Perhaps the best Ace Attorney game I've ever played, which I don't know what that says about the Ace Attorney series...
Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (PLVPWAA) was the last Ace Attorney game I had to play in order to claim that I’ve completed all of the Ace Attorney games. But, it’s also a game that took me years to complete because of how burnt out of Ace Attorney I got after 2022 (fun fact: don’t play all eleven Ace Attorney games in one sitting, it will kill you). Despite this, PLVPWAA is truly one of the best Ace Attorney games I’ve ever played, and I think that statement is really funny.
Now, I’ve never played a Professor Layton game. I still haven’t as of writing this, despite owning Professor Layton and the Curious Village. So, I can’t say on the Professor Layton side of things if it’s a good game in that series. But, for Ace Attorney, the quality of life features implemented into this game changes the entire scope of the series. Hell, without PLVPWAA, we wouldn’t have the multiple witnesses that The Great Ace Attorney series is so well-beloved for.
PLVPWAA is a crossover game between the Ace Attorney and Professor Layton game series (could you possibly have guessed?). Both of which are point-and-click adventures and often involve a mystery, though outside of that, there aren’t a lot of similarities (from what I can tell). It released in 2012 for the 3DS, and continues to be one of the more expensive Complete-In-Box games for the system. And, rightfully so, as it’s the only Ace Attorney game that hasn’t made the jump to modern hardware. Being the object of Shu Takumi’s attention, the long creation period of PLVPWAA would spawn the Ace Attorney Investigations duology and shift writers for Ace Attorney 5: Dual Destinies in the meantime. And while it isn’t considered canon for the Ace Attorney side of things, it is still a beloved crossover game for the fandom to this day.
For me, one of the things that I love in PLVPWAA is that there is so much more to investigation sequences in this game than any other Ace Attorney game. You get to talk to a lot more people and see what they think of the scene at hand, and properly travel between the areas involved. You can also find hint coins to help with puzzles later on, and there are mini puzzles to solve in between actual investigating, which sometimes can help progress the story.
Now, I don’t think Ace Attorney needs puzzles in their investigation sequences; I think that’d make the series too similar to Professor Layton, and each deserve to have their own quirk that makes them stand out from other point-and-click visual novels. But, it would be really nice if, during investigations, I could do literally anything else to help progress the story in some capacity other than look at item and talk to one dedicated individual in a particular area.
The story is also quite unique for an Ace Attorney game, if not only because the town is vaguely medieval, but also because the town’s leader writes out prophecies for how the day will go for his citizens, to which they believe in wholeheartedly (even if it doesn’t make sense). It’s got enough goofy writing in it for the silliness of an Ace Attorney and Professor Layton crossover, but it’s also genuinely takes the plot seriously, especially as this town’s secret begins to unravel.
And not only that, but you get to see the quirks of Phoenix and Maya investigating the town together, and also get to see how they fair when investigating alone with Layton or Luke, and the intermingling of their different personalities as they unravel the truth. It’s super unique, and the separation of the defense attorney and their assistant is something that rarely happens in the Ace Attorney series that it’s a breath of fresh air. You really get to see what makes each of these characters unique as individuals, rather than a package deal all of the time, which is great not only for Ace Attorney, but from what I’ve read, great for Professor Layton as well.
Not only that, but the stakes are genuinely high for Phoenix, as not being able to acquit his client could mean certain death for them (i.e. burning to death witch-trials-style). It doesn’t seem as artificially implemented as it is in Ace Attorney 6 (AA6 bastardizes the “we will kill you if you can’t defend your client” plotline in such an egregious way, I can’t believe that game exists); you can truly feel the tension in Phoenix’s facial expressions, the music, and the writing.
I don’t want to spoil PLVPWAA because it is such a phenomenal game with quite a shocking plot twist at the very end. But, I truly wish more people got a chance to play this game. There’s very limited means to be able to emulate 3DS games right now, and with the eShop permanently closed, there are very few means to pick up a copy and play. Which, unfortunately, makes it hard to recommend. If you ever get the chance to play PLVPWAA, take it, because I cannot recommend it enough (we can only hope it gets ported to Switch).
And that’s about it! God, PLVPWAA, how you’ve permanently altered the future of the Ace Attorney series so effortlessly. Despite finishing this game like…seven months ago at this point, I still remember being absolutely gobsmacked at the ending. Sure, is it a little silly? Yes, but it’s the spirit of things that matters. Plus, we get Espella and Darklaw toxic yuri out of it, so I can’t complain.
What’s your opinion of PLVPWAA? How do you shorten the crossover’s long ass title? Did it affect the Professor Layton side of things as much as it did to Ace Attorney? Leave a comment below!
Next SMS post will be live 1/25, where I talk about my experiences with Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance, the first Castlevania game I’ve ever played, so stay tuned for that! Also, if you’ve got a backlog that’s causing you immense torture to think about, consider checking out my main series Substack post for this week where we will discuss how to fix your backlog and make it less stressful! It goes live 1/7 at 3:00 PM EST, so stay tuned for that!
And as always, see you next week!
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