The Ace Attorney Series is one that is very near and dear to my heart. The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles is a compilation of two games. The two games are prequels to the Ace Attorney series known as The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures and The Great Ace Attorney 2: Resolve. On July 27, 2021, the compilation game was released on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and Windows. The game arrived and received favorable reviews from fans and critics alike and sits in the high 80s across its platforms on Metacritic.
Premise
These games have the courtroom-style gameplay popularized by the original Ace Attorney game. The game is split between investigation and courtroom battles. During the investigation, players must explore areas to gather evidence and interview characters for their testimonies. In Courtroom battles, the player must use evidence to find contradictions in witness testimonies. These games also sometimes have the player cross-examining multiple witnesses at once.
The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles Main Characters
- Ryunosuke Naruhodo – A second-year student at Imperial Yumei University. He has a strong sense of justice and is prone to putting himself in dangerous situations. He’s an ancestor to Phoenix Wright.
- Susato Mikotoba – A judicial assistant working alongside Naruhodo. A “yamato nadeshiko” with a progressive frame of mind and a love for books on law and foreign mystery novels.
- Kazuma Asogi – A close friend of Naruhodo’s and fellow student at Imperial Yumei University. He is studying to become a defense attorney, but supporters say that he is already more than qualified to become one. He seeks to travel to Britain to continue his studies. Asogi is calm and confident compared to the inexperienced Naruhodo and stands alongside him in Episode 1.
- Herlock Sholmes – A legendary English detective famous for his talent for rapid-fire deductive reasoning. He teams up with Naruhodo for criminal investigations.
- Iris Wilson – Sholmes’s assistant. A genius inventor and doctor who invented rudimentary forensic instruments for Sholmes’s investigations. She is also the author of The Adventures of Herlock Sholmes. Takumi’s familiarity with Arthur Conan Doyle’s original Sherlock Holmes stories, and their various theories and parodies, led him to create the Iris Wilson character.
- Barok van Zieks – A “cursed” English prosecutor known colloquially as the “Reaper of the Bailey”. He has returned to the Old Bailey courtroom after a five-year absence.
- Soseki Natsume – A defendant from The Adventure of the Clouded Kokoro. He is a witness in episode 1 and the defendant in episode 2.
Other recurring characters
- Yujin Mikotoba – Susato’s father and a legal professor. He serves as her assistant during the first case and appears in later cases.
- John Wilson – The victim. An English professor from London who has taught at Imperial Yumei University for the past three years. Originally named after Dr. John Watson of Sherlock Holmes fame, his name is adjusted for English localization.
- Jigoku – The judge of the Supreme Court of Judicature. Though he is not named in Episode 1, his surname is mentioned in Episode 2.
- Taketsuchi Auchi – The prosecutor in this case and an ancestor to Winston and Gaspen Payne. Equally as arrogant and self-confident as his descendants.
- Satoru Hosonaga – A waiter with a bad cough. The first witness.
- Iyesa Nosa – A Japanese soldier and father who appears as a witness.
- Kyurio Korekuta – An old merchant of relics who appears as a witness alongside Nosa. He owns an antique shop called Rasu-Tei.
- Aido Nosa – The troublemaking son of Iyesa Nosa.
Side Characters
- Jezaille Brett – A British woman in a blue dress and hat whom Naruhodo claims to have seen at the scene of the crime. She is an exchange student researcher from England studying at Imperial Yumei University’s medical department.
- Seishiro Jigoku – A judge from Japan who presides over the first case, and appears in later cases.
- Mael Stronghart – The Chief Justice in England. Strict about time.
- Tobias Gregson – A Scotland Yard detective, and the detective in charge of several of Naruhodo’s cases.
- Gina Lestrade – Defendant of The Adventure of the Unspeakable Story. The former pickpocket now works under Gregson as a detective-in-training.
- Toby – Gina Lestrade’s pet dog, who is affectionately referred to as Inspector Toby.
- Masked Apprentice – The prosecutor for Barok van Zieks’s trial.
- Genshin Asogi – Kazuma Asogi’s deceased father, and a recurring background character involved with Barok van Zieks.
- Klint van Zieks – Barok van Zieks’s deceased older brother.
The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles Titles In The Series
The Ace Attorney series launched in Japan with the Game Boy Advance game Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney in 2001, and has been published in the West since the release of a Nintendo DS port in 2005. The series currently consists of six main series games and five spin-offs.
- Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney
- Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Justice for All
- Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Trials and Tribulations
- Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney
- Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth
- Gyakuten Kenji 2 (Japan-only)
- Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney
- Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Dual Destinies
- The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures
- Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Spirit of Justice
- The Great Ace Attorney 2: Resolve
Cheat Codes
Currently, there are no known cheat codes for The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles.
