wraps around the wearer's body and the belt holds it around the wearer's waist, while simultaneously being able to loosen up to let the body become larger. I have only one complaint: There is no way Pearl's robe is long enough to cover Mia's lower naughty bits!
        • Good thing this game is always shot from the waist-up!
  • One part that this Troper spent a while on was one part in case 1-5, when Ema Skye is trying to describe what she saw the night Neil Marshall was murdered. The biggest reason is because the game throws a huge Red Herring in the way, as she claims to have witnessed Marshall getting stabbed in the chest, whereas the autopsy report clearly states he was stabbed in the back. Most of the time was spent figuring out how to object to it, including pressing every statement many, many times.
  • Why does making a defense that your actions were irrational behavior caused by oxygen deprivation require you to act insane when you are no longer deprived of oxygen?
    • Because the defense was that he was got brain damage by said oxygen deprivation. It would be a mite suspicious if he made a miraculous recovery.
      • Double Jeopardy is used elsewhere in the series as a reason someone can't be prosecuted twice for the same crime. Also, I find it a mite suspicious that Edgeworth's brain is fine.
        • Well, of course, he didn't actually have brain damage. Robert Hammond was a lot like von Karma in that he didn't care about his clients, all he cared about was winning. Whilst Yanni Yogi did panic because of oxygen deprivation, he didn't get any lasting brain damage from it. He was just made to pretend like he had so he would be found Not Guilty. What puzzles me, however, is how Miles was able to throw the gun at all. We find that they all passed out at about the same moment, when the elevator doors opened, but Miles was only a child then, with a much lower body mass than the other two. Being so small, he should have fallen unconscious/died from a lack of oxygen way before the two adults did.
        • OBJECTION!!! ::Slams hands on the table:: There were reasons to think Miles was the only one that passed out by oxygen deprivation. ::Holds out a paper sheet:: According to the testimony, Gregory Edgeworth and Yanni Yogi had a fight, that ended with Yogi beating up Edgeworth, 'while having a panic attack' ::speed lines:: So only Miles passed out by oxygen deprivation!
          • OBJECTION!!! ::Holds out a paper sheet:: von Karma states that Gregory passed out as well due to oxygen deprivation and had no idea who killed him in the end. ::Slams hands on table:: Thus, the point still stands!
  • So apparently manslaughter and murder are charged similarly in the world of Ace Attorney. Edgeworth was nearly convicted of his father's murder when he (at the time a terrified child) threw a gun in his father's vague direction. If this is the case why wasn't he tried for assault with a deadly weapon for the bullet hitting von Karma? That was an accident too.
    • Because if von Karma had revealed that he had been shot in the shoulder, he would have had to turn the bullet in as evidence, and his connection to Gregory Edgeworth's murder would have been revealed that much sooner. And since von Karma wasn't killed by the gunshot, the state would have no reason to press charges against Edgeworth, and von Karma was in no position to do so after being arrested for Gregory Edgeworth's Murder.
  • Case 1-5. One- I don't get why Gant killed Goodman- I mean, he's the chief, right- couldn't he just have refused to re-open it? He has a fair amount of control and all Goodman wanted to do was re-open the case. There was no new evidence so it was pretty safe. Also, why would he screw up something he's been planning for so long when it wasn't really in danger? He doesn't strike me as the kind of guy to suddenly flip out and kill someone like that. Two- you get the picture Ema draws of Neil Marshall and Joe Black fighting and in it, the vase is flying through the air. We can assume that it smashed when it hit the ground. Gant came in after this, when the vase was smashed so how did he get Ema's name onto it? Did he put it back together, write her name and then smash it again? What was the point? I'm not complaining, I just want to know if anyone has any answers.
    • One: Well, Gant admitted that the murder was spur of the moment and that he wasn't thinking clearly. Also, Goodman said right in front of him that he intended to hand the evidence off to Marshall, who was already suspicious of the whole deal. Fearful that his involvement would be exposed, Gant killed him with the switchblade and had Lana clean up his mess. Two: This is a little easier to explain. It's possible that the jar is sturdier than the characters give it credit for, and didn't break when it was knocked off its stand, or at least didn't fully shatter. He could've easily scrawled Ema's name on it and then completely broken the jar by either stomping on it or smashing it with a tool or a heavier object.
    • The "bad ending" of 1-5 if you present the evidence early irritates me because the contradictions still stand. Even if it proved Ema killed Neil Marshall, (which it doesn't because of the lack of bloodstains) that would actually make Phoenix's case stronger. The handprint and jar are good proof that Gant was blackmailing Lana, and with all that in the open, she would have no reason to keep covering for Gant. The defendant's testimony against the police chief's might not ordinarily carry much weight, but since he had pretty much already been revealed as a blackmailing scumbag it would give Lana points. Even if Phoenix lost his chance to prove that Gant killed Marshal, in the very least, the fight would continue, not just end all of the sudden. Gant would still have a motive for killing Goodman even if he didn't kill Marshall.
      • That's the point of it. If you do not present the evidence early, Damon Gant forces you to show it anyway, revealing that it was in his safe. Basically, he gives himself away with his Accidental Confession that he was hiding the strip of leather and the jar fragment in his safe.
    • I second the original question. During the original events of SL-9, Gant found a situation with three unconscious people that he couldn't possibly have orchestrated. He decided to use this opportunity to murder one of them, frame Ema for it, let Lana 'discover' the crime, and then help Lana frame Darke for it to get him convicted. This ensured his promotion to Chief of Police, Lana's position for Chief Prosecutor, and lets him control the Prosecution division. That's some pretty impressive Chessmastery right there, especially with all the shenanigans he had to pull with the evidence to do all that. Then he spectacularly bungles everything with the murder of Goodman. He kills Goodman in a panic on the day the case was going to be buried for good and then hands off the body for Lana to clean up. Okay, maybe she was the only person he had enough leverage over to be able to order her to cover up his crime, but that still risks his control over the department. From the way Lana acted, it's pretty clear she was trying to be caught, maybe not so much to cover for Gant as so he wouldn't be able to puppet her anymore. Also, :how did anyone know there was a murder in the evidence room? By the time Meekins and Marshall-impersonating-Goodman show up, he'd already cleaned up the body and the blood! And Meekins was accosted by someone he thought was Goodman, but he was the one who was knocked out, and there was no corpse. So, Meekins turned himself in as a murderer, someone took his claim at face value, and Gant allowed this to be reported? Or Gant reported the murder himself? None of this makes sense! By letting the court know there was a murder in the evidence room at all, he hands Phoenix the means to tie the current case to SL-9 and reopen all the events in SL-9, which was what Gant was trying to avoid in the first place!
  • Why is it that during DL-6's earthquake, no one thought to even try and shatter the non bullet-proof glass? I understand not intentionally shooting it out, just in case it was bullet proof, but they just sat there and waited to die?
    • What Glass? They were in an elevator, there was nothing to shoot at but a steel door. Also it was probably stuck middle of the floors, so they had nothing to do but wait until the electricity came back.
      • Uh, there's obviously glass in the photo. Besides, it's a central point that a bullet can be fired through the glass and hit Manfred von Karma in the shoulder.
        • On that note, how did nobody SEE Von Karma?
          • Frosted glass? ...or, they're all too oxygen-deprived to be able to see that clearly.
        • He says "I saw three people inside, all lying unconscious from oxygen deprivation." As for during the struggle, Yanni Yogi most likely was facing the wall to the right of the door, Gregory was facing the opposite wall (judging from his body's position), and Miles was most likely distracted by the two.
      • That's not glass, just a regular metal elevator door. You'd be surprised at just how much a bullet can penetrate.
        • Look here. You can see through to the other pane of glass in that picture.
    • IIRC the elevator was caught between floors before the power came back on (otherwise they would have just been able to force the doors open), so breaking the glass before they all went batty from oxygen depletion wouldn't have done anything.
      • It would still need to be close enough to a floor in order for a bullet to pass through the glass and hit Manfred von Karma in the shoulder, not to mention von Karma mentions the elevator doors opened just after the power came on. Probably, the elevator was below the floor just enough that there wouldn't be enough of a gap were the doors forced open for anyone to be able to climb out (not above, as that would make it impossible for a bullet to pass through the glass and not immediately hit the wall; considering the glass in the photo, as the elevator rose this would become impossible long before it became impossible for someone to escape the elevator by prying the doors open). ...Actually, if you consider just where the bullet hole in the glass is, the elevator would need to be well below the outside floor level in order for a shot at that sharp of an angle to hit von Karma's shoulder.
    • Going the whole hog - who in their right mind designs an elevator to be AIRTIGHT? Were you not expecting people to be in it?
      • Debris, the elevator wasn't the only thing that was damaged by the earthquake.
    • It's possible that they didn't think the power would be out that long and that they'd have to sit there for just a few minutes before someone on the courthouse staff thought to check if the elevators were safe. And they probably weren't expecting for the air to get blocked, either. Or for something a bit more logical, maybe they tried to shove the doors open, thinking that shattering the glass and getting shards all over the place wasn't a safe idea, but the doors were stuck shut for whatever reason.
  • Case 1-5: When Gant tries to put in a word in his own defense, Edgeworth reminds him that he's already forfeited his right to testify. Then, after Phoenix refuses to present the scrap of cloth, he testifies anyway -- and implicates himself through his own testimony. But it isn't legitimate testimony! Even if it acquits Lana, it couldn't be used against Gant himself.
    • Gant was too shaken to call Pheonix out on that little loophole. He was barely coherent enough to try to get the evidence invalidated.
    • I believe he lost his right to testify as a police chief, but not as a suspect in the murder.
  • 1-3. The main argument that Dee Vasqez couldn't have been in the site of the murder (which wasn't actually the murder location at all as it turns all) was that the road was blocked by a tree and there's a photo to prove it. Looking at the photo I have to say, are you kidding me? You mean you couldn't just go to one side of the tree and I don't know step over the branches or even better considering there's no wall at either side of the road, step off the road and walk around the tree? (Which by the way is exactly what Cody did). Two,
    • It's not the fallen tree that blocked the path, it was the Mr. Monkey head that had to be moved out of the way by a crane. Still doesn't explain why nobody could go around, but it is at least more of an obstacle than the tree (which we know is no obstacle at all, since the tree is down for the whole case and you can freely pass it anyway).
  • In case 1-5, How do Lana Skye and Jake Marshall switch seats in the witness stand so quickly? There's hardly time for Phoenix to speak and they've swapped places in that chair, just to say one line...
    • This troper could be wrong, but it's to his understanding that the witness and defendant stand are two separate things in the AA courtrooms and Capcom just never bothered to show them as such in the room graphic for some reason or another.
      • This troper seems to recall that you actually see a defendant stand below the judge's spot when you're investigating the courtroom in AAI.
  • Apparently, elevators are sealed air-tight. This is a critical point in the DL-6 case, as the suspect in the case, as well as the sole witness, both suffered from oxygen deprivation. In an elevator. Also, there was a bullet hole in the glass door, meaning that oxygen could get in
    • The elevator went out of service during an earthquake that destroyed half the courthouse. It's possible that the ventilation system was blocked by debris. As for the bullet hole, it was fairly small, and everyone in the elevator was at least nearly unconscious by the time it was made.
  • In case 1-3, in the initial case, it never states how Jack Hammer got to the studio. The only other photograph is one of a small child. Even though Jack Hammer was really wearing the Steel Samurai costume, no one makes a big deal about it.
    • OBJECTION! ::slams desk:: Oldbag points out on several occasions that... ::points::... she thought he left for the studio before she arrived!
  • When we first meet Ema in 1-5, she mentions that her parents died in a car accident. She later mentions when demonstrating the use of Luminol for the first time that she "saved up [her] allowance to buy it". Presumably, she has adoptive parents who are paying this allowance - who are they?
    • Maybe she meant allowance from Lana? Lana has undergone Promotion to Parent, after all.
