Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (Nintendo DS)

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney is an enhanced remake of the first game in the Japan-only Gyakuten Saiban ("Turnabout Trial") Game Boy Advance visual novel trilogy. You follow the novice lawyer Phoenix Wright and his quest for great justice, facing Japan's Los Angeles' corrupt law system. Instant success and sequels ensued. It also added an additional chapter which features some new mechanics making use of the DS hardware, such as applying and blowing away fingerprint powder with the touch screen and microphone.

Notably, it also made the game far easier than in the GBA version, where the save file created upon quitting the game was a temporary, single-use one: Screw up once, and you lose the whole episode. Realism at its finest.

To do: This site documents lots of unused stuff in all versions of the game, as well as prerelease material. There are more demo graphics present in the ROM, notably a "To be continued" screen left over from the Japanese demo as well as a French version of the demo title screen in one of the European versions.

Unused Graphics#

A title screen for a potential English demo.

Japanese	English

The ending screen for an potential English demo. The date was changed from the month and day to simply the year that it would be released, and the text at the bottom was removed.

Five placeholder icons for pieces of evidence. Each one says "bloodstain".

Unused Animations#

An unused sprite of Phoenix "in love" can be found in the game's graphic files. This was most likely meant to be used when Phoenix sees April May on the stand for the first time. However, because Phoenix first meets her during the investigation, using this would not have made sense. It was featured in the gallery in Gyakuten Saiban Jiten, an encyclopedia cartridge bundled with the Japanese release of the fourth game.

Unused sprites of Edgeworth taking damage, analogous to his equivalent in-court animation. It seems that it was simply never put to use, for reasons unknown; it would have fit various situations in the game. This animation is featured in Gyakuten Saiban Jiten, where it is listed as Damage (Unused).

Unused damage sprites for Larry. As with the previous unused animations, this one is also in Gyakuten Saiban Jiten.

Unused Music#

The unused music from the original game is also present here. Unlike all the other music, it was not upgraded for the DS. This track was intended to be used as either the victory theme or the epilogue of each chapter.

A track titled "巌徒海慈　～スケッチ (未使用曲)" (Kaiji Ganto ~ Sketch (Unused Song), with Kaiji Ganto being the Japanese name for the character Damon Gant) appears on the "Gyakuten Saiban: Yomigaeru Gyakuten ~Yomigaeru Remix~" album, which can be found below. The title for this track indicates that is an early version of "Damon Gant - Swimming, Anyone?", though oddly this track cannot be found in the data for the game itself.

Save Data Version Info#

Like in the original game, there is some version info that is used in the save data. It is unknown if the version info is for the save format or the game. Unlike in the original game, the text differs between versions.

2005 CAPCOM DS GYAKUTEN-SAIBAN 07/16 Ver 1.0000

2005 CAPCOM DS GYAKUTEN-SAIBAN 12/06 Ver 1.0000

2006 CAPCOM DS GYAKUTEN-SAIBAN 04/18 Ver 1.0000

Regional Differences#

Japanese Version Features#

• If the game detects the GBA version of Gyakuten Saiban in the GBA slot while opening the Japanese DS version, the first four episodes are unlocked from the beginning. A similar feature exists for the second and the third games in the series. The GBA-slot support was removed from international releases, yet the images for the screens remain.

• In the Japanese version of the first three games, there is an English language function available. Selecting it changes the title screen to the US version. While the text boxes have room for two lines while selecting the Japanese option, they are expanded by an extra line when selecting English in order to accommodate the larger script, along with the evidence descriptions.

Language Switch#

In every version for the game except the North American one, there's a language switch. The Japanese release has a Japanese / English switch. In one of the European releases there is an English / French switch and in the other European release there is a German / Spanish / Italian switch. When the switch is tapped, the "OBJECTION" graphic appears for the corresponding language, as well as the translated audio. Strangely, only the Japanese version has translated logo graphics (The thing on the top screen of the title screen) as all of the other switches keep it the same. In the Japanese demo, there is no switch.

Japanese / English	English / French	German / Spanish / Italian	North America

Episode 1#

Japanese	EN, ES, DE, IT

In the first episode of the game, one piece of evidence is a passport. In the Japanese version, the passport is red but in the international versions the passport is blue. The text and design was also altered on the international versions. This is because most Japanese passports are colored red while most American passports are colored blue.

Another difference in the first episode is when Phoenix explains how the victim didn't bother to change back her clock's time when coming back from her trip, which makes the witness mistake the time. In the Japanese version, the victim took a trip to New York City which makes the witness claim that the time of murder was 2 PM. In the international, non-French versions, the victim took a trip to Paris which makes the witness claim the time of the murder was 1 PM. The French version says she went to Sydney. This difference also extends to when Phoenix tests out the clock in the courtroom. In the Japanese version, the clock claims that it's 9:25 AM. In the international versions, the clock claims that it's 8:25 AM.