As far as unexpected crossovers go, Professor Layton and Phoenix Wright certainly qualifies. Sure, both series center heavily on logic-based puzzle-solving (though Phoenix Wright is surely heavier on story details)… and they’re both animated. But the attitude, setting, and writing of both franchises differs heavily. Not to mention they’re both the product of two different companies and writers.
It’s not a trainwreck
Nevertheless, it’s happened, and against all odds, it isn’t a trainwreck. In fact, while it’s perhaps a bit silly from time to time in its weaving of the storylines, the farfetchedness of the concept to begin with really works in its favor. This is fantasy, and it’s fun if you play along. It’s extra fun if you’re a fan of both worlds, and that’s the whole idea.
How does it work? It’s basically equal parts Layton and Phoenix Wright (perhaps not time-wise, but in terms of the presence of each concept). It starts out wholly separate with a single loosely-threaded point of convergence, but as the game progresses, the two game universes are inevitably brought together by what happens to be nothing less than black magic. The story, quickly summarized, involves a girl named Espella Cantabella, who is being chased by what are supposedly witches. Through the course of events, both Layton and Wright are sucked into Espella’s world to the mysterious town of Labyrinthia, ruled by a figure known as the Story Teller, who supposedly can write anything and bring it into fruition. Meanwhile, witches sneak to and fro, and accusations—witch trials—take place regularly.
As you might expect, Layton and Luke take care of the exploration and puzzle-solving, while Wright handles the courtroom encounters… well, at least, at first. The splicing of these two quite different approaches to gameplay is thankfully handled fairly unpredictably. In other words, you won’t be subjected to, say, two hours of Layton followed by two hours of Wright (rinse and repeat); rather, variations in pacing apply, wrapped around some pretty well-timed plot twists, to boot.
The Layton gameplay follows in the same vein as recent 3DS entries, where dragging the stylus on the bottom screen moves a cursor on the top (3D) screen. It’s a clever approach which allows for mouse-grade accuracy without the obstruction of a hand in front of the screen, which not only is annoying but also breaks the 3D effect. Meanwhile, the Phoenix Wright gameplay picks right up where the series left off—a good thing, I’m sure most would agree.
This is just before he opened his circus with Bailey
No objections
For the most part, once the story picks up (which admittedly takes a little bit), it’s fun to follow along and it does get pretty interesting. It’s written by Shu Takumi, series director for the Ace Attorney series, and it fits together as well as Layton fans would expect it to, while obviously still retaining the feel of the Ace Attorney series where applicable. It isn’t necessarily predictable, and it’s longer than it seems at first, too. Overall, in terms of length, there’s somewhere in the neighborhood of 25+ hours, which is right around the norm for the Layton series.
The number of puzzles has, of course, dropped. You’ll find just 70 or so, which is roughly half that of the most recent installments in the Layton series. The missing content has been replaced by Phoenix Wright gameplay, which is as sharp as ever. That said, some of the situations can actually get a little too ambiguous in their insinuated logic, which can occasionally be frustrating (such as trying to figure out how some evidence relates to testimony contradictions), but then, there’s an absurd abundance of Hint Coins littered throughout the Layton scenes (as usual), such that you will never be stuck for long.
Environments are varied and pacing is fairly consistent, though there are instances where the walls of text do provoke some eye-glazing. It isn’t that the dialogue isn’t well-written—most of the time, it’s pretty good—it’s just that there’s a lot of it, and a good portion of it is predictable. I found myself mashing A more than I would have liked, and it wasn’t that I was rushing through… my ADHD just couldn’t take all of it. This has happened before in Layton games, so if you’re okay with the previous entries, you probably won’t find PLvPW’s dialogue offensive. After all, a large part of it consists of the usual “How are you today?” “I’d be doing better if you could SOLVE THIS PUZZLE.” [PUZZLE XX]
Presentation done Wright
Unlike the predictable, uninspired puns I’ve employed to help spice up my review, PLvPW:AA actually does presentation right. Layton series composer Tomohito Nishiura joins forces with Yasumasa Kitagawa (Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon) to produce what is surely the best soundtrack in either series to date. Leveraging themes from both franchises, a large portion of the selections are also fully orchestrated, and some of the composition work (such as that of the credits theme) is truly great stuff.
Ditto on the graphical presentation, which features beautiful artwork on par with Professor Layton and the Azran Legacy, and animation (especially during courtroom scenes) of typical Phoenix Wright quality. We’re also treated to plenty of anime interludes (all in beautiful 3D, of course), which is a first for the Wright series. Voice acting is fortunately pretty good throughout as well; overall, it’s a solid effort and the caliber of presentation which both franchises deserve.