      • HOLD IT! Ema says the aforementioned accident happened while she was quite young. Are you claiming that Lana would have been mature enough at the time to take care of Ema?
        • OBJECTION! ::slams desk:: You get to see Lana's profile in game 1 case 5. While Ema was 16 at the time, Lana was 29. That's a difference of 13 years. That makes it very likely for Lana to be plenty mature enough at the time to take care of Ema.
          • I... er... uh... ::Pursuit ~ Cornered starts up:: Nooooooooooooooo!! But wait... HOLD IT! This still means that Lana could have been as young as 14 or 15 at the time the accident took place! ::slams desk:: Despite any perceived maturity, that's still not old enough to be independent for most legal purposes! ::pointing:: It also doesn't explain where any source of income would have been coming from at the time!
              • HOLD IT! We're never told how old "quite young" means! If Ema was say, five (still 'quite young') Lana would have been 18, and legally independant, meaning it could have been possible for her to take care of Ema!
            • OBJECTION! Why would Lana have needed to save up her allowance from years ago to buy blood testing fluid? Most likely it was a fairly recent allowance given to her by Lana. They also most likely got some inheritance or life insurance from their parents.
  • Again from 1-5: When you first speak to Meekins in the detention center, he claims (at least twice at various points) that after the incident in the evidence room he woke up in the Detention Center. Yet this is patently false, seeing as we see him between those two times when he shows up at Edgeworth's office - and, in fact, in continued discussions with him, he later indicates that he woke up in the evidence room immediately after the incident. For that matter, he was only arrested two days following the incident (around the time that Gant first testifies) - given that he was the only other person on hand in the evidence room, why wasn't he immediately arrested? It seems like there are two inherently contradictory timelines here!
    • Meekins was probably just being dramatic when he says he woke up in the detention center. It wouldn't exactly be out of character for him to be exaggerating. And as for why he wasn't arrested immediately... Well, the police department was extremely confused/panicked due to the fact that the guy he supposedly killed was found in a completely different place at the same time. They probably thought it was utterly impossible and were reluctant to arrest anyone else until the whole ID Card thing came up.
  • Case 1-2: Why was Redd White so concerned with Mia revealing the names of those he blackmailed during the second day of trial? Wasn't he going to jail anyway by confessing?
    • This is probably because Mia was going to release it to the press. This basically put Redd White in a corner: either he confessed and went to jail, or he didn't and he went to jail anyway however on top of the the names list would have destroyed his repetition even more then the arrest for the current case would. In other worlds, he choose to get his life ruined over one death rather then the hundreds of deaths that would have been released.
  • Case 1-3: At the end of the trial, there was a flashback about the incident five years ago, and when the actor dies, Ms Vasquez seems really sad about it. I really wonder if the actor (Manuel) is her brother/fiance/husband. Also, if it's the case, can we argue that we should felt sorry for her?
    • Perhaps this could be considered a Pet the Dog moment for her.
  • In case 1-5, one thing that always bugged me. Lana comes into the room, see's Marshall dead, and her sister and a known serial killer are on the floor unconscious. So, with a known killer in the room, why did she jump to the conclusion that Ema was responsible like she said. You'd think that if you gonna jump to a conclusion it would involve a suspected serial killer over your beloved sibling.
    • Damon Gant wrote "Ema" on the urn. It's not 100% clear whether he broke the urn before or after Lana came in.
      • That's wrong. It was clearly stated by Gant that he broke the urn before Lana arrived at the scene, and hid a piece of the urn, along with the piece of cloth, for insurance, since these two evidences would help to later "prove" that he was not the one who killed Marshall (which almost did do the job). Why didn't he take these evidences after Lana saw it? Probably because he wasn't 100% certain that Lana would choose to forge evidence to save her sister, so it was wiser to take it before. Lana also said that had she known that the urn was clearly incriminating Ema, she would have ground it to dust instead of just wiping the blood. But as to the original question - I have no idea.
  • In the DL-6 incident, when Miles Edgeworth threw the gun and it went off and broke through the glass, wouldn't the bullet hole, however small, have allowed some oxygen into the elevator?
    • At that point, they were already unconscious that the little extra bit of oxygen wouldn't have any effect.
      • How were they already unconscious when Miles had just thrown the gun in response to the other two fighting?
    • Maybe they were almost unconscious. Edgey does state that he passed out right after he threw the gun and heard Manfred scream, after all. Letting that tiny bit of oxygen in still wouldn't help much if Yanni and Gregory were just about to pass out. Yanni probably knocked out Gregory and then passed out himself right after Edgeworth did.
  • In case 1-5, I don't understand why Gant cut the piece of cloth before he impaled Marshall and left such a huge contradiction in his "evidence". Had he cut the piece of cloth after, then there would have been no problem with his "evidence".
    • Maybe he thought that if any blood got on the cloth, it might make it trickier to get a clear fingerprint reading... And this may sound picky, but it's also not like he could have predicted exactly how much blood Marshall would cough up.
  • From the killer's perspective in 1-4, it makes perfect sense to want to kill Hammond and frame Miles since the killer has a grudge against Hammond and thinks that Miles once framed him. But from Manfred Von Karma's perspective, there was no grudge against Hammond, so why not just tell the killer to kill Miles directly? I guess getting revenge by convincing Miles that he killed his father was more "perfect?"
    • Revenge is exactly the reason why. It's stated in-game that Manfred hated Gregory for so much as scratching his reputation, and also that his hatred of Gregory was the reason why he raised Miles as a prosecutor. Him trying to ruin Edgeworth's life is really pretty similar to Dahlia wanting to kill Maya as revenge against Mia in 3-5 if you think about it long enough: he most definitely wanted to make Edgeworth suffer for what Gregory did, and just having Edgey killed instead wouldn't have satisfied him.
  • Case 1-3: Was Dee Vasquez even charged for murder? Unlikely. But was she charged for her other crimes (mainly blackmail, and tampering with evidence)? They never clarify this, and it really confuses me.
    • That's a bit of an odd part about the series, since we almost never hear from the murderers or people who, like April May, get imprisoned for other crimes after the trials. Similarly, there's also the question of Sal Manella's fate, since the last time he was mentioned, Phoenix notes that he was an accomplice in moving the body; he isn't seen or spoken about again, either.
      • Doesn't Sal Manella get a cameo in AAI? He obviously didn't get much (if any) of a punishment, then. Dee Vasquez probably got little, if any, time for the murder, since it was acknowledged to be self-defense, but personally I find it likely that she did get charged for the blackmail and such. But yeah, it also bothers me that the criminals' fates are barely discussed...
  • The early setup of 1-5 seems to imply that the killer wanted to frame Edgeworth (the body is found in his car and Lana stabs it with his knife) It bugs me that unlike most frame-ups, this one never seems to go anywhere. Could it be that Angel Starr, by getting Lana arrested, is a Spanner in the Works for Gant by forcing him to sacrifice his control of the prosecutor's office?
  • I might remember wrong, since it has been a while since I played this game, but in second case does anyone mention what kind of motive Maya might have for murdering Mia? Maya is after all Mia's sister so she has no motive to kill her. I don't think Edgeworth or Gumshoe mentioned any kind of motive for murder. Of course Maya is not the murderer, but shouldn't Edgeworth at least mention some kind of motive, because otherwise Phoenix could've used the no motive fact as an advantage.
    • Hardly any cases in the game discuss motive, actually. Also in the first game, Will Powers had no real reason to supposedly murder Jack Hammer. Then in the second game, Maggey had no motive for killing her boyfriend, Maya had no motive for killing Dr. Grey, and so on. The court system in Ace Attorney doesn't really seem to care whether or not the defendant has a motive or not, as long as the defended gets declared guilty.


Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: Justice for All

  • In case 2-4, what was with Adrian wanting to burn the suicide note from Celeste? She thought the note was real, so why would Adrian think she was bringing justice to her mentor by getting rid of the one thing Celeste tried to leave behind?
    • The note was a forgery created by Juan that he would use to ruin Matt for good. Adrian wanted to destroy it to stop Celeste's good person from being used anymore in their ugly rivalry (especially considering that their feud was what led Celeste to kill herself). Whether it was a real or fake didn't matter to her.
      • That doesn't hold up. Remember that Adrian wanted to see Matt and Juan get what was coming to them. By showing the note, she would have brought them to justice. I might be wrong though, I really have to replay 2-4.
        • I haven't played it in a while either, but I think that's wrong. IIRC, Phoenix (or Edgeworth), argues that Adrian was not the recipient of the bear because the note was still in it, and she would've burned it or something had she got her hands on it. In other words, the OP is probably right; she just wanted Celeste to be remembered for who she was, not her role in Matt and Juan's twisted games. You could argue that that was wrong of her, but it's not that illogical.
  • In the "Reunion, and Turnabout" case, if everyone seems to acknowledges that channeling using the Kurain Channeling Technique is real, and that the channeler physically changes to reflect the person being channeled, why does no one even suggest that Maya may have been overpowered by the spirit and not responsible for her actions? That seems a lot easier to explain than Mimi stealing her dead sister's identity then planning and executing such a convoluted plan for revenge. Of course, that would have been a pretty boring case to play, and the real murderer would have gone free.
    • Even if Maya herself wasn't responsible for her actions, she could plausibly be charged with crimes like reckless endangerment and involuntary manslaughter. By summoning a spirit in a way that removes her control over her actions, she effectively puts both herself and her client at serious risk.
    • I can't help you with the suggest part, but that suggestion would still be problematic. Maya's reputation and social life would be ruined, like Yanni Yogi's. So that would only be a lesser evil. In fact, Phoenix specifically STATES this as a reason to go for 'not guilty'.
    • This is acknowledged on the first day of the trial. Franziska asks Phoenix (for some reason, not the defendant herself) whether he should go for a complete acquittal, or if she should be charged with a lesser crime than murder itself. Since Phoenix chooses not guilty, from there on out, nobody can say that Maya was simply being controlled by Mimi, because the defense has asserted that it simply wasn't the case.
  • In Reunion, and Turnabout, how was Mimi able to look like herself during the murder? Her face was destroyed in the crash and made to look like her sister's through plastic surgery, so why did it change back to her face? This is a clear contradiction!
    • Well, Ini and Mimi did look like each other. Note that when "Ini" gets angry, she starts to look like Mimi. Combine that with a wig pulled over her face, and the fact that no one was familiar with Mimi pre-murder, and she could probably pull it off.
  • In Turnabout Big Top, why does the killer say he deliberately framed Max? Except for the lack of footprints, the evidence against Max resulted from chance events Acro couldn't have foreseen. It would have made more sense for him to claim "I had no intention of framing Max. But when the police formed the wrong conclusion, I decided to go along with them."
    • Xanatos Roulette anyone?
      • The implication here is that Acro intended to kill someone without being blamed for it. So he had to frame someone. He first of all didn't think there would be any witnesses. But, just in case, he used the bust of Max to draw suspicion away from himself, hoping that if anyone saw anything in the dark, they would think it was Max, and wouldn't see the rope. And that was actually born out: none of the witnesses (like Moe) even saw a rope...they just saw Max flying! He didn't necessarily intend to frame anyone: he hoped he would get the job done without witnesses, but he covered his tracks in case there WERE witnesses. The cape landing on the bust was just fortunate happenstance.
      • I thought that Acro's plot was a result of his discovery of the bust in his room, not the other way around.
      • Acro did not originally intend to kill without being blamed. All his plot was to get Regina into the place where he could kill her, without caring to hide his identity as the killer. It was entirely a coincidence that Mr Berry happened to wear Max's costume to the crime scene and the coat happened to hang onto the bust, incriminating Max. Acro did not plan this to happen (and he really couldn't). Though he did say he deliberately framed Max, I took that to mean he framed Max after realizing that other people were suspecting Max instead of him.
