fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #392 ]

[ SECRET POST #392 ]

⌈ Secret Post #392 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Liz will BRB, she got newted

Secrets Left to Post: 0 pages, 00 secrets from Secret Submission Post #056.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 1 ] broken links, [ 1 ] not!secrets, [ 1 2 ] not!fandom, [ 1 2 3 4 ] too big, [ 1 2 3 ] repeats, [ 1 ] personal attack, [ 1 ] wasn't a subtle enough troll attempt, sorry. ):
Next Secret Post: Tomorrow, Saturday, February 2nd, 2008.
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I'm okay with Apollo being the new attorney, honestly, Phoenix had grown to the point that the player couldn't mess up as him anymore, or you know, it was ooc for him to mess up how the player would.

I just wish they had given us Apollo without giving us Phoenix. I know Phoenix was hardly a saint, but they still changed some of the fundamental aspects of him. I'm still really looking forward to the fourth game, but I think it could have been done without Phoenix. They could have put a new original character in his place and it would have worked just as well.

I have to disagree on the 'new character'- by using Nick, they

1. Give us solid proof that this guy was once truly on top, because we KNOW that.
2. Prove to us he used to be different to this, and didn't just pretend to be; again, we know it.
3. Increase our emotional attachment to his predicament.

I think it being Phoenix is, looking at it from a plot perspective, astoundingly important.

Hmm, interesting. If you don't mind, I'd like to tackle this and see if this is really the case. I'm not trying to argue with you, but merely satisfy the criteria you pose while using an original character.

Admittedly, the only involvement I've had with Apollo Justice is the flash version of the trial that Capcom released. If this is not really how it goes in the game, I apologize.

Let's say that instead of Phoenix, John Doe is Apollo's first client. Our first clues to John's past and personality is via Apollo, who we have to believe is a credible source because we ARE Apollo. He could be wrong, but this is what he believes.

First of all, he monologues that John was once a defense attorney and was one of the top in the country. We are asked to believe that with Edgeworth in the first game, and Phoenix is there to support that. So, believing that John is the same way is not too much to ask, and the idea is supported by Apollo claiming to become a defense attorney because of John. This satisfies point 1.

Because of the above, we also believe that John was, in fact, different than the way he's being presented now, both in his current status and his current behavior. We have to believe that Apollo wouldn't follow a crook, because he doesn't seem the type to follow someone who blatantly abuses the system (and, as we've seen in previous games, it's fairly difficult for prosecutors to pull the same word shenanigans that defense attorneys can). We're asked to believe that Mia is actually a good person in the first game, partially through her helping Phoenix in the first trial, and partially because of what Phoenix says about her. If that in itself is not enough, the introduction of another character that can act as a character witness for the player when doubt starts to creep in will satisfy this as well. Just when Apollo starts to think that maybe he was wrong in believing John to be the good guy he was, we introduce, say...a little sister, who pleads with John to not continue being like this, as this isn't who he really is. This is also used in the extra chapter of 1 when we're to believe that Lana isn't really capable of murder by the assertions of Ema. This satisfies point 2.

As for point 3, this can be handled with the writing itself. In the extra chapter of 1, we're made to become heavily emotionally attached to making sure Lana is absolved of the crime and the sisters reunited. Heck, I cried when Lana finally smiled at the end. With the groundwork made in 1 and 2, all it takes is a little pathos to make us actually care about John, whether he becomes a good guy trying to protect someone, or an actual tragic hero.

So, while I understand wanting to tie the different arcs together in some way, I think it's also pretty out there to change Phoenix so drastically to where he's on top of the world at the end of 3 with all kinds of possibilities to being a poker player in Apollo's first game. I'm holding final judgment on whether it's actually warranted until I get the game in my hands, however. So close...so close...

**(and, as we've seen in previous games, it's fairly difficult for defense attorneys to pull the same word shenanigans that prosecutors can)

-_-;

See, now those would work, certainly. I'm not saying it couldn't be done. I'm saying I don't think any of those points would be presented as strongly or effectively- yes, we believe Apollo, but our attachment to him is, at this moment, also very weak and so the impact is lessened. And I, personally, found myself not becoming very much attached to Mia over the first case; we have to remember this is a case that is, while maybe more like 2-1 or 3-1 than 1-1, overall a very short, deliberately easy case designed in this case to ease new people to the series in gently. I really don't think there would have been enough time unless this were done as a second case, which just takes even more spotlight away from Apollo. And the guys' lost enough already.

So yes, it would work. But I truly believe that it wouldn't work as well. To use your Lana example, I found the use of Ema as 'proof' something that actually made me think yes, she'd been tricked into doing it, not the opposite; it's so cliche by now to use a sweet character to trick you... And I feel a damn sight more for GS4!Nick than I did for Lana- and I felt a LOT of sympathy for Lana at the end! (I can relate to the crying-at-her-smiling thing.)

Yes, giving Phoenix more airtime in a post first-chapter case would have taken away from Apollo's spotlight...but isn't that the point that's trying to be made? Why have Phoenix in it at all? Why can't this just be like, say...the Silent Hill series where the only shared elements are the general structure of the world they're in? Is the world of Japanese law so small that we have to abuse a former title character to justify the change to a new one?

That's all I'm wondering. If in two weeks I throw that game in my DS and it hits me like a bolt out of the blue, I'll willingly and readily say I was completely wrong and it was totally necessary. But I finished 3 with the express intent of finding out what happens to Phoenix that would lead him to have this end (like, say, Maya dying or him losing or something like that), and was utterly shocked to see the rainbows and kittens rather than some tangible clue to why things went this way.

