RIP my GBA SP.
Remember I was all, “Yays! I have the same GBA as Edgey!”? Well, I violated my one cardinal rule: if you don’t want something to get broken, don’t let the kids touch it.
Tiny has recently become obsessed with playing Sonic Advance (she’s an Amy fangirl like I was). And so far, it had been fine. She’d play the first level, then put it away. I don’t know what happened this time.
Continue readingThis is something that really makes no sense. Kurain channellers literally shapeshift into the person they’re channelling. Think about it. People already spend thousands on these scam mediums in the real world.
Imagine a world where you can literally meet up with a late loved one. Where you can physically touch them, hug them, hear their voice. People would pay their entire life savings for such a chance, people would go into debt to hold their deceased child one more time.
And yet the village is decorated with scrolls and screens giving tips on saving money, and Maya is constantly cribbing money off Phoenix like the freeloading wench that she is.
Why aren’t they minting it? Phoenix is always broke because he’s a big softie who keeps taking cases pro bono and has to pay rent and bills for his flat and his office and is constantly bankrolling Maya. What’s the village’s excuse? No, like, seriously, I would pay money just to see my old budgies again. Kurain should be rolling in money. Their channelling is not a secret. They take clients, we know this from canon. They even had a public exhibition.
Kurain should be the wealthiest village in the country. Why does none of this make sense?
I might translate a few more of these. If there's a character page you'd like me to translate, leave a request in the comment section. This is NOT related to the Naruhodo Gyakuten Saiban! fanbook. All scans are from the Ace Attorney Wikia. I edited out the Japanese text and replaced it with an English translation and did a bit of contrast and saturation enhancement. As always, I did my best, but I'm not fluent at Japanese. Click for big.
I watched it. I didn’t like it.
First the good. Judge: Perfect. Lotta: always ma girl.
Gummi: awful, his voice did not match his personality or appearance. Nothing like the Japanese voice actor, who was exactly as you’d expect Gummi to sound. Larry: bad. But his “uh-oh” was perfect in this episode. Edgey: not horrible, but his voice was deeper in the game. It still didn’t quite match what I expected. It’s on the same level as the Japanese dub, I guess. Maybe easier on the ears, though.
Phoenix and Maya. What can I even say? Well, a picture says a thousand words, so here:
All I could hear the whole time was Sonic and Amy. Bad, bad casting. I know Phoenix wears royal blue and has spiky hair. That’s not the point. I don’t know how the casting went for the English voices in the game, if they were professional actors or not (they just got Capcom staffers for the Japanese one), but I do wish that they had at least tried to cast actors who sounded like the originals. Phoenix’s in-game objection is so strong. The anime version is pathetic. Our boy deserved better!
Although, looking at the cast list, they actually got different actors in for the Gyakuten Gaki Turnabout Promises episodes, so props to them for that! I might rewatch those episodes in English if I can find them.
I really enjoyed this video by Bowl of Lentils. Learning about the behind-the-scenes goings-on really explained a lot about how I felt about the later games. So Takumi wasn’t even involved with Edgey’s games or anything after GS4 in the main timeline. So that’s why Edgey’s personality shifted somewhat.
I had a little moan about this before, but Edgey’s game was such a disappointment. As I said, I was expecting something more in the stable of the Kyle Hyde games, but instead we got what seemed like a cheap imitation — well maybe an expensive imitation (I’m glad it was only £10 in the bargain bucket, though). Courtroom game mechanics, but with no courtroom. It’s like a bootleg, right? Edgey was such an annoying sticky beak, it really bugged me. I’m not sure he really needed a game at all.
You know the saying, “Never meet your heroes”, and I think Edgey is one of those characters that’s better for having an aura of mystery around him. Continue reading
Pearl’s appearance in the game was always a little disturbing.
She’s eight years old. Why is she investigating crime scenes and standing at the co-counsel desk at violent murder trials?
It really bugs me that social services are completely oblivious to her existence. With her mother incarcerated, Continue reading
I finally finished replaying AA2, and also caught up to the corresponding anime episode.
I have to say, the anime isn't all that good. I mentioned that in my last post about it. They changed a lot of things, and that reduced the quality of storytelling and character development, I think. Edgey's case seemed really rushed. If I'd watched these without having ever played the game, I don't think it would have made me all that interested in the franchise, to be honest. But maybe that's because I'm seeing it through the lens of already being a big fan of the OT. Anyway.
Watch out for spoilers.
They gave us some of episodes of the three friends when they were kids. It was nice to see how their friendship was, but they changed a few things, and I didn't like that. I love how they keep the exact same hairstyles they had when they were 9. They're all ♥gottsu kawaii♥, all of them!
Kurain is an idiocracy anyway, but that’s not what I’m ranting about today. The whole spirit-chanelling thing just doesn’t make sense in-universe.
In the real world, we can dismiss mediums as a bunch of scam artists, but in the Ace Attorney universe, it’s genuine. They would 100% have won James Randi’s $1,000,000. I mean, they literally shapeshift for all to see. There’s no way to dismiss them as frauds. And it’s not like it’s a secret. We know from the Dr Grey case that the Feys take clients, and spirit channeling is their job. We also know the cops hired Misty years back. Mia frequently appears in court post-death and Franziska literally shows the court a photo of Maya transformed into Mia.