  • One thing I do not get is at the end of Justice For All, when you give Edgeworth Franziska's whip and you get the extra scene for it, why does Franziska begin to cry before leaving from the airport? Is she that upset that she brought shame to herself for failing to get revenge on Edgeworth?
    • Franzy is a very proud girl, just like her father. She repeatedly states that "a Von Karma is perfect", so becoming emotional about a failure, any failure, seems appropriate. Plus, it may have been the writers just wanting to humanize her character.
      • Franziska also seems to realize that what Edgeworth says, that being a prosecutor isn't about a perfect record but about justice for all (no pun intended), and that's something she needs to learn. It isn't about personal records or anything like that, it's about doing what's right. When she realizes that he was only able to "beat" Phoenix in court by employing those human characteristics that she has shunned, and that her entire philosophy of perfection is wrong, well...it's enough to make anyone break down.
        • And there's also the fact that Phoenix had just willingly accepted his first defeat in court because it is the just outcome he wants, and can have now that Maya's safe.
  • Justice for All, Case 3: It's established early on in the chapter that Max Galactica's flying act is well known. Even the public knows about it. Yet when Moe went to testify, Franziska told him to leave out the part where he saw the murderer "fly away" just because it "wasn't funny". Seeing as Max is the only suspect who is well known for their flying ability, wouldn't it have been better if they had left that part of Moe's testimony in? Surely she would have heard about Max's act either from the public or when she was going over the crime scene herself.
    • If he had brought it up, it was possible that the Judge would have focused on that as his means of identification. But Phoenix could very easily have pointed out that Max doesn't really fly, it's all smoke and mirrors, and there's no reason to pretend otherwise. Meaning that "It was clearly Max because Max can fly" just results in her losing the case.
  • If Engarde really didn't trust De Killer at all, why did he think that he could leave the blackmail tape with him without him watching it?
    • Engarde learned that De Killer always places trust in his clients and he will do what his clients wants without question because that is the basis of trust. Engarde knew he could catch him on tape and it would never be watched by anyone other than Engarde himself.
    • But the reason Matt did that in the first place was because, in his own words 'assassins aren't above blackmail'. And if they're not above blackmail, why would they be above watching a tape they were told not to?
      • Let's be fair here; Engarde really didn't HAVE A CHOICE. If the tape had been found at Engarde's mansion, of all places, the trial would've ended much faster; a full recording of the chain of events surrounding the murder tends to do that, or at least makes you look ridiculously incompetent for housing an assassin in your mansion, regardless of whether or not he's working for you! The best he could do was entrust deKiller with it because nobody else had access to it; literally, either he had to trust that deKiller wouldn't watch the tape or else leave it behind for the prosecution to use at the trial.
        • Engarde would have been boned either way; even if he'd managed to get away scot free at the trial, the instant he tried to blackmail deKiller with the tape, deKiller would have just come right back around and killed him instead for breaking their contract. There is no plausible way this could have gone well for him.
          • You have to understand though that Engarde was hoping that De Killer would kill Juan, and no evidence would be left behind besides the card. He had no idea that Adrian would come in, try to frame him, thus getting him accused and putting him on trial and into this mess. In other words, in his perfect world, he wouldn't even need to have hidden that tape because there would be no trial to discover this evidence and thus no reason to hide it.
            • He still would have been screwed over even if there wasn't a trial. He was apparently planning on blackmailing deKiller with the tape which still would have gotten him killed for breaking the contract.
  • Game 2, case 2: When Lotta photographs Mimi, her costume doesn't have a hole in it. While Phoenix and Lotta are calling the police, Morgan removes Maya's costume and burns it (thus explaining how the key ended up in the incinerator), and dresses her in Mimi's costume. When Maya's costume (actually Mimi's) is presented in court, there IS a hole in it.
    • I'm not sure that description is correct. I think it was Mimi's costume that was burnt. Mimi rubbed blood over Maya's costume and put her in the box, but Grey was still alive and fired, with the bullet passing through the sleeve of the costume Maya was wearing. That costume was the one submitted in court. There was no hole in the photo because the photo showed Mimi's costume.
      • But if Mimi's costume was burned, how did the key end up in the incinerator? It was in Maya's sleeve!
      • I think that Morgan and Mimi knew Maya had the key and to make sure they got rid of all evidence, Mimi probably took the key and her bloodied clothing and tried to burn them in the incinerator.
        • Erm, metal doesn't burn very well. And the best way to deal with the key would be to put it in the sleeve of whatever costume Maya ended up wearing, where it "should" be.
  • And don't get me started on 2-3, and how contrived all that was... The murder weapon just happened to be a full-sized bust of one of their group, which is a very normal object for someone to have, even as an award. The victim just happened to be wearing both the hat and cape of that same person. And then somehow that cape magically gets caught on the statue, because apparently it was only being held onto the man's shoulders by magic or something - my mind tries to make the trick make sense, and it still seems nearly impossible. What are the odds of all this happening? Honestly?
    • The sheer impossibility of the entire thing is lampshaded repeatedly, but, you know, that's what happened. It may be a one in a million chance, but that's the chance that happened.
    • It was clearly implied by Acro that all of these events were coincidental and he did not in anyway plan them ahead. His original intention was just to kill Regina by the bust, and probably turned himself in if someone saw the murder. If we ignore the coincidences then Acro's plan was pretty logical.
  • Case 2-4: Shelley de Killer knows enough about Adrian Andrews to finger her as a plausible client (as opposed to someone really off-the-wall like Will Powers or Wendy Oldbag), but he doesn't know that she's female?
    • Considering the fact that de Killer fully expects Phoenix to play along, he's not worried about the minor details. When Phoenix doesn't play along, de Killer points out that it's not exactly good for Maya, and Phoenix quickly backs up. In other words, de Killer expected Phoenix to agree that Adrian Andrews was his client because it would get Matt Engarde off the hook and set Maya free. He doesn't expect Phoenix to play a different game entirely.
      • There's also the fact that he knows about the status of the trial. Probably from local news. He may just be aware that Adrian came up, and used that name to stay consistent.
    • I always assumed that Matt happened to mention "my manager, Adrian Andrews" in conversation or something. (Preferably the way it happened in this fanfiction, for Rule of Funny.)
  • Case 2-1: How does everyone know how Phoenix is spelling Maggey's name, when he's just speaking? He says that the writing says "Maggie, but the defendant spells her name Maggey", without saying "with a Y", or anything.
    • Psmith Psyndrome. Alternatively, he actually is saying 'with a y' but the game doesn't show it like that because the makers know we can tell the difference.
    • The prosecutors seem to be aware of the "health" meter and can manipulate it, so who's to say they can't see the text boxes?
    • Rule of Perception and Law of Conservation of Detail. Because the player can see how Phoenix is spelling the names, there's no need to add extra dialogue explaining the difference. Also, it's kinda funny this way.
      • Also, in the original Japanese Version of the game, Naruhodo/Phoenix says something to the effect of "I am not talking about the Katakana-spelling, Prosecutor Auchi(Payne), I'm talking about the Kanji", directly refering to the spelling issues that arouse with Maggey's name (Suzuki Mako) in the japanese version. Apparently, the "Suzu" in her name is spelt with an rather unusual Kanji there.
  • Okay, so in case 2_2, one major piece of evidence as to the identity of the killer is that the Miney sisters were driving a European car, so the driver was on the right side of the car when it crashed into the center divide however, Japanese cars have the driver's seat on the right side, and drive on the left. Was she using an American car or something in the original? And wouldn't that change the flashback a bit?
    • I think that the Japanese version had a different type of car. As for changing the flashback, why would it?
      • Well... y'know that flashback "photo", where we see "Ini" sitting on the road, and the flaming wreckage hung up on the center divide? Doesn't it look like they're on the right side of the road? You can see a bit of the road on the other side of the divide, too. Of course, if my memory is sketchy on that, and I'm wrong, then an American car would sort things out nicely, but that one detail is bugging me.
        • It was a really impressive crash.
      • Just to clear up matters, in the Japanese version, the car is indeed an American sportscar, with the driver's side on the left.
  • In that Wacky Ol' Circus case in the second game, you are asked to present the evidence that is mentioned in the note written by Acro (It roughly says, "I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SIX MONTHS AGO, I HAVE EBBIDENCE"). The evidence you are supposed to provide is not the bloody, pepper-covered scarf, but a pepper shaker. Did I miss something?
    • Most likely. Acro put the evidence in the large trunk, right? When the cops opened the trunk, there was a pepper shaker inside. Thus, that's the "evidence" Acro provided, despite more obvious evidence having been made available.
    • It was most likely intentional. If the cops would have found the scarf, they would most likely ask around for its significance. Upon finding about Bat's incident, the cops would, of course, look into Acro. Since there would be a motive for murder (even though the motive was for Regina, among other things), this would implicate Acro, and thus wanting to not cast suspicion on himself, he used the pepper shaker. Besides, its a rather okay representation for Bat's accident.
  • In Case 2-2, Maya's fingerprints are found at the scene and on evidence. Wouldn't this be impossible, as the Kurain Channeling would change the fingerprints? I kept on presenting evidence to point out that out, and it kept EATING AWAY at me!
    • Hmmm... maybe Franziska would have pointed out that she probably killed Dr. Grey first and THEN channeled in an attempt to prove her innocence.
      • Only "Mimi" claimed to have killed Dr. Grey herself, so that wouldn't stand up. I'm more inclined to agree with the comment below; channeling changes the shape of your body, and possibly your voice as well, but not things like hair and fingerprints.
        • Hair is not living (I wonder if nails are kept? Ouch.) I think finger tips are.
    • Mia ends up with black hair when channeled by Maya, so maybe channeling doesn't induce a total physical change.
      • Mia's distinctive beauty mark also fails to appear when channeled, so it seems like the outer skin of the channeler remains unaltered. Though it's a bit of a stretch, I know. Sorry, bad pun.
    • Don't forget that the Kurain Spirit Channeling Technique is a sacred art that only the people in Kurain village practice. It's unlikely that Phoenix himself knows much about it, and thus he couldn't very easily substantiate the claim that "Her fingerprints were not her own", because he doesn't really KNOW if that would change during channeling. Franziska, on the other hand, has studied up on it, and could call his knowledge of it into question pretty easily. And considering how easily the Judge is swayed, Phoenix probably wouldn't get very far on conjecture alone.
    • OBJECTION! Is everyone forgetting that Maya was innocent, and therefore her fingerprints shouldn't be on the weapons AT ALL?
      • The knife belonged to the Feys.
    • Not to mention, even if channeling does change fingerprints, Morgan immediately forced Phoenix and Lotta out of the room, so she could have easily wiped off Mimi's fingerprints and just stuck the knife handle in Maya's hand for a few seconds to get her prints on it.
  • Something that bugged me about case 2-4 is that de Killer said when he delivered the bear puzzle to his client, they were wearing the Nickel Samurai costume, and the way you prove that the person in the costume couldn't have been Adrian is by presenting the bear puzzle or the suicide note, because Adrian knew how to solve the puzzle and would've taken the note out and burned it, but the note was still in the bear. But, if I remember right, de Killer said he delivered the puzzle immediately after killing Juan. Adrian didn't have access to the Nickel Samurai costume she used until after she went to Juan's room, which was much later, and she couldn't have taken Matt's because he was wearing it while napping, and she would've woken him up if she tried to take the costume. Since Adrian using the costume is one of the biggest topics in the previous trial, it should've been a pretty obvious argument, and nearly impossible to counter. The puzzle and note argument could be countered by saying she simply didn't have enough time to take apart the bear and burn the note right then. Why does this never get pointed out?
    • I noticed that one myself. The gameplay answer is "There's no convenient way to provide evidence for an error in timing", unless Phoenix goes with a testimony counter or a "Show us on the map" attempt, but it's still something that should've come up.
    • This is probably reaching a bit, but maybe Phoenix intentionally doesn't point it out because it would end the trial and get Maya killed?