I'm not screaming at you or telling you you're wrong or anything, this is just something that's been stewing in my brain for a while. It all seems very canon-raping George-Lucas-esque at this point, in the vein of "we did it because we can", like they didn't expect Apollo to be able to stand on his own two feet and so needed Phoenix-crutch to limp through his first game.

Honestly, I would have been just as happy if Phoenix was to Apollo what Mia was to Phoenix in the first case...and then just up and retired, only to appear in cameos as the same quirky Phoenix I spent three games getting to know. This Phoenix seems like an impostor to me.

"...rather than some tangible clue to why things went this way."

Ahh... just out of curiosity... the phrasing leads me to believe maybe you aren't spoiled for GS4? Can you tell me just how spoiled you are?

I keep forgetting not everyone is a spoiled as I and I don't want to make assumptions or mistakes ^^;;

I've only played through the first maybe fifteen minutes of the mock trial Capcom put out in flash format. I've been pretty careful about not completely spoiling, but I'm not 100% in the dark. Just about...98%.

And the tangible clue was for the end of 3, which I very much so saw. :)

So, yeah, admittedly, this is a lot of someone whining on the sidelines before the game is out. It's mostly fueled by "oh God please don't suck", because this series of games is the first in a while I've gotten so wholly behind, and I'm already missing my blue-suited finger-pointing ace attorney. :T

Ahhh...

That explains it. I think a lot of very important events that you won't know about might- I know they didn't for everyone, but they still might- make it more understandable for you.

Everything you just said is true for Edgeworth in the first game, and we didn't need to know him beforehand.

In the very first case of PW1, we meet Mia, find out she's a great defense attorney, meet Larry, Nick's childhood friend who's a spaz, and set up Edgeworth in foreshadowing.

What's more, by virtue of Phoenix being PHOENIX and ERGO being more important, the game suffers. The most common criticism of the otherwise adorkable Apollo is that he's a "weak" character--because the entire game, he's overshadowed by Phoenix. Apollo may be the playble main, but the game is just as much Phoenix's story as it is Apollo's, if not more.

To make matters worse, nearly all of the supporting cast is tied to Phoenix, rather than Apollo. Imagine if in PW1, Edgeworth had been Mia's childhood friend, Larry too--as someone said on 2ch, "Apollo can't even make his own friends?"

Honestly, I strongly believe Phoenix's presence in the game both spits in the face of the first trilogy and the people who loved it, and AJ would have been ten times better had his mentor been Scruffy McExLawyer #3 instead of PHoenix Wright.

Except that for the vast majority of game one, I know that personally I was unable to form any kind of attachment to Edgeworth; I only really cared about halfway through case 4, before that I only cared if Nick got what he wanted- answers. I only started really caring 1-5 and then 2-4.

I do agree in that they overdid the connections to Phoenix, however. Yes, Apollo was overshadowed, they didn't pull it off perfectly; I'm saying that it's not the fact they used Phoenix that makes it like that.

I'm still trying to work out how people think Nick is so much different. I mean, look at all the dodgy things he's done and been prepared to do o_o; I always got the feeling that in 2-4, had he been 100% certain that it was Matt and that he could get away with it, he would have forged evidence (and we still have no proof of the contents of that tape...). I actually assumed it was deliberate and everyone else saw it until I went online...

...I just want to say I hope I don't sound annoyed/grumpy D= it's kinda early for this so I might. I don't mean to be if So ^^;

I think the fact that Phoenix did have the opportunity to do the wrong thing for the right reasons and he still trusted in others enough to do the right thing, even if it meant an absolutely horrible result, clearly shows that Phoenix is not even close to dodgy. Right until the end of the third game, he held every single one of his morals close to him, and never once compromised them. I think that's the most bitter pill to swallow, the very idea that I helped him be the good person he was at the end of 3, and now the game developers are laughing in my face and telling me the person that I helped preserve is inexplicably no more.

Naturally, I will readily admit that in the several years that transpire between 3 and Apollo's game, damn near anything could have happened. Phoenix went from being a complete buffoon (as evidenced in 3-1) to being a capable attorney in the span of less time, if I'm not mistaken. So I suppose a fall from grace isn't out of the realm of possibility, but it's so far on the fringe that its clawing and scraping to keep from falling into the land usually reserved for rancid canon-raping fanfiction.

...and that is the weirdest metaphor I've ever done. *bows and goes to beat herself to death*

1. Best. Metaphor. Ever. We're, like, on GODOT territory here. XD

And, well, I don't know. I've seen people's personalities change more than his has in a couple of years, let alone the seven he went through. And looking at what he DID go through- his entire life changed. I mean, Maya would have to leave basically for good. Master, and all that. Edgeworth would probably have settled in Europe now. No Maya means no Mia, no Pearl. He didn't lose everyone close to him, but he probably didn't see them much. And I don't wish to go into how the disbarment etc occurred for fear of spoilers, bu having to do *that* of all things- I think that would screw anyone up, just from... this is really hard. But I don't think I could do that for seven years, and not come out like he did. I would probably end up much crueller than him.

Godot? *blush* Aww, you know just the thing to say to a girl... ^.^

And now that I see the evidence and the little bit I didn't know before me, I'm beginning to see why this actually might not be the logic leap I thought it was. Now I really can't wait for the game to come out, if nothing more than to feel really, really bad for Phoenix and want to cuddle him and make him feel better. :3

Oh gee, that was my fangirl showing. >_>;

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[ SECRET POST #392 ]

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Because I like extra comments! Cause I'm lazy!

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