The Great Ace Attorney 2: Resolve is an adventure game in the Ace Attorney series and the sequel to The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures, developed and published by Capcom. It was directed by Shu Takumi and produced by Motohide Eshiro. The game was released for the Nintendo 3DS in Japan in August 2017, with Android and iOS versions following in April 2018. Resolve was released worldwide in July 2021 via The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles, a duology compilation of both games for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and Windows.
The game won the Famitsu Awards 2017 in the Excellency category.
Gameplay
The game focuses on the signature courtroom style of gameplay used in the Ace Attorney series, including the fully 3D environments and character models that became a part of the franchise since Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Dual Destinies. Like its predecessor, most of the game's episodes are divided between two phases: investigation, in which players explore areas to gather evidence and testimonies; and courtroom battles, in which players must use evidence to find contradictions in witness testimonies to find the truth behind a case. In the latter phase, the player will sometimes have to cross-examine multiple witnesses at the same time, potentially gleaning new information by addressing one witness when they react to another's statement.
The game retains two additional gameplay mechanics introduced in The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures: the Dance of Deduction, and Summation Examinations. Dance of Deduction segments occur during certain investigations and involve correcting mistakes with a flawed theory on a crime issued by the character Herlock Sholmes, based on his observations of the scene and the behavior of witnesses. In these, players must correct his mistakes to reach a more logical conclusion, by examining the scene and witnesses carefully while comparing what is seen to what he states in his theory. Summation Examinations take place during trials, and focus upon convincing the jury to postpone declaring a guilty verdict in order to let the trial continue. Players accomplish this by comparing statements from two different jurors that contradict or otherwise prove strongly relevant to each other, and sometimes may be required to press a juror or present evidence in order to change their statement.
Plot
Four months after the events of the first game, Susato Mikotoba returns to Japan only to find her best friend accused of murdering Jezaille Brett, the murderer of John Wilson. Aided by her father Yujin, Susato disguises herself as the male cousin of her friend Ryunosuke Naruhodo and proves her friend's innocence. After the trial, she finds that her return home was due to a case she and Ryunosuke handled in England six months ago. In that case, after proving the defendant innocent in the near-fatal poisoning of a failed actor, the pair discovered a jeweled dog collar in the defendant's apartment, but were forced by detective Herlock Sholmes to hand it over to the police, advising them and his assistant Iris Wilson to not disclose any details of their discovery.
In England, an explosion at the demonstration of an experimental teleportation device results in its inventor being held responsible for the death of a known crime lord. Ryunosuke, upon receiving permission from Lord Chief Justice Mael Stronghart to return to court (following an investigation of his first trial in the country), is assigned to defend them. Facing off against the infamous Barok van Zieks — a prosecutor who is known as the "Reaper" due to how everyone he prosecutes is either found guilty or dies under mysterious circumstances - who in turn is accompanied by the mute Masked Apprentice, an amnesic man Stronghart assigned to van Zieks. Throughout the trial, Ryunosuke discovers that the case is linked to a decade-old case in which five members of the aristocracy were killed by an individual known as the "Professor" using an enormous hound, with the fifth victim being van Zieks's brother Klint. Moreover, it is revealed that the Professor escaped his own execution in a closed casket, only to be shot rising from his grave. With the aid of Susato upon her return to England, Ryunosuke proves the victim was murdered by Scotland Yard's chief coroner, Courtney Sithe, who was being blackmailed over her part in the Professor's escape. Afterwards, van Zieks unveils the Professor to be a Japanese man named Genshin Asogi, the father to Kazuma Asogi, Ryunosuke's close friend. This brings back all of the Masked Apprentice's memories, revealed to be Kazuma himself, having actually survived the events of Adventures and made his way to London.