I got a DS a few weeks ago and bought Pheonix Wright: Ace Attorney off ebay. I want to get into the series, but are the rest of the games worth buying?

They're all generally excellent, but you, like many eventual fans of the series, may find yourself implementing your own personal sliding scale as to which games are best.  The majority of us feel that AA1 and AA3 (Trials And Tribulations) are the best of the four main Ace Attorney titles, and AA2 (Justice For All) and AA4 (Apollo Justice) are the weakest.  (Except for SonicPanda, who appears to prefer AA2 over AA3.  The weirdo.)  ;)

Either way, you'd be remiss to skip over any one of the titles without playing them in sequential order.  The games are treated as an ongoing story; more specifically, there are overarching plot threads that are introduced in the first two titles that get resolved by the third.

So chronology-wise, in what order should one play the games? Asking as I'm just checking out this series myself for the first time, playing Ace Attorney.

Like so:

1) Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney
2) Ace Attorney: Justice For All
3) Ace Attorney: Trials And Tribulations
4) Ace Attorney: Apollo Justice

My favorites are AA1 and AA4 followed closely by AA3 and then AA2. I love the entire series dearly though. Once I started playing the AA games I honestly couldn't stop (I skipped a couple of classes that semester). As Angela mentioned, it really is worthwhile to invest in and play them all. Even the low points of the series are still a lot of fun.

Thanks for the info.

And as I'm playing Ace Attorney right now, I must say this game is incredible.

As harshly as I take issue with Ace Attorney series' gameplay, it remains one of the few game series that I'd recommend purely on the basis of storyline (with music being the other, lesser basis).

*OBJECTION* My character is not on trial here, Your Honor!

Anyway, I'll admit JFA has its issues, namely a ton of typoes in the early cases and the most annoying case of the series in Case 3 (at least until the back half of AJ's final case was a dull chore with a completely blunted climax, but anyway). I still feel, however, that it nails its underlying themes better than any other entry in the series and the last case is still unblemished genius videogame storytelling. It's still my favorite, followed by Rise From the Ashes and The Stolen Turnabout, respectively.

I heard the translation in the pornographic one really suffers from a rush job.

Speaking of Phoenix Wright, I think this is probably going to go on Angela's upcoming wishlist...

http://kotaku.com/5339000/phoenix-wrigh … t/gallery/

Although, I've read some comments that this is just an English translation of the book that was already released. Clarification?

Way ahead of you, guy:

http://www.soundtrackcentral.com/forums … 103#p52103

It is looking like a straight-up translation of the original Japanese set, except it'll be binded into one book. (As opposed to the Japanese version, which split GS1-3 into one, and GS4 into another.)  As nice as it is, I'm still contemplating whether I should go for the double-dip or not.

On another note, apparently Ema was supposed to head up the Investigations game, but fan-feedback wanted Edgeworth instead. This is personally disappointing, as I like Ema quite a bit and wouldn't have minded more SCIENCE (yes, I know she appears in Edgy's game, but it's not the same). I put the blame on Apollo's team for making her such a sour pill in AJ.

That's too bad.   I'd be all over an AA game led by Ema. Sour pill or no.

Yeah, I must admit I'm a little disappointed by that too. In a way, I suspect Ema could headline a game better than Edgeworth could. Of course, I'm saying that without playing the Edgeworth game so I could turn out to be completely wrong.

I wouldn't completely rule out a game starring Ema in the future.  Kenji has been doing well enough that sequels are almost certainly being planned.  Of course, they'd have to do something about the "Kenji" moniker, but the foundation of "investigating" clearly plays a big part in this new series.  Quite apt for a scientific spin.

In any case, I applaud their decision to use Edgeworth this time around.  It should be fascinating to see the story unfold from within the prosecuting world -- and it ensures that we get our beloved Cross Examination (sorry, Confrontation) gameplay included, too.

Maybe in future Kenji games Ema could be given a larger role? I'm not entirely sure how it would work, but the games with Wright always had two separate segments: court and investigation. Maybe the next Kenji game could feature segments led by Edgeworth as well as segments led by Ema. I would totally be down with that.

DeroZorro: I think all the games are great, barring a few annoying and/or downright scary characters that I wanted to slap silly. The main issue I had with the games is how you move around to the different areas, which is really tedious. Otherwise, excellent stories and characters (for the most part). It's pretty crazy, some of the cases are so convoluted that I actually stated writing up re-enactments of each crime just so I could get things straight in my head. ^_~

- Whoo-hoo, an English version of the artbook?! I'M SO THERE! I'm quite willing to double-dip if it means English text -- hopefully well-translated English text. Good thing I don't buy Japanese books very often or I'd be broke from the double-buying I'd be doing. ^_~

- Oh god, Ema Skye Investigations? She was one of those annoying characters for me, although she got somewhat tolerable as the game went on. I'm VERY glad Miles is the one getting center stage instead, although I still don't particularly care for the English voice actor.