It was just last year that Phoenix Wright and his various plucky, psychic sidekicks rode off into the judicial sunset, wrapping up three games and close to an entire work week of goofy, lawyering, adventure gameplay. While in the real world, it’s only been three months, in the game world it’s been seven years and old Feenie has seen better days. No longer practicing law, he roams around in a wardrobe best described as “homeless guy meets raver kid” and scrapes a living together by playing piano in various restaurants and cheating at cards with his 15 year old daughter who just happens to be an amateur magician. Enter Apollo Justice, a young, up and coming lawyer in need of a job to support his enormous hair gel habit. Apollo teams up with Trucy, Phoenix’s daughter, to help represent the innocent and learn what caused Phoenix to be stripped of his attorney’s badge seven years ago.

As you can tell, even though the lead character may be different, Capcom has retained the same gloriously goofy sense of humor and drama that made Phoenix Wright so darn entertaining to make jump through the various legal hoops put in front of him. By keeping true to the series, as well as adding some new technical bells and whistles, the heart of the game is kept intact, even if the experience seems somewhat hampered by the inability to let go of the characters that came before.

For those that have played the Phoenix Wright series the basic gameplay mechanics will come as no surprise. You’ll investigate crime scenes using a combination of talking to witnesses and examining crime scenes via the DS’s touch screen. Those of you that remember the fifth case of the first Phoenix Wright series will be happy to learn that the forensics mini-games present in that case are now at Apollo’s disposal, making the game feel more at home on the DS and less like the GBA ports that the games of the last series were. Apollo can dust for fingerprints, and toe prints in one case, pour plaster molds of shoe prints as well as rotate evidence in three dimensions allowing for clues to be found upon the clues themselves. There’s also a handy 3-d representation of the murder scene that plays out at times while the dirty deed is being discussed. This is definitely one of the coolest parts of the game, which makes it a shame that it isn’t used more, and that it can’t be navigated as a piece of evidence.

While in trial, Apollo will do his best to press witnesses’ statements to uncover contradictions (lies) and then present evidence to back up the fact that each and every person sitting in that witness chair is seemingly incapable of telling the truth. While Phoenix had his super-special magic amulet that allowed him to see Psyche locks, Apollo has a super-special magic bracelet that allows him to perceive the nervous ticks and fidgeting of witnesses whenever they lie. When Apollo thinks someone is fibbing, the player can tough the bracelet icon, which then switches to an extremely freaky view of the witness on the top screen and a huge close-up of Apollo’s eye on the bottom screen. Moving the eye with the cursor allows the player to focus on whatever part of the witness is fidgeting so that you can then catch them in a lie. As a gameplay mechanic, it’s a lot of fun, if a bit unsettling, as if Apollo has been replaced with the Flaming Eye of Sauron. As a story element, it’s rather silly, as it hinges on the fact that a witness desperately trying to hide the fact that they murdered someone in cold blood will give a full confession just because you saw their nostrils flare.

Story logic has never been the hallmark of these games, however strong writing and interesting characters have and in these respects, Apollo Justice still delivers. The various conversations are very well written and often times, laugh out loud funny, and the characters are some of the strangest you’ll come across. The new prosecutor, Klavier “rock star by night “ Glavin is a bit too likeable to be an effective foil for Apollo. He doesn’t have the fun, barely controlled rage of Miles Edgeworth, but at the same time, he’s not cracking a whip every five seconds, so it all comes out in the wash. Ema Skye returns as the chief detective, replacing the loveable loser Dick Gumshoe, however Gumshoe still manages to make an appearance for those fans of the big galoot.

Oddly enough, the weakest character in the game is Apollo himself. That’s not to say that he isn’t written well, because he is, it’s that playing as Apollo isn’t that much different from playing as Phoenix. Both have the same attitude towards their cases, and their sidekicks, and both have plenty of snarky comments to make about all the parties involved, when they’re not sweating heavily in court. Hopefully future games will serve to distinguish Apollo from his predecessor. The characters all sport the same well done, 2-d animated look with a great deal more detail going into the characters in this version. Who knew Phoenix was such a looker, wardrobe notwithstanding?

As usual, there’s no lack of value in the game as it clocks in at over 20 hours, more so if you press every single statement in court. The structure of the game, with it divided into four cases lends itself well to treating the game like a TV series or a book of short stories, where you pick it up, play a case and then go do something else before starting up another one. The unchanging gameplay formula doesn’t hold up well to marathon sessions of frenzied suspect defending, however as a series of four, smaller games, it works quite well. Of course, individual results may vary. As with the Phoenix Wright games, the various cases all fit together to uncover the answers to a greater mystery, in this case, what happened to make Phoenix give up his badge seven years ago. For newcomers to the series, there seems to be a lot more gentle prodding in both navigating the investigations, as well as when presenting evidence in court, which helps to streamline play, as well as cut down on frustration.

In the end, Apollo Justice is a worthy successor to the Phoenix Wright series, even if the first outing seems a little too eager to hold on to the characters from its predecessor. By placing Phoenix and co. at the forefront of this game, Capcom gives Feenie fans a hook to buy into, but it’s at the expense of establishing Apollo as a character in his own right. Hopefully future Apollo games will give him more of a chance to stand out on his own, however even with this in mind, Apollo Justice: Attorney at Law provides plenty of well written, engaging, adventure game play that finally makes use of the DS’s feature set. Whether you’re an adventure game fan or a Phoenix Wright fan, you won’t be disappointed.