Ace Attorney 6 Japanese Trailer + ANIME! (#107)

OH MY GOD! Oh my God, yes. Today at the Tokyo Game Show (I completely forgot about that thing) there was a presentation on the upcoming and highly anticipated Ace Attorney 6, we learned a ton of stuff about the game, along with an announcement about another big thing, which I'll be talking about really soon. First of all, we got an AA6 trailer! It's in Japanese, but, thanks to the beautiful fanbase, we got an English-edited trailer. Click here for the Japanese trailer, or here for the English Edited trailer, which is a much, much better choice for most of you reading this. Kudos to Calios on YouTube for editing this. :)

We can learn a lot from the video, including the fact that the 'mysterious country' that Phoenix visits in AA6 is called 'The Kingdom of Kurain', (which will of course be associated with Kurain Village from Turnabout Trial 1-3 (not 1-3 as in case 3 in game 1 but as in games 1, 2 and 3) which is where Maya is supposedly at right now in the chronology! PLEASE GIVE US SOME MAYA! Even if it's just a side character. I'd even settle for some other spirit medium characters) where, as we already know, people are very superstitious and believe strongly in the spirits of the dead. Rightly so, it would seem, as you can apparently cross examine the actual dead victims themselves in court! Jeez, I know Nick's been in some pretty hopeless situations before, but it's beyond me how he's going to win a trial where the person who got killed is testifying that the defendant killed them?! This will be crazy, but it seems that even the victims will lie in the trials. And check how funky the judge looks! He even has a Magatama.

Some other stuff we've seen from the game is a new prosecutor who looks like Winston Payne (an inevitable yet beloved trait of each game) who I'm assuming will be the prosecutor for 6-1, as well as the Princess of Kurain, Leifa, a spirit medium who in court conjures up the final memories of the dead (i.e. the victim) as evidence (in a process called 'spirit vision'). This clearly showed the defendant, Bokuto, at the scene which seemingly proves his guilty. However, as always, there are contradictions to be found. And finding them is what I shall be doing when this thing gets here in 2016. Oh, and there are no defence attorneys in Kurain, which makes for another awesome 'Phoenix suddenly enters the court' moments when he declares that he objects to the lack of defence and the premature verdict.

Despite early beliefs, this is not Maya, but the new Leifa. I'm
thinking we might see Maya though, as Kurain Village
is where she resides and this is the Kingdom of Kurain.
A fan can hope.

As well as this hurricane of AA6 news, Capcom went and announced an ACE ATTORNEY ANIME, AIRING IN APRIL 2016! Yes, it's what all the fans have been waiting for, and, however unlikely it might be, I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it'll be localised and not just a Japan-only thing. Please, please, please, Capcom, have mercy on our English-speaking souls. The anime will feature Phoenix Wright and Miles Edgeworth, along with Maya Fey, who hasn't been seen in any (non-crossover) games in the series since Trials and Tribulations.

YESYESYESYESYESYESMYFROND.

Oh. My. Freakin'. God. I just cannot get over this. I swear, this anime better be localised, and Ace Attorney 6 better not come out over here months and months and months after it comes out in Japan. If it does, I'm learning Japanese. I don't even care.

Update: Turns out that the Winston Payne-looking prosecutor is actually his brother, Gaspen, from Dual Destinies. Nice, it'll be cool to see his character explored more and find out why he's in Kurain. He even seems to be wearing gold clothes and a crown!

Kneel, peasants. 

Thomas

Layton VS. Wright: List of Magic Spells (#106)

Alright, so here's that list of magic spells I promised, from Professor Layton VS Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. These spells aren't things you can actually cast in the game (that would be so cool) but the spells found in the Talea Magica book that can be presented in court trials. I shouldn't really have to explain this much, so scroll down below to see the list. There are seven altogether. Since one or two of them are pretty blurry, I'll just write what the description says in the caption for each one.


List of Magic Spells in Layton VS Wright

1) Ignaize

[Inferno Spell]: Summons a circle of flame within a 1 metre
radius of the caster. Requires an incantation and sceptre to cast.

2) Dimere

[Vanishing Spell]: Causes anything the caster touches to vanish
 from sight. Simply chat "Amere" to make it reappear.

3) Goldor

[Transmutation Spell]:Transmutes the caster's target into solid gold.
 The spell will transmute the closest target within range.

4) Famalia

[Shadow Familiar Spell]: Summons forth a magical familiar from
 the shadows. Although it possesses a physical form, it is
 completely weightless. 

5) Godoor

[Portal Spell]: Creates a portal on two sides of green-coloured
 walls. The portal will disappear after five minutes.

6) Granwyrm

[The Great Fire Dragon]: Summons forth a great fire dragon for
the caster to command. Responsible for the "Legendary Fire"
that lit the town ablaze so many years ago.

