Game Thoughts: Ace Attorney: Spirit of Justice

 I love the Ace Attorney series. Even if its got so many flaws and hilarity when it comes to localization. Self-aware, pop-culture references, and delicious puns...it holds a dear part in my gamer heart.

So recently the newest installment for the series has come through to the States: Spirit of Justice. With a round of familiar faces coming back and great new ones.

Synopsis:
This time 'round, we go through trials dealing with corrupt judicial systems, in foreign lands where defense lawyers are outlawed. The system instead relies on seances where the last moments of a victim are replayed for the court. We follow trials of Phoenix Wright taking a trip to Kurain to visit Maya Fey, Apollo Justice taking care of the office back in the "USA", and Athena Sykes helping along.

Virtues:
Mixes a lot of the old gameplay from previous titles.
Excellent characterization and engaging storyline
Delicious puns

Vices:
They do show murder scenes so there is that.
...contortionist dude Maya...*shudder*...
Shows religious folks as pretentious or ignorant...or plain stubborn. Granted it is a hokey religion.

Conclusion:
I'm a bit biased toward these titles but for good reason. While the justice system is terribly flawed (and illegal) in the games, I'm ignorant enough of actual law to enjoy them. This one gets approval from me. Check it out if you so desire.

Game Thoughts: Fire Emblem: Fates

So for Easter I got myself the game bundle for Fire Emblem Fates so I could play both storylines - Birthright and Conquest. One was advertised as being more difficult and focused on strategy, so I figured I might get frustrated with that storyline, but no...if you play both in Casual mode it's no biggy.

Synopsis

The avatar (Corrin) is royalty captured from their home country at a young age and raised with "the enemy" with the conflict growing between the countries Hoshido (clearly Japanese influenced) and Nohr (medieval Europe inspired). Once you find out your true heritage you must decide who you will support: the land of your birth or the family who raised you? Then work for peace and all that nonsense.

Features

The game decided to split the story into two games and you have to buy both to get the whole story, which is lame if you are more story-motivated to play the game. There's also a 3rd game that's supposed to clarify a few things "Revelation".

There is DLC and amiibo stuff and nonesense.

Weapons no longer have a limited number of uses.

The partner, marriage, children system is back. They added bonding time with avatar's chosen spouse. Which just means more work for me...uggggh.

Pros

Again the marriage with children thing I have to highlight that here.
Lovely art and music
Some returning characters for nostalgia.
Easier gameplay compared to Awakening, a lot more accessible.
Empowered female roles.
A huge cast of interesting characters
Lots of pro-family goodness.

Cons

Very sexualized, revealing armor and body-types for female characters
Includes a gay marriage (male in conquest, female in birthright)
A somewhat convoluted timeline, really not sure who was the parent of who, but there is time travel which ruins everything.
Almost an overload of characters.
Ritual suicide (samurai story so...it's expected.)
Personally the cutesie "bonding time" with your spouse is weird to me. Are we having sex? Is that what we're doing? I can't tell! I'm glad I can't tell, but seriously weird and oddly uncomfortable, but I'm uncomfortable with any affection from game characters anyway. I'll have to write about it later or something.
Suggested Incest? I think you can "marry" your blood siblings. Unless there's a story point that means you're not related to EITHER family. (Looking through walkthrough: spoiler not blood related but still very very very weird.)

Conclusion

I think this iteration can be passed over. The gameplay is similar to the last one but it's not super great. The fact you have to buy two games is rough. Personally, I like the Conquest storyline better. (Because personally, I'd feel more loyalty to the people I grew up with.) However, Awakening was a better experience for me.

Game Thoughts: Fire Emblem: Awakening

After many years of HATING hype from co-workers...this one I'm glad they pressured me into getting. I've know OF the Fire Emblem series, but never played the games. Couldn't tell you why either, but I'll definitely be exploring earlier titles.

This will currently be a "first impressions" as I've only played the game  for six hours or so. (Probably more as I kept deleting files and remaking characters.)

So on we go with synopsis, virtues and vices.

Synopsis

We have what I'd ironically call "standard" fantasy fare. (Only in our modern age could fantasy become "standard".) There's some great dark (the fell dragon Grima) stirring up trouble in our neighborhood, namely war mongering. The player is a tactician in a military group called "Shepherds" that start fighting invading brigands and a new threat called the "Risen". (Darkspawn, Zombies, that whole reanimated dead evil guy thing.)

