How Dual Destinies Failed Apollo Justice

The phantom of seven years past has returned

My favourite thing about Dual Destinies is Simon Blackquill.
Seriously though, I totally agree with what you're saying. Knowing nothing about Clay, other than him being Apollo's friend, just felt like any other case. Like, how sad this person is dead, but I know nothing about them so I don't care. Heck, even in the first game with Mia, you interact with her a small amount in that first case and her death still hits you hard.
I like what you were pointing out that having that first investigation and experiencing Apollo reacting to Athena potentially lying would have added so much more to the tension in that case.

After getting both the Phoenix Wright and Apollo Justice remaster trilogies on Steam I steamed through the first four games like a breeze until I get to Dual Destinies. That yokai case was enough to make me quit and hate my time through it. Thank you for verbalising the things I couldn't put my finger on.

Ngl i had to mute l'belle's theme because it was so annoying

Your hot take for Monstrous Turnabout is valid, but i can't take the Turnabout Big Top, this case irritates me so much and at least i was entertained by Tenma Taro funny acting. But yeah, the yokai case is kind of the point where Apollo has all his spotlight at the game and loses it all after that, and in top of all this, the plot making him the "antagonist" for like 1 segment of the last case is a bummer for me that wanted a story about him (even liking the Athena/Blackquill arc). Surely the next game can tell a good backstory about him, but the mess is already done in DD.

I think your pick of Redd White to compare against Florent was good, but I think an even better one would be comparing him to either Roger Retinz or Luke Atmey. Retinz, because of how much they make you hate the guy before they even drop the big spoiler, and Atmey because his annoyingness hides his cleverness.

Honestly I get the feeling the devs knew how much they screwed up when it came to Apollo's story which is probably why spirit of justice tried to have more focus on him (your mileage may vary on that if you ask me though) like this guy now has 2 back stories and Athena is almost completely thrown out she's get one case and the only thing people remember from it is the clown.

DD has phoenix on the cover so...

Easiest do not recommend channel ever

Am in the minority for disliking AJ way more than DD?

What really baffles me about DD is how the dlc bonus episode is better written than the main plot

I overall like Dual Destinies quite a lot, but... yeah, its biggest problem is how dirty it did Apollo.

I loved The Monstrous Turnabout

It's insane how 4 of the 6 cases in Dual Destinies are flashbacks, and yet we never get to see any of the plot important motivations on screen, and have to be told them instead

The weird thing is that there's a case in SoJ that is very much a closure to a bunch of points presented in AA4 that no one would bat an eye if it was actually a case from that game, so they had ideas to build off of AA4, they simply decided not to until SoJ, which has such a completely different main plot that the case ends up feeling disconnected and almost like a filler despite being such an important part of the overarching "trilogy" of Apollo

While I love DD, I refuse to accept it as a sequel to AJAA. It's much more like an AU than actual continuation of Apollo's story.
Apollo? Like you pointed it out in the video, he barely exists there and the only thing he did there was to turn his back to Wright and he didn't evolve at all.
Where is Kristoph? Phoenix' mentor figure, Mia, was appearing in all of his games, and Kristoph like… Doesn't exist anymore. He was just barely referenced while re-introducing black psyche locks and Apollo parroting him on the witness' stand. They definitely should explore more the relationship Kristoph and Apollo had. If Apollo turned against Wright, they could simply show him visiting Kristoph in the prison and, man, there was a great opportunity to show if Kristoph had bad intentions towards his former mentee (we can't forget of the fact that everything Apollo learned until now was literally thanks to Kristoph).
I loved Edgeworth, but come on. He should be gone together with Phoenix as they already played their roles in the series. It should be Klavier to appear in the last case, not Edgeworth. I was absolutely disappointed by that. Oh, another point! They left Gavin brothers without any explanation, though there was something interesting showed to us in the second part of the trial when Kristoph walked in the courtroom.
Athena is a great character, but it would be much better if she got her own games instead of consuming the time that should be focused on Apollo. We didn't have it happen in the actual trilogy that we had different playable characters at the same time. It's a very bad decision.
I agree about the point about Clay. He literally appeared out of nowhere and as already dead guy. Also, it would be much more interesting to play as Apollo during the whole Clay's case.

cod finally someone agrees on 5-2 being the worst case in the series, it's just so annoying and boring, there's nothing you'd lose in the slightest removing it AND it was the case that was like "SURPRISE TRUCY GETTING SIDELINED"

A way I thought we could have all 3 protagonists focused on in the final case is to have Apollo as the prosecutor instead of edgeworth, will make sense why a difficult opponent because knows how Phoenix works and uses perceive, this role fully shows his spiral of negative character arc and make it even more emotional and tense, becomes prosecutor where Gavin gives him his badge as a reverse edgeworth as defence , making Gavin actually important in the game, gives his badge because sees how desperate Apollo needs to find out the truth.

I managed to agree with absolutely everything said here

Dual destinies really was bad. The original trilogy (especially 1 and 3) was the best of ace attorney. Ever since, it became a big franchise and really boring and shallow.

The yokai case just annoys me in general due to how ungrounded from reality it is. It feels hard to care about any of the characters when we constantly talk about monsters and demons as if they’re actually real (yes ok spirits exist but still) and it just comes across as overly silly and not to be taken seriously.. which is a real shame considering it’s Apollos only real case as the controllable character here.

Also the writer should have known that revealing the villain is usually reserved for case 1, due to it being a tutorial case. There was absolutely no reason for the villain to be revealed so early. It’s likely that because they enjoyed putting in anime cutscenes to try and impress the players they just went overboard putting too many plot revealing cutscenes in…

"black quill is only here because of Athena" "Fullbright is only here because of Athena" Like yeah no shit that's how stories work lmao.

