Somehow managed to make it through the video without mentioning the side quest where an "Alpha Wolf" tries to sell useless supplements to his pack 💀

That's good to hear. Definitely got a bit burnt out doing the side quests in the base game, so I'll probably wait a bit to get the DLC until I'm feeling in the mood for more ZA.

I think my issue is that much of the game frames Edgeworth's choice as "will he choose defense or prosecution?", but we know from prior games that's a false binary.

It's about "finding the truth" from either side, and I'm left thinking Edgeworth already understood this from before AAI2 even began.

See, I actually felt like Cases 2-4 all had this kind of scene, albeit in the Gregory flashbacks with Case 3.

It's part of the game's project to align both Edgeworth (and the player) closer to that of the usual AA ethos, which I think is not a particularly interesting choice for a spin-off.

*Sorry, I should specify, *because of the Committee's cruelty*

I think that hits at the conflict the game is trying to get at with Edgeworth a lot better than the game's focus on "finding the truth," which is just a generic AA standby at this point.

Like, I'd prefer if Edgeworth gave up his badge in Case 4 explicitly because of their cruelty.

Oh, yeah I definitely agree the last case overall was really strong. Really liked Edgeworth's speech to Gavelle about the best judges using their humanity as a guide rather than their impartiality.

OK, one more. Kay is terrible. Agonizing character. Every. Single. Exchange. Is. The. Same. Exact. Joke. Throws the tone of the game way off-balance and it seems she's only here because it can't be an AA game without a Maya-like. She was at her best in the case where they gave her a new personality.

I dunno. I have a lot more problems, but I think these are the big ones. I guess I wanted to like the Investigation games more than I actually did.

Which is what makes the final case pretty good. It is the only case in 2 which effectively, through its antagonist, tries to argue why it is necessary to be playing as a *prosecutor* in a *non-courtroom setting* for its duration.

2 (mostly) end on a high note, thankfully.

Edgeworth explicitly acts more like a typical AA protagonist. But why? I won’t try to argue these spin-offs were ever that much different in the first place, but AAI2 drops the pretense of there being a difference almost completely.

The game, in effect, argues for its own redundancy.

There's something dispiriting about many of 2's choices, even if they do prove engaging. AAI2 has Edgeworth roleplay as a defense attorney, placing him under the care of one, having us actually play as one in a case, and giving us a prosecutor and judge to face off against during our arguments.

Edgeworth remains a prosecutor, Gumshoe a detective, Kay the Yatagarasu, Eustace... also a prosecutor.

The story feels preordained the moment it begins. This is especially true in Edgeworth's case, whose arc feels like an extended retread of the original trilogy.

Fittingly, a contradiction lies at the heart of AAI2. The story causes our main cast to question their chosen life path, only for *all* of them to wind up in more or less the exact same position they started the game at.

Everyone chooses the same path with, like, a slightly different flavor.

tbf, the character in question said Earth is "suffering"

...but the devs have implied time travel may play a part in this current storyline, so post-apocalyptic Earth is not completely off the table

alas, I am more of a Galaxy 1 & 2 kind of guy, but I do think most Mario games could use some more Sunshine-like energy

Leaked screenshot of what Earth will look like by the time we get there in 2-3 years, probably

I need people to know I'm not exaggerating when I say Wizard101 is my favorite thing ever. They're cooking something absolutely goofy with this video game

A lot of it comes down to how underdeveloped the school setting is, frankly. It barely seems to augment the stories the game is telling, and in Penny's case, reveals some pretty glaring gaps (it would be nice to actually *see* a bullying problem at the academy firsthand, for instance).