Gameplay is strategy based with a grid plane and various character classes in a very complicated game of chess. (That's really a gross simplification.)

Virtues

Fire Emblem boasts of a near infinite ways to approach party building, classes and battle strategy.

You can play as a male or female avatar with mild customization.

Women in the game are for the most part (so far) presented in a respectful way. There are many females in roles of leadership both politically and militarily. While they still fall into roles of "healer without a way to defend herself" (no male characters take up this role), women are equally shown as lancers, swordswomen and so on. There are some "sexy" outfits but there are more examples of modest dress and actually functioning armor. And some male characters have very impractical armor that's just for show. Also...a woman of color as a leader. :)
Edit: The more I play the more "sexy" armor I see particularly with female riding armor which lacks enough material to cover a bum. :/

This particular title in the series allows for partnering which is a new mechanic. There is also importance put on developing relationships so that on the battle field, they support each other better. There are romance elements that are pretty much "clean" that lead to marriage and eventually children that can join the battle.
...
I'd like to repeat that...MARRIAGE that leads to CHILDREN that play significant roles in game.
I want a BIG FAT highlighter on that. Although the romance is all narrative driven and not really a "date sim", for the longest time I've been looking for examples of games where marriage is a POSITIVE and end goal of a relationship.

Death...if you play in "classic" mode (aka the way the franchise is "supposed" to play) is permanent for pretty much all characters. For immersion, I REALLY think this is cool. But I'll also be listing it as a Vice.

So far, I haven't seen a "revenge" plot.

*Update*...there was a line that "only men can be priests, women are clerics". Granted this is a completely fantasy styled religion, but that line got a little smile from orthodox me.

Vices

If you don't regularly play the grid  type tactical battle games, it's hard and may not appeal to a large audience. I list this under vice only because I really think showcases many positive qualities narratively. The only reason it is hard is that there are so many nuances to remember.

Time travel. No spoilers but there's a bit of "time travel" involved. It follows Back to the Future logic instead of Bill and Ted logic. I tend to follow the Bill and Ted school of time travel. "Time has told." Honestly, this is really a MINOR vice that is more personal than anything.

Classic vs. Casual, because I'm not very good at this type of game I play in casual mode. I started in classic because I wanted to understand how it's "really suppose to play". It ends up I'd pretty much lose everyone within 5 maps. Even on "easy classic" setting, it's NOT a very beginner friendly. Really this fits in with my first vice about accessibility.

So many characters...omg...This could be a "good" thing and it's also part of games of this type. However, many other strategy tactics games like this...say like Disgaea only have a handful of named characters (I only remember 6 from Disgaea). FE pretty much has named every character. So far I think I have about 16 named characters that I can send into battle. I had the same problem with NWN2 with the huge cast. There is a narrative being told, I'm not sure how many of my current characters are really all that important. Some get characterized, while others only seem to get a mention every now and again.

Values...now I haven't played far enough into the game story yet to really get a full read on the values it promotes. So far I've only seen violence in a violent situation and a dragon cult. Most of the battles have been as "defense". I know these sound more like virtues, but let's just say I'm going to reserve judgement. So far, it's the "typical" fantasy medieval village raids, war crimes and so on with a very "clean" look to it. (No rape or visible murder of innocents.) This tends to be a vice of most games, making "light" of real violence. At the same time, horrors of war don't fit the tone of this game.

Addiction warning. Playing this game takes time and once you get going it's hard to stop. This is a vice of compelling gameplay design and story. There's so much stuffed into this game!

*Update*
Ah yes...a value I usually have a problem with just occurred: suicide as sacrifice. This one straddles the fence for me but I'll put it on the vice list as I have fairly strong feelings about suicide. I won't give any spoilers but this is something common I see in JRPGs. You could argue it's self-sacrifice, but the context is different. Self-sacrifice is like Boromir in LOTR: Fellowship of the Ring or Gandalf in Two Towers. I know that suicide is viewed a bit differently in Japanese culture but here it's no es bueno.

Conclusion

So far, I can give my approval for this game. Unless it does a 180 and it turns out the Catholic Church was the villain the whole time. (Highly unlikely.)
These are my thoughts "so far". I may add an addendum later in the game.