  • Figuring out that the suicide note was still in the bear puzzle was the reason why Adrian couldn't have been De Killer's client was particularly hard for this Troper. She kept thinking it was the fact that De Killer said his client was wearing the Nickel Samurai costume and Adrian didn't have the costume until after she went to Juan's room, and spent several minutes pondering why Lotta's photo, the Nickel Samurai glossy, and the guitar case were making her lose points.
  • This Troper feels that the Scrappy Case 2-3 was one big drawn out Guide Dang It moment.
  • How exactly did Morgan and Mimi come to work together in "Reunion, and Turnabout?" Every other "collaboration" comes from a pre-existing relationship like Redd White and April May, or is explained like Matt hiring De Killer. This comes out of nowhere.
    • Maybe but Mimi was desperate so she might have known about Morgan having lost to her older sister for the position of master and was desperate for revenge. I mean if Lotta could get the information so easily maybe Mimi could've too. Or even if she hadn't she might have been so desperate she consulted Morgan and Morgan saw it as the perfect opportunity to exact the revenge she had been waiting to take out.
      • Those are both logical, but the problem is that either one consitutes an enormous risk on Mimi's part. How did she know that Morgan would be sufficiently vengeful for the task? Even if Morgan had been up to it, there was no guarantee that Morgan wouldn't reveal the plan, thereby gaining a sturdy alibi (of sorts) to hide behind when she did launch her inevitable plot. Morgan was in no hurry; Maya had four years to go before her installation as the Master, and even Pearl would remain next in line until Maya had a daughter. If Mimi had been able to dig up all that information on Morgan, she should have figured out the rest as well. I can buy that she was desperate, but it would have been nice for it to have been spelled out because that is a decent-sized plot hole.
      • Morgan probably came up with the whole plan herself while Mimi was just a convenient pawn. Considering that Mimi was desperate enough to risk her cover by staying that close to the doctor and planning on killing him just because he could discover her secret, she probably wasn't thinking that far ahead. It was a stupid risk, but she wasn't thinking clearly enough to turn the plan down.
      • It's also entirely possible that Morgan did NOT know about Mimi's Secret, and only found out about it when it was revealed in court.
  • Case 2-2: Was it really necessary for Mimi to kill Dr. Grey? Maya is still a relative neophyte at channeling; just because she was unable to call a particular spirit doesn't mean that person is necessarily alive, just beyond her skill. And even if Dr. Grey concludes that Mimi isn't dead, who would believe him? Spirit channeling is still viewed with skepticism in most of the world, and I don't see him convincing any authority that Mimi is alive because a teenage girl in a funny costume failed to polymorph into her.
    • No, it wasn't necessary for Mimi to kill him, but that doesn't mean she thought that way. In her mind, even the slightest chance that she'd be discovered was too large of a risk to take. Truthfully, I don't think it was really about her identity at all: Mimi wanted to kill him for all that he put her through. She lost everything in one day and needed someone to blame for it. She just used her secret as a way to justify it to herself. It's like a lot of murders (especially those in this series).
      • It's also important to keep in mind that she may have lost her job because she really did mix up the medicines, before falling asleep at the wheel under stress. It's for this reason why the general fan consensus is that Dr. Grey didn't drug her, he's just a Jerkass who she chose as a target for her anger.
      • And, not to mention, Mimi doesn't necessarily know that Maya's a beginner. Maya actually seems to be held in fairly high regard by those who've never met her.
      • -> But Mimi had to talk to Morgan in order to plot everything. In fact, claiming that Maya was too incompetent to channel the spirit would have suited Morgan's goals well.
    • This troper figured there might have been a risk of Maya accidentally channeling the real Ini Miney, who could have blown Mimi's cover.
  • 2-2. One argument raises against the prosecution is the blood stain on 'Maya's clothes which Ini apparantly didn't notice. Ini and Von Karma dodges this by stating that the room was dark and she couldn't see it. Ok, so how about later on when they are now talking about the locations where she is OUTSIDE of the room in BROAD DAYLIGHT?! Why doesn't Phoenix bring up the blood stained clothes again considering now she has no excuse for not noticing it?
    • By that time Ini was supposedly already told of the murder. The problem with her testimony is she stated not be surprised with her sister appearance at the time they met.
  • Two (tangentially related) points from 2-4:
    • The first clue to de Killer's location is courtesy of Shoe the cat. However, how in the world is that connection made? It's not as though Shoe is the only cat in the vicinity, after all.
    • We see de Killer twice before knowing who he is - once at the hotel at the start of the case (telling Maya she "has a phone call"), and later at Engarde's mansion. Given his distinctive appearance - stitches and all, how does Phoenix not make the connection? For that matter, since de Killer spoke on both occasions (thought not necessarily to him directly in the first case), wouldn't Phoenix be able to figure out that it's the same voice?
    • ...and a bit of possible Fridge Brilliance connecting the two: de Killer is deliberately obfuscating his voice in his public appearances; the meowing reminded Phoenix of Shoe, which led him to realise the voices were similar enough to be the same person. It still sounds horribly flimsy, though. (Though something that flimsy would be very Wright indeed...)
      • Well, they've just confirmed that Matt Engarde is the killer, the butler looks a lot like the guy who took Maya, there is a cat at his house, and there is a cat at the place where the assassin is hiding. All together, the logic is a lot less flimsy.
  • The dang translators. "The miracle never happen" I mean REALLY, Capcom, really?
    • They did it on purpose.
    • Hey, you can't catch em all. Typos, I mean.
  • In 2-2, Lotta's testimony is repeatedly referred to, specifically the part about the folding screen. The problem? That testimony doesn't necessarily exist. If, when pressing her, you don't actually ask about the folding screen, that testimony is never made - yet the case continues, and the imaginary testimony is referenced later.
    • The problem is that the plot assumes you press almost every statement of almost every witness. Simple solution? Just press every statement that doesn't lead to health damage or a game over.
  • Shelly de Killer is a Karma Houdini. This has been noted time and time again and should be a surprise to no one at this time. But it's disconcerting that he seems to be specifically written as if he was a Karma Houdini. For one thing, his ethical code, in which he takes every precaution necessary to ensure that his clients are never implicated for his actions. If my method of murder involved walking into a target's room, strangling him, placing a card and leaving, I'd be far less worried about making sure a guy who never went into the room is left alone, and more worried about making sure I'm not caught. Then there's the part where he based his surveillance and kidnapping out of the defendant's house, somehow knowing that the police wouldn't bother to check there for clues or a motive related to the case until it was too late. And then there's the little bit where he, while literally on the run from the authorities, broadcasts a radio signal to testify in the court case in which his client is being charged, and even then goes as far as to make death threats to people who rub him the wrong way. It's not like he has underworld connections who could make good on his words, either; he's just a skilled assassin. Simply put, none of his actions would be rational in the slightest, unless he was somehow certain that he was never going to be caught.
    • It gets worse. After so many cases devoted to the belief that no one is above the law and the truth will be revealed in the end, isn't the end of 2-4 a bit backwards? Basically, you get the culprit to plead guilty by... telling him that another criminal, one who is never punished for his crimes, wants to kill him? As often as it uses an Asshole Victim, Ace Attorney isn't exactly the place to preach Bad Guys Do the Dirty Work.
  • In the first case (2-1) the victim broke his neck in the fall. Why doesn't anyone tell the court that breaking your neck like that, falling a few meters either kills or paralyses you? Then it would be obvious that the accused was Not Guilty!
    • I always hear this and I always respond with the same thing: Breaking your neck does not mean your automatically paralyzed. The windpipe in your neck is what must break for this to happen and it IS possible to snap your neck without snapping the windpipe. In fact I a doctor, and I have had a patients with snapped necks who have not only lived but also been able to talk, write and breath perfectly. Once again I AM A DOCTOR. I would not suggest trying to argue a medical issue with a doctor...
      • Whoa now, slow down. That would be a perfectly legitimate thing to teach us, except that it's stated that it's the fall that killed Dustin. While, yes, it is a bit of a stretch to say he would have been paralyzed, if the neck snap was strong enough to kill him, it's easy to see why people would make that mistake. He still supposedly died instantly either way, so the fact that everyone complains about the broken neck actually has less to do with him having a broken neck and still writing, but more to do with the fact that he broke his neck and still wrote despite this contradicting other things stated in the case.
  • There are a couple things that bother me about the last case (2-4). I know I'm nitpicking here and playing devil's advocate (in more than one way). But first of all, when the judge says that Matt is not truly innocent or a good person because he caused a young woman to commit suicide, it has just been revealed that the suicide note was a forgery. So why doesn't Matt object to this? Maybe he doesn't really care because it doesn't affect him that much, but the judge has no solid proof that Matt drove Celeste to suicide.
  • Another thing that bugs me is the whole presentation of the video tape to Dekiller. There's no way he could see what is playing in the tape, and there's no reason Dekiller would believe Phoenix over his own client. Why doesn't he just hang up the transceiver at that point, believing that Phoenix is a backstabber? I mean I guess he could hear it...I just thought it was odd to "show" someone something when they have no way of physically seeing it.
  • In case 2, didn't Maya or someone else at Kurain think it was a bad idea to channel a spirit that might have a grudge against the person requesting the channeling? It seems risky that they planned on having only the channeler and the client in the room at the time! It might be offensive to a spirit to be called back to take the blame for something whether she was at fault or not and even if it was to help her old boss. They even let the Doctor take a gun into the room. Did Maya just trust Morgan to set everything up for her?
    • If Kurain was still recovering from Misty's public disgrace, maybe Maya felt she didn't have the luxury of turning away clients who might pose a risk. As for the gun, he didn't necessarily tell them about it.
  • In case 4, when Phoenix says to Edgeworth that Maya was kidnapped, why doesn't he mention the kidnapper's name? He remembered the name long enough to tell it to Matt a few minutes after he first heard it. Did he really forget the only info he had about the kidnapper by the next night? Given that Edgeworth had just said he was looking for "Shelly De Killer," it makes sense that Phoenix would mention that the kidnapper said his name was "De Killer."
  • Why the heck does Phoenix take Pearl with him to Engarde's mansion when they're storming the place looking for Shelly De Killer? Isn't looking for assassins and their hostages something that should be handled by the police without the involvement of 8-year olds? She could easily have been asked to stay at the Criminal Affairs Dept., which had people in it despite the late hour.
  • In case 4, how was the door between Engarde's living room and the video room locked from both sides? You approach it from one side as Maya and it's locked. Later, you approach it from the other side as Phoenix and it's locked. I guess someone who was hiding illegal activity behind that door would come up with fancy ways of locking it, but there's no reason it should have been originally designed to lock in a way that would prevent people on Maya's side from opening it.
    • Maybe Engarde had that lock installed so he could lock himself in that room with the only key to "focus on the script". It just happened to be a convenient place to hide a hostage in during that case.
      • A bit redundant to use it, considering the plan was to keep Maya in the wine cellar. Also, that would require de Killer to obtain the key, which requires us to speculate once again about how much Engarde knew about the plan.
  • Why did de Killer leave a calling card with Maya? It doesn't help to use such an object to inform your victim who they're dealing with when you're already there in person, especially if they're unlikely to recognize the symbol. It shouldn't be there for the police to find when they recover her, because finding her there would throw a lot of suspicion on the place's owner, which he is deliberately trying to avoid. And, of course, it's counterproductive to give your hostage a Skeleton Key Card.
    • Given how he originally threatened to kill Maya if Nick didn't end the trial in one day, it's possible that deKiller just left the card there in case Nick didn't do what he wanted him to do.
  • Case 2-3, it turns out that the one who orders the surprise search on Acro's room was Edgeworth, not Franziska. But if that's the case, why did Franziska acted like she was the one who did when Acro brought it up, blaming herself for doing something that ended up costing her victory?
    • It seemed to me that Edgeworth just suggested it, and Franziska was actually the one who ended up ordering it to be carried out. She could have just been mad at herself for taking that suggestion instead of thinking up an alternative.
