http://www.officialnintendomagazine.co. ... t-trilogy/

A while ago, ONM UK had an interview with Shu Takumi for the launch of Professor Layton vs Ace Attorney, but it has only been put on the website now in anticipation of the 3DS trilogy. Enjoy!

Glad to know it's officially readable now!

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I shudder at the thought that Edgeworth was originally planned to be a comic relief character like Klavier. And yet, I can't help but wonder how this series could have gone if Takumi didn't occasionally play to fanservice and stuck with his own ideas. Sure, I'm glad how things worked out anyway, but this is plenty of food for thought.

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It always makes me kind of sad seeing him talk about AJ because it shows how good it could have been. I like it plenty as it is, but it's evident it was rather pushed and rushed. Fun interview though, Takumi seems like a cool and nice person.

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Pretty interesting how Takumi originally planned to have Edgeworth as the Prosecutor for all the cases in JFA. That really would have made a big difference. I mean, that implies that the whole 'new prosecutor each game' thing wasn't planned right from the start, which is how I'd always imagined the sequels would be pitched.



Quite honestly, I would agree with Takumi here. I love the Ace Attorney series, but even if games keep coming, it does kind of bother me that they may become stale. I didn't particularly enjoy AA5. I liked the cases and the side characters, but I found that the focus had shifted from the original characters that I cared about, and that they were not portrayed in the way I was used to. Still, I don't feel it would be right to totally return to the series with Takumi as director again.

I feel disappointed in a way that AA4 was not a completely separate arc to the original trilogy. I don't think I would have minded the switch in characters so much. I wonder somewhat if Takumi would like to leave the series behind and move on to other projects. Either way, the new Meiji era game looks interesting, so perhaps it will be a way for him to put a fresh spin on the series.

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A shame, really. They could have remade the graphics at least for the DS port, or for AJ.

• Turnabout Succession looked horrible using Phoenix + Gumshoe + Judge trio's old sprites combined with all the other characters.
  
• Turnabout Trump looked horrible using Judge's and Payne's old sprites with all the other characters.
  
• Apollo Justice as a full work, looked horrible, just slightly recoloring Judge's sprites, instead of giving it a whole new quality.

Why was it such a problem for GBA version to look outdated compared to DS version? They could have inserted new graphics for the whole re-release of the trilogy.

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They did tweak the graphics for the DS rerelease, they extended the graphics to fit the larger screen size.

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Yeah, I know that. The problem is that they did that, instead of improving the graphics' quality, for example.

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I think RftA was much more jarring to look at than AJAA as a whole. AJAA has more new sprites and a couple of old ones. RftA was like 4 new ones and a lot of old ones plus the courtroom and a lot of the BG art was recycled from the GBA game. It was so bad that I remember booting the case up after finishing PW:AA (my first ever AA game) and I quit playing case 5 after day 1 investigation because I thought because it had those new sprites I figured it was made recently and I thought it was also written by another writer (simply because it felt alienating with the sprites I guess)

What a dumb decision, but luckily I did play it after playing every other officially translated game in the series afterwards.

At the very least some of the new sprites in AJAA like Alita Tiala fits in pretty nicely with old sprites because there's something about her outline that looks old-school. After playing AAI and going back to AJAA again I also realized that I think AAI has some of the worst character art ever while AJAA actually had some of the best. And BTW I think the problem of completely reworking the sprites is that Kumiko Suekane wasn't available and Tatsuro Iwamoto only did some of the original sprites but not Nick and not Maya (and ugh, I hate how he draws Maya)


A lot of breakdowns and transformations were lolfunny in AJAA, like Mr. Kitaki "opening his eyes". It totally caught me off guard.

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I think AJ has by far the worst art in the series. I realized this when someone posted the profile section for each game and basically said, "Which game looks the least interesting to play?" There are some really horrible choices with design in that game. Stickler, Wesley, Machi, and Plum are just...bleh. Plus, like Nearavex said, the flashback trial looked horrible

I don't really think any of the breakdowns are funny in AJ. Kristoph doesn't really have one in Case 1, Alita's is pathetic in Case 2, Daryan's is what you expect when you meet him, and Kristoph's second is one of the best series, but it's not that funny. And Cammy's buble wand>>>>Big Wins' eyebrows

I can't stand Machi and I'm not too fond of Lamiroir in her stage clothes either... but the rest. Pure friggin GOLD!

Especially Valant, and oh, I'm one of the few who loved Spark Brushel. He looks ugly as crap but in a good way.

What I like about it is that it looks so clean and there's a great diversity in how the characters look, but to top it off I think the game has the most ingenious character transformations but I already mentioned that.


Didn't like it at first, and I have to be honest, RftA pissed me off because the designs are too zany and surreal (and they clash with the more normal-looking GBA sprites) I still think AAI has hands down the worst sprites ever. The coloring looks hideous on some characters (PALAENO) and some designs gross me out, like Earnest Amano (he has cancer in his ears or something, look at them!) and the animations were sometimes pretty horrible too. I just think AAI looks much more bland and doesn't feel as "smart" as some of the other designs in the series.

I think as far as art goes I'd probably say:


PW:AA = JFA > AJAA = DD > T&T > AAI2 > AAI

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Major characters art:
DD = AAI = AAI2 > AJ > T&T = JFA >> PW:AA

Minor characters art:
DD = AAI = AAI2 > T&T = JFA > PW:AA >>>> AJ

It's this way to me. Almost in reverse.
Obviously, I'm not counting recurring characters, unless they were redesigned (like all of the AAI and DD cast or Phoenix in AJ)

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