Continue reading I recently remembered that there’s a Gyakuten Saiban anime, so I decided to watch it. I saw a few clips of the English dub and wasn’t too happy with the voice cast, so I went with the subbed version. I don’t like Edgey’s voice. I know it’s supposed to be deep, but it sounds the wrong kind of deep. I dunno. It just doesn’t sound right. Maybe his English voice is better. Maya was a bit too high-pitched for my liking, but it’s kinda an occupational hazard for anime, isn’t it? I seem to remember her voice being better in the Layton vs Phoenix Wright trailer. Anyway, I’m only up to the second episode. So here’s what I think so far.
One thing that bugged me is that Naruhodo-kun (Phoenix) kept calling Chihiro (Mia) “Chihiro-san”, which he didn’t do in the game. He called her “shochou”, or, in the English release, “Chief”. I don’t know if they made the same mistake in the English dub. They also couldn’t make their mind up about Mia’s age. She literally aged down a year in one second, even though she was dead!
Recently I've been playing the first Ace Attorney again. I thought since I'm working on the translations again, I should refamiliarise myself with the characters' quirks. I blazed through the first 3 cases, and now I'm on Edgey's case and he's been on trial for over a week now. Poor Edgey. Anyway, a weird thing is in the fanbook, Larry calls Phoenix by his actual surname Naruhodou. But in the English release, Maya gets the Nick-name (see what I did there? Of course you did) from Larry. Before that, she calls him Phoenix. So where did she get Naruhodo-kun from in the original? I'll have to try playing that case again on the DS re-release. Also, in the original, Maya calls Larry by the nickname Yappari, instead of his name Yahari. But in the English, she says his name correctly as Larry, rather than Harry, which is what Mia and Gummi call him. It's strange how they changed that.
Anyway, I was recently looking up my blog online to see if it had been indexed yet (as you do), and came across this post by sophie_inthesky at AO3.
Continue readingTo commemorate almost actually finishing this after *checks* almost exactly 9 years, here are some more photos of the inside of this book. Just to clarify, it’s an official fanbook, not a fanwork. It was published by Softbank Creative, and has a retail price of 1,500 yen + tax. I think I paid about £15 for it on eBay. It was first published on 14/06/2006 and I have the second printing which was on 30/06/2006. The ISBN is 4-7973-3556-4.
Here’s the dust jacket opened out.
Continue reading I am finally back working on this project! Thank you to Yuki-san for helping me when I got stuck. The end is finally in sight! Takumi-san uses the phrase "ato no matsuri" (the festival after?), and then at the end, Maya says "matsuri no ato" (after the festival), and I don't really know what they're getting at. The original title of this page is Matsuri. You can read more about matsuri here. Hamidashi means something like, "sticking out", "overflow". Pearl's Japanese name is Harumi, Hami-chan for short, so they got her character to answer the reader comments in the puntastically named Hamidashi Letters Corner. Turnabout Trials is the literal translation of Gyakuten Saiban. I had to use that version to make Phoenix's observation work.
Hello. It's hot every day, huh? It seems like day after day, the heatwave of over 30° is just going to keep going, but... here's one big question.
... So an air temperature of 30°, it makes you feel really hot, right? But hang on. Continue reading
BEHOLD: The first glimpse of Phoenix's bedroom!
Takumi Shuu (??)
Ace Attorney's director and scriptwriter. It's rumoured his fuel is alcohol.
Status: ... It's like playing a clarinet that doesn't make the sound of do, re, mi, fa, uh, so la, ti. So every day is a pakkyamarao day.
Letters Corner• For perks for pre-ordering "Rise from the Ashes", a soundtrack CD or files about creating the game would be nice. (Uehara, Saitama Prefecture)
Continue readingTranslator's note: Maya's favourite food in the Japanese release is miso ramen. Takushuu is Shuu Takumi, the series' director.
[Picture text. I think the lines are Phoenix, Edgey, Phoenix, Maya. But I'm not sure. The little writing by Maya's head says "Why?"]
Phoenix: If you're just here to loiter, go home.
Edgeworth: Hm, but I'm thirsty...
Phoenix: This isn't a tea room, you know. Maya, don't you be serving tea, either!
Maya: Nick's stinginess...
Nice to meet you! I'm the Ace Attorney team's Shuu Takumi. For the three games in the series, I'm responsible for planning, supervising and scriptwriting.
Continue readingTranslator's note: Completely re-translated October 2021. The last version was so full of mistakes, I had to redo the whole thing. There are still a couple of bits I'm not sure about. Golden Week is a week-long holiday in Japan.
Takumi Shuu (??)
Ace Attorney's director and scriptwriter. It's rumoured his fuel is alcohol.
Status: ...If it's the case that "time is money", I want to buy some time with money! I think about this while I'm working. I want more time...
Letters CornerLast month's issue brought forth several reactions. With attention turning to the launch of "Rise from the Ashes", expectations were getting higher and higher!
• Phoenix, Maya and Edgeworth were in perfect harmony (?) [sic] when Payne interrupted them in the middle of their conversation. Despite suddenly seeing this ordinary middle-aged man, it was my turn to discover Payne-san's charm. Takumi-san, please do your best to take care of your health. (Kazutotoro, Hyougo Prefecture)
Continue reading