  • In case 2-4, I'm kind of confused about something. During the second trial day, De Killer was going to reveal the name of his client. Phoenix had thought that he was going to reveal it to be Engarde, and was super worried about Maya at that point. But if De Killer was about to name Engarde as the client, why should Phoenix be so worried? Why didn't he just think that De Killer would release Maya now that he "broke his contract with the client."
  • In 2-4, after it's revealed that de Killer committed the actual murder, the trial doesn't end. No, the rest of the trial is devoted to determining who hired him because that person is therefore guilty of murder by hiring him. With this in mind, how was Engarde expecting to avoid suspicion by hiring a known assassin who routinely implicates himself using a calling card? Once that was established, not even an alibi would have helped him, and given their well-known rivalry and the knowledge of the planned post-award ceremony, Engarde would still have been at the top of the list of suspects.
    • Since Engarde seems to know that Adrian also had a grudge against Juan for his role in Celeste's suicide, it's likely that he could have tried to implicate Adrian as deKiller's client if it hadn't ended up happening anyway during the trial.
  • Case 2-3 (Turnabout Big Top). Why does no one seem to notice that the supposed "killer" didn't leave footprints by standing next to the victim? That detail would have shown that the "killer" there couldn't have been a human.


Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: Trials & Tribulations

  • In 3-4, while Phoenix is in the hospital, how does he know that Dahlia has come back if he hasn't gotten out yet?
    • Two possibilities. 1: He heard about it on the news or through a correspondent. 2: He doesn't, and he is only saying as much because he can feel it in his gut.
  • In 3-4, why is the obvious contradiction that The people on the bridge are facing each other, there is no way the defendant could push her down not able to be pointed out?
    • Because people can move. It's not difficult to assume that the victim had turned around at some point.
  • In 3-2, what was the murder weapon that also knocked out Ron DeLite? I assumed it was the Schichishito, because it was bent even though Luke was never knocked out. But why would Luke take a fake sword all the way from Lordly Tailor?
    • Same troper here. In that same case, How did Kane and Luke know each other? How did Kane know Luke was blackmailing Ron, and what did he have on him?
    • Me again :(. If the numbers next to each stolen item on Kane's list weren't their values, what were they?
      • He was knocked out without a specific weapon, Luke didn't knew Kane but Kane found out somehow that he was behind De Masque's heists, and the numbers were maybe what Luke paid Ron for each of them, or just what he could get in the black market.
        • Thank you. And if I remember correctly, presenting Kane's List to Ron merely has him confused and saying "those numbers seem too low to be the values", so I'm guessing it's not what Ron paid, but the black market thing.
      • I'm not sure where this is mentioned, but I was under the impression that, while it's never put into evidence, the murder weapon was a statuette from Bullard's desk.
  • It just bugs me, who exactly throws or gives, the coffee to Godot during court? I mean, it slides to his hand. And also, does Godot prepare the coffee before the trial or during the trial?
    • I'm going to say that he has coffee-based telekinesis.
    • Maybe his coffee machine (hidden to the right of the screen), launches the cup forward when it's done filling it?
      • Well, that answers that.
      • He could just summon it from hammerspace. Calling it is optional.
      • Alternatively, Brewster is his assistant but as he is a giant pidgeon he understandably doesn't want to be seen and just slides coffee to him.
      • Obviously, it arrives from the same place as Matt Engarde's mysteriously appearing glass of brandy.
      • Now see, it always looked to me like Matt was pulling it literally out of his ass.
    • The person who handles his Court Record for him...? (because he's too cool to handle it himself?)
    • I swear that somewhere in the manga it was shown that his visor also included a coffee machine. And since the desks are slanted, maybe he just slides it up and then back down for emphasis.
    • Perhaps someone behind him in the audience goes on runs for him and using some sort of large stick puts it on the bench and slides it over.
  • In Trials and Tribulations it's revealed that part of the reason Mia went off to law school and left Kurain Village behind was because she didn't want her and her sister to end up fighting over who was the head of the Main Family and who was the head of the Branch Family as their mother and aunt did. Given that this meant that someone could step down from leading the family, why is that Morgan Fey went to all the trouble of framing Maya for murder in order to remove her for consideration as heir to the title of Master? Given how much Maya and Pearl love each other and the fact that Maya doesn't even like the politics of Kurain Village anyway, would it just have been easier to ask Maya to step aside in favor of Pearl?
    • It would never occur to Morgan that Maya would comply.
    • She couldn't just ask Maya. Maya and Mia were siblings of the main family and in that case it's just a matter of who have the most spiritual powers. Pearl is from the branch family and the only time the village would pick someone from a branch family is when there was no one left in the main one.
    • You seem to be forgetting the little detail that Morgan is batshit insane. She doesn't just want Pearl to become head of the clan, she also genuinely hates Misty and wants her and her daughters to suffer. Seriously, even Dahlia Hawthorne finds Morgan a little too evil for her tastes. And when Dahlia finds a character creepy, you can't expect anything resembling common sense from her.
  • Question about the last case of Trials and Tribulations: Is there any way that Godot's going to get any sort of harsh sentence for actions? He was protecting someone he cared about from an obvious psychopath who had killed multiple times before. This is like Luke going to jail for killing Darth Vader or something like that.
    • Well, he didn't really kill her, he killed Misty Fey, who was an innocent woman. The result of his action was that Maya's mother died and Dahlia survived (as much as she already was) to testify in court.
    • There's also the popular fan theory that Godot is in such poor health that he died soon after the trial. The only thing keeping him alive was sheer determination to defeat Phoenix Wright and/or protect Maya. So while he may have been convicted, he never went to jail.
      • Note that this depends on what Godot tells Phoenix to explain the former's absence until that point -- but Godot is lying to cover up that he had been on that side of the river all along. The medical treatments he says or implies he had been undergoing at that time never happened. So he could be in much better shape than he claims, aside from his vision. For that matter, he survived an unplanned stay of two days in midwinter with totally inadequate facilities.
    • Despite his actions, Godot killed someone. And it's pointed out quite specifically, by Godot no less, that he really had a number of options available were he just looking to protect Maya. By actively killing Misty, he acknowledged and confessed to premeditated murder. Even though it may have been consider justifiable had he only acted to save her...he had plenty of time to do something else. Sentence: death.
    • He was a man desperate for revenge from the woman who poisoned him and ruined his life. Dahlia was already dead, but after reading the note and knowing he could find a way to exact revenge, he used Maya's family for his own selfish needs. In my interpretation, I'd say he's up there with Dahlia in terms of being a main villain of that game.
      • That would make sense if Godot had planned on killing Misty from the beginning rather than hoping that there was a way to stop the plot against Maya without killing anyone. That interpretation is at odds with the game: 1. Misty said she had hoped she could stop the whole thing just by reading to Pearl all evening. Maybe Godot was in on that. 2. Godot said that the reason he hadn't asked for Phoenix's help was out of pride. Assuming this is true, this implies that it wasn't because he wanted to prevent plans for stopping the attack without killing anyone from succeeding.
    • This may not be an actual law, but I think it's likely that You can only plead self-defense or protecting somebody if you plead so right off the bat. He was actually PROSECUTING somebody else for the murder, and never admitted to his actions until the last minute. He probably had this option (Hey Phoenix it was me, no need for a case.) but wanted one showdown with Phoenix
    • Godot, for one, admitted to murdering Misty. Misty agreed to be murdered, too, mind you, so this is basically assisted suicide. Godot went with this method because, one, it would protect Maya, and two, it would give him the chance to put Phoenix "in his place" for not protecting Mia. Godot is just as much of a villain as von Karma, in that he had a petty reason to do the elaborate crime he committed. Godot, in the end, committed premeditated murder and actively tried to push the blame on someone else.
      • Misty never planned on getting murdered so much as she preferred to assume that risk for herself rather than making Pearl take the risk. She may have consented to being killed if there was no other way to stop Dahlia, but that wasn't plan A for her. There isn't proof that that was plan A for Godot, either. It is also implied that he didn't fully make up his mind to kill her until after he was stabbed.
      • They were both still fully aware that it was an option. Godot not only admitted that he knew at that moment that he wouldn't really be stopping "Dahlia" and knew that it was really Misty or Pearl that he'd be stabbing, he also admitted that he willingly risked Maya's life just so he could go in and "save" her. That kind of implies that he pretty much let Dahlia get summoned despite the fact he probably knew that it would make it fairly likely that at least one person would walk out of there with at least some serious injuries.
    • In AAI 2, Criminals from the previous game are shown as still alive. Also, Kristoph in Apollo Justice was sitting around in his jail cell, clearly not dead for murdering an innocent man.
      • Kristoph had connections mad enough to get a freakin wall full of books on his solitary cell. It's really likely he was using those same connections to avert his sentence.
  • Case 3-5: Why didn't Godot swing across on the same rope that carried Misty's body?
    • Because if he fell into the river, he'd die, most probably.
      • But he wouldn't fall in as long as he tied the rope securely around himself, like he did to Misty. And since Dahlia was still at large as far as he knew (he wasn't there when Maya locked herself in the cavern), risking the river would seem to be the safer bet.
      • The victim fell 10 feet after death because of that rope trick. If Godot had attempted it, he'd have died whether or not he fell into the river.
        • Oh my god, a ten foot drop! No one could survive that!
        • It was late at night, it was cold, his body was utterly messed up, and he had gone for hours without his coffee. It was not the time for a dramatic action sequence. Besides, he had some snow to clean up first. And... uh... Mia would have never forgiven him if he had left Maya alone on that side all night.
        • Also, there was always the chance that someone would see him. I think the point of Iris framing herself rather than just dropping the body into the water was to create a court case, so that Godot could blend in with the investigation group and get back home without arousing suspicion.
        • He never got the chance to actually escape, after using the rope to swing the body it ended up dangling in the middle of the bridge like it's seen on the photo, it didn't return to the other side. And he didn't swing along with the body because he had cleaning to do.
      • Not to mention he got stabbed in the face earlier. Do you really feel like swinging across a dangerous river on a flimsy rope connected to a burning bridge, all the while with a stabbed face?
  • How did Dahlia successfully impersonate Iris? We've seen various members of the Fey family channel Mia, and each time, while Mia's presence was fully visible, it was also obvious who was channeling her. Yet she managed a picture-perfect Iris imitation, and one that can fool the player, unlike Tigre. She didn't display Maya's black hair, nor her usual red. (On the brighter side, as seen when Dahlia left her body, Maya's hair was let down.) She couldn't have planned for this, either; the intent was for Pearl to channel her, and both Misty and Maya's channelings occurred without her knowledge. (For the record, does she dye? You wouldn't expect identical twins to have such different hair colors, yet even her spirit is a fiery redhead.)
    • With regards to the hair dye stuff, I always assumed that Iris was the one who dyed her hair, because of the whole deal with the spirit.
      • Given that almost everyone else in the family has black or dark brown hair, Dahlia's has to be the one that's dyed. Her spirit's eyes are red too, aren't they? Can't be literal.
    • And a minor thing: does that mean that Iris was wearing Maya's outfit when she was found? Not an IJBM; just an excuse for fanart.
      • I think Maya changed into a Hazakura temple outfit before she began training. Sure, her sprites during the flashback have her wearing her usual clothes, but that's just because Capcom didn't have much room to spare on the GBA cart.
      • My only conclusion is that Dahlia and Iris actually do have black hair and the visual difference is just for the sake of the player. Which still doesn't explain the non-black haired people that were chanelling her and ARGH ARGH JUST A GAME BRAIN HURT
    • Iris has black hair. Dahlia was impersonating Iris. Maya has black hair. Dahlia had Maya's hair. I honestly don't see a problem here.
      • It may just be an optical illusion, but Iris's hair looks gray to me. Also, the host keeps her hairstyle, and I don't know if Maya's hair braids up that well in the front.