7) Fainfol

[Instant Sleep Spell]: Causes those who hear the incantation to
lose all consciousness. Its effect takes hold the second the
incantation is heard.

Thomas

Nintendo's Fifth President: Tatsumi Kimishima (#105)

Nintendo have announced that Tatsumi Kimishima, 65, has been promoted to the Japanese video game organisation's company fifth and most recent president. Nintendo's last and fourth president, Satoru Iwata, unfortunately passed away two months ago. Shigeru Miyamoto, the creator of Mario, Zelda and Pikmin, and Genyo Takeda, one of the creators of the Wii, were each expected to be chosen as the next president, but Kimishima, who was CFO of the Pokemon Company in 2000 and Nintendo of America's president from 2002-2006, was given the position instead.

Nintendo will be making a lot of changes in the next couple years, from the release of the details-scarce NX console, to the mobile games that Nintendo are experimenting with, such as Pokemon Go which looks pretty cool.

Thanks to arstechnica.com for this information.

Thomas

Hedgehog Reviews (#104)

I think it's time I introduced you guys to my last blog, Hedgehog Reviews. As I've said before (you really should be able to tell from the title anyway), it's a blog I used to make reviews of video games. I had planned to do reviews of movies, comic books and TV shows too, but I never really got around to it. It's the second blog I've created, this being my third, and probably much, much more similar to this one than my first one. Don't ever expect a link to my first blog though; it's from around March 2013, and apart from a review of Wreck-it-Ralph I wrote on it, it's all angsty emo stuff. Back when I was (more) cringeworthy. Now I'm more... Edgeworthy. Hardy har har.

*swoons*

By the way, if you think I don't post enough on this blog, that blog was only updated once a month (apart from a couple very short 'mini-posts'). Granted, those monthly updates were fairly long reviews... but still. Once. A. Month. The blog ran from February-July 2014.

Anyway, I'm much more proud of the blog than my first one, and it's a shame that I abandoned it, but if quitting it meant I could make this instead, I have few regrets. Without further ado, click here to see my second blog, Hedgehog Reviews.

Thomas

Dai Gyakuten Saiban 2? "Ryuunosuke's Next Adventure" (#103)

Although this news is a little old and was released around one to two weeks ago, I thought I should mention this since when the news was first announced I was doing Top Ten Turnabouts and, again, I didn't want to talk about irrelevant stuff.

In the final and most recent DLC pack for the not long ago released Japanese game Dai Gyakuten Saiban, there was a message along with a little doodle from director Shu Takumi. The first message can be seen below in the picture, along with a translation in the caption.

"London, at the turn of the 20th century...
I hope you enjoyed your great turnabout voyage.
The team is looking forward to the day we can meet you again in
Ryuunosuke's next adventure." 

The next pictrue shows the cool little doodle included with the message of the game's main protagonists, Ryuunosuke and Sherlock Holmes.

It now seems fairly likely that there will be a Dai Gyakuten Saiban 2, as hinted by the existence of 'Ryuunosuke's next adventure." I have no arguments with a DGS2, but since, the first one wasn't localized, there's a very unlikely to impossible chance that they'll localise the sequel. Still, a fan can hope.

Thanks to the forums at court-records.net for this information.

Thomas

Mario Maker, Double Dash and Fire Emblem Awakening (#102)

Wondering what those three games I got this week are? Well, not anymore, if you know how to read a title! Yes, I really love giving all the answers away, don't I. Yeah, so I got Super Mario Maker for Wii U, Mario Kart: Double Dash for the Gamecube and Fire Emblem Awakening for the 3DS this week.

On Monday, I got Double Dash (it's the fourth Mario Kart game) from my friend at school who had the game from when he was younger and never played it anymore. I was originally going to give him £10 for the game, but had to offer him £5 after I went and LOST A £10 NOTE. Wow. Just wow. While I was waiting for the school bus, I checked for my money, and it was there. But when I got on the bus where my friend was waiting and I reached for the £10, it had just disappeared. I bet I dropped it knowing how dumb I am when it comes to responsibility. Or maybe some kind of lowlife pickpocket stole it. If you're reading this and you did, I HATE YOU.

But yes, Double Dash is very fun. I played two 50cc cups on it the other night while listening to my music playlist.

On Tuesday, I ordered Fire Emblem: Awakening after pondering getting it for about half a year. I couldn't play it soon as I got it on Wednesday because, although I finished Professor Layton VS Ace Attorney, I still had to play the twelve or so special episodes in the game, so I didn't start the game until Thursday morning. Which was a mistake since I was half asleep and could barely see two feet in front of me. Speaking of the Layton V Wright aftergame stuff though, I love how when you complete the main game you get a load of cool stuff like in all the Professor Layton games, namely all the cutscenes, music, special episodes and lots of nice artwork from the game creators.

