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[Thoraxes]

http://www.capcom-unity.com/zeroobj...phoenix-wright-ace-attorney-spirit-of-justice

Director Yamazaki and Writer Fukuda talk about many things, including some good stuff in there about the creation of the game, how to approach creating new themes for this title, and much more! I thought it was a good read, and it looks like more will be coming in the weeks leading up to launch.

The game comes out in NA on September 8th, 2016 as an eShop title.

A Demo will be available on the eShop on August 25th, 2016.

Some fun quotes:

Like any long-running series, Ace Attorney lives or dies by each game’s ability to go beyond its predecessor. The same is true for the themes of each game. This meant that the core concept for AA:SoJ had to be even more impressive than the destruction of the legal system itself! Like Apollo and his Chords of Steel exercises, I found myself yelling, “HOW THE HECK AM I SUPPOSED TO PULL THIS OFF?!” at the top of my lungs as I sat there at my desk, trying to come up as many ideas as I could to overcome this giant wall in front of me.

“The birth of a court system!” “The evolution of a court system!” “The incineration of a court system!” “An ancient court!” “An underwater court!” “A space court!”

“You talentless hack! I’ll revolutionize your face!” one of the team members yelled as the lot of them knocked me onto my back and beat me to a pulp. My face swelled with the punches it received until I looked like a completely different person.

...Just kidding. But that’s more or less how the team and I are with each other for real. And actually, I didn’t just randomly pick “courtroom revolution” as the theme. I did have my reasons, and I did properly explain them to the rest of the team, who were then on board with the idea, too.

Being that Ace Attorney is not just a story, but a game as well, we had to also really focus on creating thrilling moments, such as when a player exposes a witness’s lies, and gratifying moments, like when a player defeats the true culprit at last.

Basically...

・From a traditional “game level design” perspective, how should we design each episode in terms of difficulty or pacing?
・What kind of development or surprise should occur when? What kind of dramatic elements should we include?
・When should we have the story draw the player further in with a tender or surprising moment?

Sometimes, our intense discussions lasted long into the night in our company’s meeting rooms. And sometimes, I would catch Mr. Yamazaki trying to work through an idea by walking around and around inside the R&D building as though he were the philosopher Kitaro Nishida himself, taking one of his daily strolls along the Philosopher’s Walk in Kyoto. We had some seriously “sardines-in-a-can” level of densely packed days of discussions for a while there.

 

[Neoxon]

It's amazing to see the all of the thought that goes into the Ace Attorney games. The “You talentless hack! I’ll revolutionize your face!” parr specifically got a chuckle out of me.