      • Dahlia testified that when she was channeled that night, the first thing she did was pin her hair up, though why she did that when she was going to be wearing a hood, or how she did it without hair pins or the like, is beyond me. At that time she was actually being channeled by Misty Fey, though she didn't know it; maybe when she was channeled by the mystery medium in the Training Hall she pinned her hair up in the dark?
      • One thing though, Dahlia could not have been surprised to learn that it was Maya who was chanelling her in court. The hairstyle of the summoner is kept (when either Maya or Pearl channel Mia), so in pinning her hair up, Dahlia must have at least felt, if not seen her hair. if she really had been summoned by Pearl, then she wouldn't have been able to impersonate Iris anyway since she's a light brunette. Dahlia should have known Maya summoned her if she gave it a moment of thought.
        • It seemed more like she never suspected that Maya could have come up with the idea to channel Dahlia's spirit on her own (which she didn't). As for the hair, unless Morgan specifically told Dahlia "My daughter will summon you. She has pretzel hair, remember that", there wouldn't be any reason for Dahlia to not believe that the medium who summoned her was anyone other than Pearl Fey.
    • Dahlia simply never knew Pearl's hair color, as in the original plan she was supposed to wear a hood while she was channeled anyway - Morgan would have had no reason to warn her that Pearl's hair wasn't black. Since Morgan's hair is black and Dahlia might have seen herself in a mirror after Misty channeled her, it was perfectly natural for her to assume that Pearl's hair was black when she unexpectedly woke up in the cavern and went on to impersonate Iris without a hood.
    • There's also one more possibility. Maya Fey was told by Mia to channel Dahlia. Maya doesn't go into a lot of detail about what Mia wrote. It is possible that, along with the instructions to channel Dahlia, Mia also told her to change outfits and put her hair down to avoid suspicion, and just didn't mention it to anybody.
    • There's a possibility that Iris and Dahlia have the same color hair, but it is colored differently as a convienience to the audience. The same thing comes up all the time in Ranma ½, where anime-Ranma's black hair changes to red when in female form but other characters can't always tell the difference right away.
  • Godot replaced his blood on the dagger with some other blood, I assume. Why didn't he just get rid of the thing? There was a raging river right below him.
    • If you mean the night of the deal, he couldn't find the dagger. If you mean the day of the trial, Gumshoe was the one who gave it to him, he couldn't just get rid of it after that.
    • Why could he not find the dagger the night of the murder? The garden isn't that big.
      • Yes, but it ended up stuck in the back of a tree. Not exactly the first place you'd look for a knife that had been randomly flung somewhere. If that doesn't do it for you, well, Godot's vision is messed up.
      • Now that I think about it, how did it get stuck in the reverse side of the tree, anyway? If their fight was near the lantern, shouldn't it have ended up in the front of the tree (the part you see when you enter the garden)?
        • I firmly believe the reason that is so, it's because they didn't want you to find it and have the blood examined, and have Godot be instantly snagged into the case.
        • Or it's possible that Godot was just lying and he went and put it there in the tree himself so nobody would find it until later.
  • 3-5 is full of it, in my opinion: How is it that Godot could tie a rope swing around Elise's body that supported her during mid-swing but came loose at the end? I try and work out the physics of it, and the way I see it, that body either should have dropped in the river or stayed on the rope, hanging down over the river. It would have made a lot more sense if Iris had caught it, but then there wouldn't have been that infamous ten-foot drop.
    • There are certain knots that can be tied that, when pressure is released, they come undone. When Misty's body swung up at the end of the arc, the knot was probably loosened enough for the body to slip free.
    • He swung it with precision so that it would come up next to the outcropping on the Hazakura Temple side, the move sideways a little and drop on the outcropping. As for why friction had seemingly no effect, he threw it down.
  • The Judge and Winston Payne in 3-1 and 3-4, the reactions they show to the witnesses, with no comment whatso ever on Ms. Fanservice ?
    • Maybe they prefer the Yamato Nadeshiko type. Or redheads. Or a combination of the two.
      • I think it's more the fact that Dahlia looks and acts so sweet and innocent and angelic (which she's not) that she pretty much has the Judge and Payne under her spell for that reason rather than her looks. There's a difference between looking hot (like Mia does) and looking like you'd never hurt a fly (like Dahlia does).
      • Indeed. Dahlia looks completely harmless, vulnerable, needing and worthy of protection. Mia is confident and aggressive (when she's not being rookie-nervous), exactly what many men find threatening... indeed, this is underlined when the force of her point blows Payne's hair away. There's probably a trope or three in there.
    • For what it's worth, Gumshoe does make a comment in which he flat-out tells Mia, "You're really gorgeous!"
  • In the first case of Trials and Tribulations, Winston Payne says that perhaps the victim could have grabbed the bottle of medicine to "identify the killer" or something to that effect. Did the victim stop and pick it up as he was about to be murdered and hold onto it while being electrocuted, or did he pick it up after having electricity from a high voltage wire surge through his body? The bottle was most likely planted. It doesn't bother me that Payne said it, but that Mia didn't pick up on it.
    • She probably did, but that argument wouldn't have held water. She couldn't possibly know when he grabbed the bottle OR known how long he lived after being electrocuted.
  • Case 3-3 involves an unplanned murder - Furio Tigre didn't expect Glen to win the lottery and back out of the deal. He only manages to avoid suspicion by reenacting the crime and planting evidence on an unconscious Maggey. So what exactly would the murderer have done had Maggey not fainted and simply called the police? Or what if Maggey hadn't passed out for an hour, and instead woke up before or during the reenactment? Seems like a pretty flimsy plan to me . . . .
    • It's probable that Viola can be called in as witness, since she was at the scene when the killing happened, and Jean was also in the plan, so there's no witness to support Maggey. For Maggey waking up, well, if I remember correctly, she was carried out. It would still be an flimsy plan, though.
    • On a related note, can anyone genuinely picture Furio slipping poison into someone's drink unnoticed? I mean, he's the anthropomorphic personification of intimidation! His impersonation of Phoenix consisted of yelling at and threatening everyone. His attempts to throw suspicion off himself in court consisted of yelling at and threatening everyone. He doesn't strike me as the calm, subtle type at all! Now, see, if Viola had slipped it in there...
      • Considering how intimidating he is, it's not entirely likely that the victim would have been looking him in the eye... or even at his body.
  • Why, in case 3-5, does Dahlia's spirit have red hair? Dahlia did have red hair when alive, but as demonstrated by the Kurain Channeling Technique, spirits take on their host's hair. Why does Dahlia's spirit thus have hair, and not the actual features of Dahlia which are channeled?
    • It's been shown before that the host acquires some of the more iconic features of the person they are channeling: Mia and Pearl both acquire Mia's facial features, her rather impressive bust, and a mole, which would imply rather extensive physical change (in Pearl's case, at least two feet). It's possible that the specific feature you mentioned is merely such a part of the character's self-image that it transformed the channeler.
    • You make no sense, when we see the spirit Dahlia had already stopped being channeled, so what we are seeing is her real self, so it's obvious it's going to have her normal hair again, she isn't even in Maya's body at that point.
    • My theory is that the harder it is to control a spirit, the less he or she would look like the channeler.
    • It's a spirit. When the spirit inhabits a host, the spirit has to borrow the host's body and share physical features. When it's outside the body, it can look like whatever it wants to be. Recall 1-5, where Mia's spirit appears twice looking like she did in life. As for why it only has her red hair, remember that the spirit is being exorcised, and most likely 'fading away' just before she disappears completely. The red hair probably is important enough to the spirit that it stays on even after her other features have turned into shadows. A possible explanation may be that she actually dyed it, and her hair is actually black all along. The act of it may be important to her, perhaps symbolic of her taking charge of her own life, and thus why she values it enough to place such importance on it.
  • I'm very confused by the map of the Hazakura Temple area you receive in case 3-5. It appears to be a scale map of the area, including both temples, the hall and the bridge. The thing is, we know that bridge from the previous case, and both that case's map of the bridge and Edgeworth's estimate of its length to Gumshoe put it at twenty meters in length. The path from Hazakura to the bridge appears to be about three to four times that distance, counting meandering. So eighty meters tops. It takes fifteen minutes to walk that far, or five minutes by snowmobile? That's basically... eighty steps. Even in the cold, you should be able to take more than five steps a minute!
    • Not to scale?
    • Steep, switchbacks, tons of branches and rocks hiding under the dirt to grab at careless ankles...?
  • How is it that Jean Armstrong (The pink-loving chef from 3-3) is able to confuses people about his gender, with even the judge asking if he's male or female, yet nobody is confused by Ron DeLite? Jean is very clearly a guy. His body and face (And facial hair) are very obviously male, he just dresses weird. Ron was far more effeminate-looking than Jean was.
    • Ron doesn't do anything that calls his gender into question.
    • They might not be sure whether or not Armstrong is transgendered and identifies as female.
      • When Armstrong talks about himself, he jumps around between masculine and feminine descriptives (at one point, he refers to himself as a "pert and perky gentleman" and another time calls himself a "coquette," a term reserved for women). It supports the transgender theory, but even if he wasn't, his inconsistent descriptives certainly wouldn't help anything.
    • There are bearded ladies and really buff ladies that can sometimes confuse a person.
  • Case 3-5: Once Dahlia Hawthorne realises that she's being channeled by Maya, why doesn't she attempt suicide? After all, we hear over and over again that her objective is to kill Maya. Admittedly, it appears that she's in denial over it for a while and she IS in a court room, but we already know that she's a master of hiding her true nature and it wouldn't be the first time someone has fled from, or died on, the witness stand.
    • I believe it was stated at some point (case 2-2?) that a medium usually takes precautions to prevent the spirit from harming its channeler. Also, Dahlia didn't have any weapon or poison at hand with which to kill herself. As for the Terry and young Phoenix incidents, they happened years ago, and presumably court security was tightened up as a response. Also, wouldn't killing herself be against her nature?
    • I don't think Dahlia has prepared anything to kill herself with, and there aren't many things that can be used as aids to suicide in a courtroom. The moment she tries to seize a weapon, security will just pin her down (that's what they're trained to do). Given that, what's she gonna do? Grab a pen and stab herself? Get 1000 papercuts? Bang her head on the stand repeatedly and very, very strongly?
  • Also Case 3-5: If Godot wanted to protect Maya, why didn't he just destroy Morgan's instructions so that Pearls would never find them in the first place?
    • Because Godot's desires were not as altruistic as he made himself believe. He didn't just want to protect her, he wanted to save her, like he felt he had failed to do for Mia. And he couldn't do that if she wasn't in danger in the first place. He admitted as such. He even admitted the best thing he could have done was to simply tell Phoenix, who was almost always by her side, and the whole debacle would never have happened.
    • There is such a thing as Hero Syndrome.
  • A timing issue from 3-5: What woke Larry up? The lightning strike on the bridge. He claims he sketched exactly what he saw at that moment (the sketch is presented upside down because he was lying on his back at the time). Yet the sketch shows the body swinging under the bridge... so the body was swinging the moment lightning struck the bridge?
    • The lightning woke him up, and he watched the fire for a while before he saw the body swinging under the bridge.
      • OBJECTION! ::pointing:: That directly contradicts the witness' testimony that he sketched exactly what he saw at the moment! Further... ::slams desk:: he would have no reason to continue to lie on his back after waking up! This means... ::speed lines, Theme Music Power-Up:: the picture would not have been upside down!!
        • HOLD IT! Why wouldn't he be laying down on his back? If he had just woken up, and he was content with his position, then why would he move? Especially if he was in awe of the burning bridge? In addition, the body swinging under the bridge wouldn't take much time to complete at all, even if he didn't need time to take it all in! What we have here is simple; he did sketch exactly what he saw at that moment. That moment was while he gazed in awe, and saw a body swinging under a bridge - while he was laying on his back! Then he grabbed his sketching tools, and completed the sketch, long after that moment had passed!