Finally, yesterday, I got Super Mario Maker. I haven't done a ton on it so far but it's really good and fun to play. I haven't unlocked all of the possible level design tools and items yet (in fact I've not even unlocked all of row two, and there's about six rows), and I only have the Super Mario Bros and New Super Mario Bros U art styles unlocked, but so far I've made three levels which are fairly alright and a little hard. In fact, I went to my friend Kurt's house today and we played through Investigation Day 2 of Rise From The Ashes (from Phoenix Wright). We also played a little of Mario Maker and beat my three levels, but he struggled a lot with the first one and I had to do the third one for him. Scrub. I look forward to unlocking the Super Mario Bros. 3 and Super Mario World styles. I'd love to see a Super Mario Bros 2 (USA) design though. Maybe a future DLC pack? The game even comes with a neat little picture book with tons of pictures of crazy Mario levels, many of which I'm sure can be recreated in the game.

Thomas

The Wonderful Post 101 (#101)

The game I'm about to talk about in this post is actually a pretty amazing game that I don't think I've ever mentioned, even in my introduction when I talked about all the games I liked (which was exactly 100 posts ago, wow). I might have, but I'm pretty sure it just slipped my mind. But anyway, since this is post 101, I think this would be a very fitting time to have a little talk about one of my favourite Wii U games, The Wonderful 101.

When Mario Kart 8 came out last year on 30th May 2014 (still can't believe it's been like one and a half years already), you could actually get another free Wii U game with it if you bought the game within a certain amount of time after it came out (think it was about two months). Well, okay, you had to choose out of ten games, but from what I remember they were all pretty good games, or at least alright. I know that one of them was Pikmin 3, but I didn't get that because I wasn't really interested in Pikmin and I hadn't played either of the first two (I became interested in that around October to November last year after my friend showed me the Pikmin 3 demo. But I accidentally ruined it for him because I kept talking about how good it was nonstop. Oops).

Aww, so cute and innocent right? No. They're evil and
bloodthirsty and kill anything that moves.

Anyway, one of the other games was called The Wonderful 101, which my online friend Kane said I should get. So I did. And it was a great game. In some ways, it was a little like Pikmin in that you have to control a lot of people at once, but a lot less stressful and a lot cooler and more action packed. You play as this group of secret superheroes called the Wonderful 100 (officially pronounced one-double-oh, not one hundred) who have to defeat alien invaders called G.E.A.T.H.J.E.R.K. who are led by their leader (duh) Jergingha, who, get this, is a planet. Yes, the main villain is a planet. Holy crap, trust me, this game has amazing amounts of fighting in massive ways that often seems ridiculously overpowered, but I don't care, because it stays amazing the whole way through. The main members of the Wonderful 100 that you play as (I forget the exact number, there's around seven but some other people join your team so there are about eleven or twelve main characters you get to play as altogether I think) have their own very unique weapon that they use to fight.

That sword is just... woah. 

The way you switch between characters is simple and fun. You just use the right control stick on the gamepad (or draw with your stylus, but I much prefer the control stick) the shape of the weapon you want to use, and you will automatically change to the character with that weapon. For example, with the main character, Wonder-Red, his power is the Wonder Hand, which is red and can turn wheels to open doors and such. Simply draw a circle shape with your stylus or right control stick to switch to him and activate his power. Another awesome part is that the weapon can get much, much bigger depending on how big you draw the shape. In the game, the shapes are created using individual members of the Wonderful 101, which means if any of your members have been hit by enemies and passed out, the shape you draw won't be able to be big and therefore the weapon will be small. You can try drawing the shapes as often as you want, as long as your Unite Morph bar has enough power to draw the shape. The biggest version of each weapon takes all 100 members but is massive. And, no spoilers, but there's a point later in the game where you get 200 members, so the weapons size limit you can have is just enormous. It's really fantastic. Plus I love the game's QTEs (Quick Time Events), which happens when you have to draw one of the shapes in a few seconds or you die. This usually happens during bosses and at certain points in levels, and it's great.

The more current members in your group, the bigger you can draw
the shape for each weapon, and therefore the bigger it can be.
You can add more people to your group (mostly citizens) as you
go through each level.

In fact, you know what? It has been absolutely ages since I did a list, so I think I'm going to do a list of all the weapons you can use in the game, along with the users, abilities, and so on. Expect it in the next few days to weeks. Also, I haven't forgotten about that list I talked about doing with all the magic spells in Layton V Wright, I just haven't had time with Top Ten Turnabouts and I have a lot of other stuff to talk about. I will totally be doing it though. Soon.

I now remember why I love TW101. Add that to the long list of games I really feel like replaying right now.

Thomas