Title: Dai Gyakuten Saiban: Naruhodou Ryuunosuke no Bouken 大逆転裁判 ‐成歩堂龍ノ介の冒険‐
Platform: 3DS
Genre: Mystery, Adventure
Language: Japanese
Company: Capcom
Summary: A definite welcome new take on the Gyakuten Saiban series, but in the end, everything was VERY underwhelming compared to the main series. Smaller end of the blame for that is the limitations of the time period it’s set in, but they really could have done more…
Story:
Characters: 7/10. My attachment to the characters other than Naruhodou and Holmes were all super thin. There wasn’t enough Holmes for my liking. The girls were cool but nothing exceptional, and there was essentially only one main prosector for the whole storyline who had no particular personality either…??? Once in a while he’d break something with utmost accuracy and make me blink twice. Other than that, he was frankly EXTREMELY boring. The waiter from the first case was eons more interesting, but he awkwardly disappears into oblivion early in the game (and he’s not a prosecutor anyway).
Graphics: 9/10. Definitely the best 3D in a GS game thus far, and character models are all very well done, motions are great, etc. Points down for lack of “IMPRESSED, DID NOT EXPECT THAT” kind of characters motions that I’ve come to expect from the main series, and while trivial, the lack of fancy cut-scene type of things at the start of a case. For this game, they were reduced to fancy text reading presentations of Sherlock Holmes novels… sigh.
Sound: 9/10. While many of the tracks sound too much like PLvsAA (same composer), there are a good number of reoccuring tracks that distinguish the game quite well. Holmes’s theme for example. Overall very fitting for the setting of the game, although I still miss Iwadare’s stuff from the main series. But at least it’s good to know that it’s just for this one-off series. I wouldn’t mind more!
Gameplay: 7/10. This is a generous score imo, I wouldn’t put it as low as 6 just because I still enjoyed playing, even though I was constantly getting “lower standards” vibes. Another weakness of this title compared to the rest of the franchise. The cases were by far the easiest out of the games thus far.
*LIGHT SPOILERS* I swear about half of the “mysteries” in the game were solvable by just LITERALLY turning an object over and analyzing what was on the other side. The last case presented some small exciting perspective twists, but overall did not feel like a final case. Case 1-4 ALL at most involved only small spaces and never go beyond that scope. Case 1 is always introductory so I’m always forgiving that it only involves one room. Case 2 for example is literally just a locked room mystery that I feel like I would be solving in a single Layton puzzle, but they managed to stretch it into a full case because of people’s misunderstandings and extraneous story that was plausible to the time period–I guess they were hoping gamers would be so distracted with the “OMG IT’S PEOPLE WHO AREN’T JAPANESE IN NON-MODERN TIEMS” (Holmes AND Russians, ermergerd it’s too much all at once) that they wouldn’t notice how freakishly SIMPLE the case ended up being. Case 3 never goes beyond the carriage, and there isn’t even a real investigative portion EVER, also ridiculously basic.
Even through Case 4, the second to last case, everything is such a dead giveaway as soon as you step into the scene, because the story literally just PUTS it all in front of you and does a terrible job at being discreet. Those baby-spooning case-solving habits go straight into the 5th and last Case of the game, sigh.
After the rest of the GS series, and games like Gyakuten Kenji with A LOT OF PLACES to investigate that are deeply relevant to the cases, the narrow scope for the cases in Daigyakuten Saiban was VERY disappointing. It was like they were afraid to add more setting/worldbuilding to the game because of the development time/costs, and it really shows.
Replay Value: 7/10. I’m pretty irked that the full set of DLCs for this title cost 2000 yen, and that was the DISCOUNTED bundle pricing. GS5 presented a FULL extra case for only 400 yen (for limited time, regular 800 yen), and that case was EASILY another 20% to the game. My impression of the 2000 yen value is only another 15% addition to the game… because they puddled it in with 3DS themes and other little things that should’ve come with the game for free or offered separately at cheaper prices ugh. The value ratio kills me.
Overall: 8/10, my weakest score for the Gyakuten Saiban franchise… But still a good score! Points removed from the complaints listed above.
Despite all these complaints, it’s still too bad CAPCOM doesn’t have any plans to localize this overseas. XD;
I personally think it’s more of a travesty that they never brought over Gyakuten Kenji 2. Holy shit that one was amazing, why would they not–
At least there are fan patches. The Gyakuten Kenji 2 one is AMAZING.
I’m sure people are working on a fan patch for this one too since CAPCOM practically said they’re skipping this for localization? There are hopefuls that think it’ll get relooked at after GS6, but Iunno :V
So ppl who depend on that English, there’s this thing called Gateway…

*edit* Fan trans is underway! https://gbatemp.net/threads/request-someone-interested-in-making-a-translation-of-daigyakuten-saiban.393054/page-10#post-5657678

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