This page involved a lot of word play, which I found hard to convert to English. The game they are playing is "Old Maid". In Japanese, it's called Babanuki, which is written ババ抜き and means something like "extract/pull out the old maid". This is the reason for Gumshoe's logic for why he is the winner.
Gumshoe's concept for the year is "念には念を" which means something like "be doubly sure", and I translated more figuratively as "always be prepared". The character used, 念, is read "nen", and pops up later when Pearl tries to recite her proverb.
Gumshoe also makes a play on the phrase "sore loser". In Japanese, the word is 負けず嫌い (makezu girai) which literally means something like "without losing, hates". When Phoenix calls him this, Gumshoe then uses a word play on 食わず嫌い (kuwazu girai), which means a person who hates a food that they've never even tasted ("without eating, hates").
Pearl is trying to use a Japanese proverb 馬の耳に念仏 (uma no mimi ni nenbutsu), which means "reading the nenbutsu (prayer) into a horse's ear", equivalent to the English, "It's like talking to a brick wall". However instead she says 馬の耳に . . . てんねんきねんぶつ which means "into the horse's ear, protected species/natural monument". I tried my best to come up with a similar wordplay in English that also includes Gummi's earlier 念 (preparation), but it feels a little awkward!
"Happy New Year" in Japanese is written 賀正 (gashou). Gumshoe writes the first character in kana (が正), possibly because the first character is harder to write (although he should be able to).
Also, Ema Skye: you gross.
Episode 17 — January 2006 Issue
Takumi Snippet
Takumi Shuu (??)
Ace Attorney's director and scriptwriter. It's rumoured his fuel is alcohol.
Status: ...The production of Ace Attorney 4 has launched! I wonder how things will go from this. And so the new year has arrived at the Wright & Co. Law Offices.
Continue reading →