          • HOLD IT! Have you tried laying on your back with your head tilted back like that? It's a pain in the neck... quite literally! There's no way he would have stayed that way!
      • HOLD IT! Who says that he sketched it in that position? It would be perfectly reasonable if he sat up, sketched, then went back down briefly to look again!
      • HOLD IT! Larry is an idiot. Logic does not apply to him. He might very well have stayed in that position.
  • In "Recipe For Turnabout", how exactly did Viola manage to impersonate Maggey? Even if Kudo saw her from behind, wouldn't he notice her bandages?
    • My assumption is the big bow. There's a big pink bow that goes on the back of Maggey's head when she wears her uniform, and if Viola was correctly impersonating her, maybe the bow would obscure the bandages? Besides, Kudo wasn't looking above her hips, anyway. Phoenix' cross-examination reveals as much.
  • Okay, so, by the end of "The Stolen Tournabout", we learn that Ron is, in fact Mask* DeMasque after Phoenix proved that he wasn't the thief on the night of the urn theft (and he wasn't. Not that night, at least). And Ron says that, because of the double jeopardy law, he can't ever be tried for the crime of being Mask* Demasque again. Fair enough, but the thing is, he was initially tried for the theft of the Sacred Urn, not the crime of being Mask* DeMasque. Even if he can't be tried for the theft of the Urn again (which makes sense), why doesn't anyone bring up the idea of trying him for, say, the theft of the Tear of Emanon? Or the Crown of Bongora, or the Left Hand of Hades, or the Portrait of Majeena? That's four different cases of grand larceny for which, I can assume, Ron has never been tried. They are all completely seperate from the theft of the Kurain Sacred Urn, so they shouldn't be covered by double jeopardy because of that case. But Ron admites to have been Mask* DeMasque for all those other thefts, and he gets off scot free because he was framed for the fifth robbery? Huh?
    • The laws in AA universe are very different from what we have, with changes mostly directed towards "streamlining" processes, so a suspect is tried for a group of linked crimes whenever possible? Other than that, rule of cool/funny at its finest?
    • My best guess is that he was more-or-less charged with five counts of grand larceny at once, with the Urn taking priority since evidence was actually left there. So then the double jeopardy would then attach to all five counts instead of just the Urn theft.
      • Ron DeLite was being tried for grand larceny. In America (which I'm going with), larceny turns into grand larceny when you've stolen a "significant value of property". In most states, you qualify for this at the $250 mark. The urn was valued as priceless, and I mean that in the worst possible way, meaning it had no "value". The odds of them lumping all of the theft crimes into one increases.
    • In the AA 'verse, theft is not a crime. Being a thief is a crime. Thus, since Ron was proven to not be a thief, Double Jeopardy applies. Maybe.
    • Ron DeLite was being tried for grand larceny. In America (which I'm going with), larceny turns into grand larceny when you've stolen a "significant value of property". In most states, you qualify for this at the $250 mark. The urn was valued as priceless, and I mean that in the worst possible way. The odds of them lumping all of the theft crimes into one increases.
      • I think there is a legal need to prosecute all related crimes the state wants to charge somebody for at the same time. Not sure if this extendeds to serial theft though, but "charging him for all of it in one trial" is a valid, logical explantion.
  • On a note related to the question above: why was Ron never charged with the data theft that he confessed to in court? They never even asked him for information that would allow them to warn the company whose data had been stolen that their security had been compromised.
    • For that matter, we don't see any proof that they even asked him for information that could help them track down the stolen items after the trial was over. It is possible that this could have happened offscreen.
  • 3-5. Godot makes absolutely no reaction to Mia showing up in Pearl's body. Whut.
    • Presumably the same reason Franziska needed a photograph of Mia being channeled in 2-2, despite the fact that Mia was currently being channeled on the other side of the room. It seems that the rest of the court don't notice your partner unless she speaks to them first... Note that your partner often makes incredibly incriminating remarks, but nobody ever hears them.
      • Except that Mia does immediately and directly address the court at that point. She and Godot even exchange words. Godot obviously acknowledges her presence, and yet he doesn't completely freak out there (unlike later, when he kind of does).
        • He and Mia acknowledge each other, yes -- and then the very next thing he does, as that clip shows, is tell Phoenix that from here out Phoenix has to do it all himself, no beautiful women jumping in to save the day. This is likely as much a message to Mia to let her protege prove himself as it is to Phoenix. And indeed, she does -- and he freaks out because he sees her in him, or parallel to him, in the form she had when he knew her (her rookie lawyer outfit and hairstyle), not just giving him counsel from the side while being channeled. At that point he sees the literal metaphor that she does live on in him, or at least her brand of wholehearted belief in the clients does. When he shows that he can do it on his own, without prompting, Godot realizes how wrong he's been and this shakes him to the core... and damn, this troper just teared up for the first time thinking about it.
    • Considering that there is both documented evidence of a medium changing appearance while channeling and precedence for people thinking that channeling is a hoax, it's likely that by now Kurain mediums have something of a reputation for somehow creating believable illusions of the deceased. Godot may have believed that he was seeing a very good impersonation of Mia rather than Mia herself.
      • Except, the last case kind of revolves around him believing the Kurain Channeling Technique's power.
  • At the end of Trials and Tribulations, Ron and Desiree DeLite apparently started a business counseling thieves to help them start honest lives and selling them plans on how to do their crimes on the side. There are two major contradictions here. The first is that Ron DeLite was given most of his plans by Luke Atmey, and the one plan he did make didn't work out so well. Where are these plans coming from? Also, Desiree hates sneaky thieves. Do all of their plans tell the thieves to announce their plans ahead of time? No smart thief would have the confidence to do that and if so many thieves started using calling cards, wouldn't there be an epidemic?
    • Nobody said those plans they sold on the side were any good...
    • Ron may be mediocre, but no one said Desiree is...
  • One thing that bugs me is Luke Atmey lied after you break his Psyche-Lock and it doesn't register. According to the characters he shouldn't have been able to do that. (He claims he was knocked out by the Shichishito. It's not true.)
    • The thing is, the Magatama isn't exactly a straight-out lie detector. It reacts specifically to concealment and the withholding of secrets, which is precisely what Atmey was doing; what made his situation unique was that he was hiding another secret behind the first one. By concealing his lie about getting hit over the head by the Shichishito, it was treated just the same as any other secret, and "unlocked" accordingly. Had Phoenix used the Magatama a second time immediately afterward, it probably would have picked up on the presence of a second secret (i.e. what actually happened), but as he's never had to do that in the past he simply didn't think of it.
      • Related to the above point: The Magatama shows a person's heart kept secrets, not lies. Someone could be lying about something that they themselves don't consider a "secret" yet the locks would not show. It's quite plainly stated that the psyche-locks are "locks on a person's heart" so they probably would not respond to something that is not a strong emotional lie to a person. Not only that, but the locks would not appear anyway unless Phoenix directly questioned whether him getting hit was true or not. Like the above comment stated, the Magatama does not instantly detect lies. It detects someone locking up their heart from the holder.
  • At the end of Case 4 of Trials and Tribulations, Terry Fawles commits suicide via poison. Who in their right mind would let a convicted murderer on Death Row keep a necklace with a bottle on it without first checking the contents? Also, how could everyone in the courtroom miss seeing him take off the necklace, open the bottle, and pour it into the coffee Armando gave him before he drank it?
    • He didn't keep the necklace for all of those years. Terry states that he went to retrieve it from the 'special place' where he and Dahlia promised never to betray one another, on the day of the crime. It's clearly been there for the past five years.
  • In "The Stolen Tournabout", you pick up "Bullard's Notes" (That binder full of prices that are "too low" for each of the stolen items)... and you never use it in court. What was it for, and what are those numbers, anyway?
    • This is brought up towards the top of the page. I think the consensus reached there was that those were the prices Luke Atmey received for selling the treasures on the black market. Or something.
      • I thought that those were the prices that Bullard received from Luke Atmey for blackmailing him over the theft of each item. It was stated twice that the prices were too low to be the black market values of the stolen items.
      • I think the emphasis was more on "why can I pick this up if I'm never given the opportunity to use it"?
    • You do use it. You show it to Ron to get information in the investigation.
  • 3-4: Valerie Hawthorne's age is given as 23. Much attention is given to a then five-year-old incident in which Valerie, as a detective, played a significant role... but she would have been 18 at the time!? For that matter, 23 is pretty young to be a detective!
    • This bugged me too. I kind of figured that age is but a number in PW and doesn't affect anyone's profession or skill level. For example, Franziska became a prosecutor at age 13, Pearl is an incredible channeler at only age 8, etc.
  • In game three, case five, how is it that exorcism occurs in the middle of a public trial and no-one thinks it worthy of comment? I know Nick is surprised at how comfortable the Judge seems with it all, but what of the spectators? Aren't they disturbed? The existence of ghosts and the afterlife has been proven before their very eyes, for goodness' sake!
    • The second case of game 2 treats the Kurain channelling technique as an established fact, presumably everyone already knows that ghosts exist (of course this then puts Edgeworth into Flat Earth Atheist territory with his initial disbelief)
    • But Bikini mentions that the Kurain Technique was viewed with suspicion after Misty's failure, and that Kurain is failing financially as a result, or something.
    • It is possible that everyone in that trial was simply SO amazed by what they saw that they were stunned speechless.
    • I'll go with the last one. If I were to see that in person in a trial that's already holding so much unusual facts, I'd just go O_O for a while.
  • I know Phoenix isn't the nicest guy in the game, and I know Gumshoe can annoy him somewhat, but what was his problem during Gumshoe's introduction? In 2-4, Gumshoe was a big help in gathering evidence to help find Maya. How does Phoenix introduce him in 3-2? "Oh no! Not him again!" What the hell?
    • I can really understand Phoenix in this regard. Gumshoe, while adorable and a rather nice person, is usually trying to gather evidence against your client, witholds information and isn't all that bright. It got better over the games, as Gumshoe warmed up to Phoenix, but Nick would probably have prefered a more competent detective on the case.
  • In 3-2, this troper can't see why Godot didn't squeeze another day of trial by simply proclaiming that, though the defense had proved that Atmey was at the crime scene, so was Ron DeLite, both of them having opportunity and motive (the blackmail), there being no evidence pointing at either of them being the murderer (Ron's testifying that someone hit him in the forehead was not supported by any evidence).
    • It probably had to do with Phoenix's insistence on finishing the trial that day before Luke could be found guilty of theft in the other trial.
      • Nevertheless, considering how the other trial was at its first day, having proved that Atmey was at the crime scene and that the Sacred Urn was stolen before the day of the murder would be sufficient to convict him in both counts of larceny and murder.
      • Actually, there was evidence that Ron's story was true; as Phoenix pointed out, if he had been conscious at the time that emergency buzzer was pressed, there's no way he would've stayed in the room.
    • And why does Phoenix care about catching Atmey so much? He says near the end 'Even if I get Ron saved the real killer will go free.'. Getting the killer isn't the point, stop your client from getting the death penalty!
    • Well, it's always about finding the truth in the 'verse. As for why there was no extension? Phoenix was quite adamant on it, and rightly so, since Atmey will be found guilty for theft really quickly, given it's exactly what he wants. If that happens, Double Jeopardy, people.
  • In 3-3, how the hell did Furio Tigre manage to trick the entire court room into believing that he was Phoenix? I mean, I can understand how Maggey might have been fooled, since she only met Phoenix once before, and it's possible that Payne noticed it but decided not to say anything about it because he couldn't pass up a chance to stroke his ego with an easy victory. But the judge had seen Phoenix on multiple occasions over the past three years! Are you going to sit there and tell me that he sat through the whole trial without noticing that "Phoenix" now had bright orange skin, a thick Brooklyn accent, a nasty temper, and, to top it all off, a fake paper badge?
