Case 2-2: Reunion, and Turnabout

I decided I’d take a day off to mark the proverbial midway point of Phoenix’s story after this.  I shall update my schedule accordingly.

First off, it’s key to know that this case, as I mentioned, takes place two months before case 2-1.

For some reason, this ends up being my favourite case out of every other case in Phoenix’s story.  Because of that I found that this case was fairly easy.  There were a couple of spots I couldn’t remember but got through effortlessly.

To contradict my last statement saying this is my favourite case, as a Christian, I’m not a big fan on discussion of the occult.  Unfortunately this case discusses it quite a lot.  (The whole spirit channelling thing is considered an occult thing even in-game after all.)  This also isn’t the last case in Phoenix’s story that deals with Kurain in one way or another.

This case also introduces a new key character: Franziska von Karma.  As you could probably tell by her name she is the daughter of Manfred von Karma from case 1-4, and she is also the forefront prosecutor in this case.  Although she is not as notorious as her father, she obviously follows in his footsteps and that shows in her courtroom tactics.

One thing I thought I’d point out now is that Franziska doesn’t disappear from the series at the end of this game.  Her battles between her and a certain someone else (that I’ll keep secret for now) tend to keep her as a key character in this game well into Trials and Tribulations.

Another new character that we meet in this case that will stay with Phoenix until the end of his story would be Maya’s younger cousin, Pearl Fey.  For such a young girl though she sure seems intent that Phoenix and Maya are quite the couple, and although she’s not much of a help now she ends up being somewhat of a help on later cases, when Maya’s help isn’t available, and her channelling powers greatly surpass that of her older cousin and so it’s easier for her to channel Mia in clutch situations.

This game introduces one last investigative feature that we’ll see up until the end of TaT: the psyche-lock.  Throughout the first game, certain pieces of information that a witness would keep secret could be dug up.  In this case, Maya gives you her magatama to take back to Pearl, who charges it and gives it back to you.  From this point on, the magatama will be a common item in the court record along with the attorney’s badge.  Now, whenever you try to talk about something is trying to keep a secret, locks will appear depending on the difficulty of the psyche lock.  Breaking a psyche lock is done by presenting the magatama to the person with the lock, which will start a sequence that will have you present evidence or facts that shows what this secret is.  Presenting the wrong evidence will get you penalized, although in the end once you successfully unlock a psyche lock you regain half your life meter.  (There are usually at least two psyche locks in each investigation chapter, so if you had a bad day in court you could eventually refill your life meter completely to have a full meter for the next day of the trial.)

So, today will be a break for the halfway mark of the story, and I will tackle case 2-3 on Sunday.

~ by Moofey on February 8, 2008.