    • What's important about the series of events preceding 3-3 is that they serve to communicate that, to the other characters, the only truly memorable thing about Phoenix is his spiky Anime Hair. Beyond that, I'd say that the Judge was so cowed by Furio that he wasn't really willing to question him. Also take into account that the Judge is pretty old and the relative distance involved -- it's possible that, be it from his poor eyesight or from that distance, he couldn't tell that the badge was fake. It's actually more unsettling that Maggey didn't notice, given the physical proximity that she would have had. Remember that in her first appearance she pretty much idolized Phoenix for getting her off the hook, and it's not too hard to imagine that she would be rather familiar with Phoenix's behaviour through her correspondence with Gumshoe. She's the one who would have been the least likely to be fooled, and with her gung-ho attitude and police experience it's hard to believe that she was simply too scared of Furio to call him out.
    • It's specifically mentioned by Maggey on at least one dialog path that everyone in the trial had question marks in their eyes(or similar), but nobody quite dared speak up. That Furio was so intimidating may have contributed to this - it's a harsher edge than Phoenix's usual bluster, but honestly, it's not like Phoenix himself is above pressuring witnesses to get his way. In fact, it's a core mechanic. He just usually doesn't do it to the other courtroom figures(the judge and prosecutor).
    • It's entirely possible that Maggey is a bit of an idiot (remember, she's like a female Gumshoe, not too bright) and took Furio at his word. Besides, Furio may be a better actor than we give him credit for.
  • According to case 3-5, the in game court system has no problem letting the defendant in the case testify that somebody else committed the crime in another location which was, at the time, not accessible from the location the body was found at.
    • Most of Phoenix's rebuttal to that testimony is proving that it wasn't accessible. After all, the defendant claimed to witness the murder itself. In fact, the fact that she didn't know that it wasn't accessible is key to the reveal.
  • Here's another one for 3-2: The last thing you have to trick Atmey into mentioning is the fact that Ron was wearing his Mask*De Masque costume, since it hadn't been mentioned in the time he was there, which, the game would have us believe, meant that he couldn't have known Ron was wearing it. Why is this a major plot point when Luke obviously would have visited Ron in the detention center (if for no other reason than to preserve his 'Ace Detective' facade)? He could have just looked at Ron and found that out! I apologize if I'm missing something obvious, but it's just bugging me.
    • Just because Ron was wearing the outfit when he surrendered himself to the police, it doesn't mean that he wore it when the murder occured. So even if Atmey vistied Ron in jail, there was no way he could have known what was worn at the time of the crime.
      • Ah, you know what I was forgetting? The fact that Ron turned himself in, and wasn't arrested. It makes more sense that he might've changed into his costume before admitting to being Mask*De Masque when nobody was sure that was the truth. I suppose it only would have been a problem if he hadn't had time and incentive to change...
    • Ron went home after the murder, you can change clothes easily in your home.
  • Glen Elg is Gle Nelg backwards. I know this is means something but I don't *what*!
    • Lisa Basil, too
    • Move the N in Gle Nelg and you get... Glen Elg. Same with Lisa Basil.
    • The Ace Attorney series is very, very big on Theme Naming. The theme for the Blue Screens, Inc. employees just happens to be palindromes; there's no greater or lesser meaning to it.
    • During the credits Lisa Basil lampshades this by saying they'd just hired Adam Mada, who she was certain would work out as soon as she heard his name.
  • In the final case of T&T, why did Phoenix decide to defend Iris? At the time, he didn't know Dahlia had a twin: Iris. For all he knew, he was defending Dahlia who, most likely, escaped from prison.
    • It is implied heavily from Phoenix at many points that he is still in love with her. Also she constantly states that she has sins she wants to banish from herself so it's likely that Phoenix just remembered his love for her and decided to believe in her.
    • You two need to refresh your memory. EDGEWORTH decided to defend Iris on the condition that she tell Phoenix the truth.
      • While that is true, Phoenix would not have given Miles his badge unless he wanted him to use it.
      • The last Phoenix saw of Iris was five Psyche-Locks, he wanted to protect her til he got the truth out of her. And he had reason to believe she wasn't Dahlia because none came up for going to his university.
  • When I played the game, I was angry with Maggey for not telling Phoenix about the lottery ticket before the trial started. But in retrospect, Phoenix is the one who should be apologizing to Maggey for not reading the court record from the first time she was tried! I know he had a limited amount of time, but why didn't he read that over?
    • For that matter, why did the judge act like it was his first time seeing the apron even though he had already given a ruling on the case? Was the first defense attorney so bad that Payne won without one of the most important pieces of physical evidence?
      • The first defence attorney was trying to get Maggey convicted. It's actually possible and a lot more plausible that the evidence never came up.
  • Why did Godot try to frame Iris in the fifth case? Yeah, Iris agreed to get framed willingly, but Godot's whole goal was to protect Mia's family, right? Plus Iris is younger than him, healthier than him, female (which would presumably matter if his chauvinism is accompanied by chivalry, as is implied), etc. Is Godot really so selfish that he has to have her take the fall for what he did (which is exactly like what Dahlia did)? What makes matters worse is that it is implied that Iris agreed to take the blame because she was afraid Maya would get blamed otherwise, which would mean that she thought Godot would actually be willing to frame the very person he was trying to protect. It would be pretty crazy to kill Misty in order to protect Maya only to have Maya executed in order to protect himself! It could be argued that Godot was angry with Iris for her role in protecting Dahlia, but if he trusted her enough to enlist her help, he must have known that her goal is to protect her family. I guess maybe Godot thought that he needed to stay alive to protect Maya again if Morgan kept trying to kill her? Or maybe he thought Iris was going down anyway because of how Bikini saw Iris desecrate Misty's body?
    • In retrospect, at no time did Godot ever say that Iris killed Elise/Misty. He never really pushes for a guilty verdict in court (though the game still gives you one if you run out of "health"). He spends a large portion of the time in court trying to force Phoenix to present better arguments about why Maya is innocent. He doesn't ever seem to want to say who did it or even attempt to suggest that Iris did. He still admitted that the plan called for Iris to "take the fall" if they couldn't keep track of Pearl, though.
  • Why didn't Elise or Iris tell Phoenix, Maya, Pearl, or Bikini about the plot to kill Maya?
    • They probably thought that they could stop it on their own and it wasn't very clever to worry anyone for nothing. Plus, Elise could be worried about revealing her identity to Phoenix or Maya.
    • Plus, the plan on the whole is being masterminded by Godot, who for his own personal reasons would have insisted Phoenix and, by proxy, Maya, who'll just blab it all out to him, be kept out of the loop. Presumably, Iris and Elise trusted him, and therefore believed him to have a better justification for this then he ultimately turned out to.
  • At the end of case 3-1, Phoenix says that he wants to become a lawyer in order to save his friend (or something to that effect). If he's talking about Larry, how did he predict three years in advance that Larry would be accused of murder? Or had Larry already been accused and somehow put off his trial for three years so that Phoenix could defend him?
    • He's talking about Edgeworth. The first game details his efforts to change him.
      • So he became an attorney in order to save Edgeworth from being like Manfred von Karma?
        • In a nutshell, Phoenix mentions in the first game that what pushed him to become an attorney was hearing all of the media coverage of Edgeworth's success as a prosecutor. Facing him in the courtroom was the only chance he felt he had to confront Edgeworth about becoming a ruthless prosecutor instead of a defence attorney like his father.
        • But he also says to Mia in the very first case of the first game, before even entering the courtroom, that Larry is one of the reasons he became a lawyer. Edgeworth's reputation and refusal to communicate with Phoenix was probably what pushed him into making the final decision to study law on the side, but he says it's because of both of them that he decides to become a defense attorney. So probably he'd been at least considering it since that classroom "trial", perhaps also because of Edgeworth's shining image of his own father.
  • In case 4, how did Valerie and "Melissa" get to the Dusky Bridge area on the day Valerie was murdered? If they drove, where were their cars? For that matter, did the culprit really carry around a knife, a tripod camera, a spare change of clothes (so that she could be photographed as Valerie and herself), a scarf, and possibly a phone and watch and umbrella and lockpick all over the wet mountain that day?
    • Dahlia is Crazy Prepared. After all, five years ago she had convinced Terry to agree to take the poison they left at the temple, right before she faked her own death without his knowledge, just in case they happened to meet up again in circumstances that would threaten her. Also, she must've taken Valerie's scarf after killing her, and may have already had a coat that would look the same in the black-and-white photo her camera took even without the obscuring drizzle. As for getting there... got me. I'm more surprised that Dahlia was able to get the necklace -- wasn't this what Terry used to kill himself? -- back after the trial.
  • The Shichishito was bent in case 2, so why wasn't it bent later? Did some kind of metal smith fix it?
    • Getting a single kink out of a (relatively) straight metal rod is easier than you might think, especially if they took it to an expert. Considering that about four months pass between Cases 3-2 and 3-5, it doesn't really seem all that surprising that they managed to repair the damage completely.
    • IIRC, if you present the bent Shichishito to Adrian in 3-2 she offers to fix it, in considerable distress.
  • How did Terry Fawles get those marks on his face? It looks like he had an encounter with three layers of barbed wire. However, the game states that he escaped when a police wagon crashed. There shouldn't have been barbed wire involved, right? Was there a previous failed escape attempt?
    • Same way Matt Engarde got his. They're just there. Call it character design.
  • Iris repeatedly states that she's lived at Hazakura temple for as long as she remembers. However, Dahlia implies that their father didn't leave Kurain until after DL-6. He certainly didn't, by her story, leave until after Misty became Master, which is said to be three years before DL-6. Iris would have been 8 when DL-6 happened. How could Iris not remember anything prior to age 8?
    • The most probable explanation? She's lying. After all, given everything we can guess about her father and all we know about her mother, it's likely that Iris simply doesn't want to remember life before Hazakura.
      • Iris says that she's always been at Hazakura during conversations in which it is logical to think that the other conversant is using the Magatama. The Magatama must be in "Luke Atmey saying that Mask DeMasque hit him over the head counts as an unlock" mode every time she says that... or else she doesn't consider that statement to be concealing a secret.
      • That's what I would argue, both in this situation and in Atmey's. The Magatama doesn't detect falsehoods so much as it detects the deliberate act of concealment; if a person doesn't consider themselves to be lying (either because they interpret Phoenix's wording differently then he does, i.e. Engarde, they are concealing a second falsehood behind the first as if it was the truth, i.e. Atmey, or they are applying something akin to Doublethink and may to some degree believe their own story, i.e. Iris), then the Magatama won't pick up on it.
  • In case 3-1 why is Mia so surprised when she learns Doug couldn't have been hit by lightning? Did she forget who was at the witness stand?
    • Mia appears to have taken the case based solely on hearing that Dahlia was involved. She doesn't appear to have figured very many things out before entering the courtroom. When she first went into the courtroom, she didn't know exactly what had happened and had no way of being sure of who or what did it. She's basically like Phoenix himself when he first started out, i.e. greenhorn.
    • Also, IIRC, the way the whole hit-by-lightning thing happened, it seemed (to me, at least) that Mia was just saying it to buy herself some time. Besides, although that turned out to be wrong, she still figured that Dahlia was up to something, so it's possible that she was going to say something like Dahlia pushed Doug towards the lightning (although that would have made for a flimsy argument).
  • What exactly was Iris's role in the Dusky Bridge fake kidnapping supposed to be? Supposedly she got scared and ran away, and supposedly this "betrayal" led to problems for Dahlia. What exactly was she expected to do?
    • Most likely, to provide some sort of escape route. If she had done her part, presumably Dahlia would not have had to jump in the river and risk her life (and the diamond) to get out of there alive.
  • How was Terry Fawles able to afford to hire Grossberg's law firm?
    • Grossberg and the rest of the firm had nothing to do with it; it was just Mia, a greenhorn who happened to take a personal interest in the case. Presumably she took it pro-bono or at least at a reduced rate, and Diego tagged along as co-council for, well, obvious reasons. Grossberg himself may not even have heard about the case in particular detail until after the fact.
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