I actually really liked Dual Destinies. Especially the music. The story of the phantom was pretty cool and the who it turned out to be was took me completely by surprise. So, yeah, imho, you're wrong about it.

The entire time, I could only wonder if there is an Apollo Justice anime and where I could watch it 😅

Trucy was a really annoying character imo and dual destines did a great job of removing a lot of characters as even gavin was really lame lol
Dual destines was much much better than apollo justice easily

It's a lot easier to understand if you look at the big picture and understand Apollo as the Scrappy of the AA franchise. He had no background whatsoever, and his intro game wasn't even really about him--he was the player's stand-in to observe and puzzle over Phoenix, a la Watson watching Holmes--so his personal growth from the beginning of the game to the end was basically nonexistent. There was nothing to build on when DD came around--he was still the same blank slate with a loud voice, which is why Clay (and then a game later, Nahyuta and Durke and that whole fiasco) came out of nowhere.

Given that, the direction of the series over the next two games--first bringing back Phoenix and once again making him the main character (along with giving him a new apprentice lawyer to mentor) and then spending SoJ putting Apollo on a bus, then a plane, and then setting him up with his own law office in another country and presumably writing him out of the series--is best seen as one long, extended retcon to get rid of a character they regretted creating.

Man La Bell was a bad antagonist. I agree his case is bad with the only major upside to the case was how the murder was committed. When I first did the case, I was stump with how he did. But once you get by any herdle the game gives you, it failed miserably

Cap

I'm stuck on monstrous tournabout. I have 0 interest in the case and man do i not like the idea that nothing from apollo justice is expanded upon. I also think Phoenix just being his old self again is jarring and lazy.

I think case 3 of Dual Destinies is worse due to how much of a badly paced tedious slog it is with some of the most embarrassing moments in the series especially the scene with Hugh crying. Case 2 of Dual Destinies I just found to be incredibly boring and I hardly remember anything that happens.

Dual Destinies should have absolutely been postponed until a slightly later game. The timeline wouldn't suffer from an AJ sequel whatsoever. I absolutely loved Simon and Athena, but... AJ deserves better.

Wait... it's a beautiful mess of a sequel that steadfastly refuses to acknowledge any of the major plot points from the previous installment.

Dear God, It's The Rise Of Skywalker!

apollo bustice

Feels like Dual Destinies might have been better if it was just an Athena game. I know a lot of people (including myself) want a good continuation to AJAA, but in my opinion, the best parts of Dual Destinies are Athena, Simon Blackquill, and Bobby Fulbright. If they're gonna sideline Apollo that hard anyway, might as well just make a game about those three without having to also drag along Apollo and Phoenix, and it might have turned out better.

In my opinion, Dual Destinies is the best game in the series imo. It has a ton of loveable characters, a fantastic antagonist, a compelling story and banger music however I always found the lack of focus for Apollo to be an issue. Now I want to state a bit of a controversial opinion, the writer trying to write of what happened in Apollo Justice isn't a bad idea and the reason why is because of how the events of the game could literally destroy the series imo, we have the Dark Age of The Law which was so stupid because the person that caused it had one of the worst motives i've ever heard, Phoenix losing his badge because of forged evidence felt so forced and the way they stopped Kristoph is as stupid as 1-2 where Mia basically lets you win for not knowing how to flip a piece of paper. They did the entire game so dirty so when they did stuff like stopped the Dark Age of The Law by stopping the Phantom, giving Phoenix his badge back and had the game focus on Phoenix, Apollo and Athena, I was really happy because we didn't need to deal with the nonsense that is Apollo Justice the game. Look, I understand that even if something is established whether it is good or not needs to be expanded upon, I mean I feel the same because I feel like cases need to last 3 days again however you have to understand that writing something around that and expanded upon it is a risky move especially if the writer thinks that the established stuff in question is bad, so much that they had to write an entirely new story. I understand to those that think that they should've expanded upon that stuff but you can't blame the writer for wanting to do so, I personally think that it's an amazing decision that they did that however one thing that they shouldn't have done is sidelined the Apollo Justice characters. One of the biggest issues with Apollo Justice is that Apollo himself is sidlined by Phoenix himself and it felt like anything that Apollo did had no meaning to anything whatsoever. And one of the positives that I can give the game are the characters, Apollo is fine in his own game, Trucy has a ton of charm although isn't as good as Maya and Kay, Klavier is a different breath of fresh air for prosecutors and I love it and I don't like the rest lol. However in Dual Destinies and Spirit of Justice, we made Apollo an entirely different character and him having like 3 backstories, Trucy feeling as important as Ahlbi from Spirit of Justice and Klavier making a small cameo although I did like the appearance. They shouldn't have done that, while I understand the decision to move away from Apollo Justice, at least focus on the characters. The game felt more like Phoenix and Athena's game and while I like those two and think that it's not a bad idea to focus on them for Dual Destinies especially after learning what they did to them in Spirit of Justice but the game is supposed to be about Phoenix, APOLLO and Athena so all three of them needed the focus. And even now I wonder why the Apollo Justice Trilogy has Dual Destinies in it, but then we get to Spirit of Justice and I have to ask how they managed to make it seem like Apollo is both underutilized and overulitized. Seriously that is an accomplishment in itself because Apollo doesn't appear as much as he should yet when he appears, suddenly everyone gets pushed to the side in favor of Apollo, Nahyuta and Rayfa which I hate. Rayfa appearing so much in the investigations is why I don't like her so much as she got annoying for me, Nahyuta is underrated and honestly a really good character but did Case 4 had to be necessary and while I like Apollo, it's not a good thing that I only started to like him around the end of the game. I hate that everyone else got sidelined, Athena basically became a side character, Ahlbi could've been a new version of Pearl but after the 1st trial, he became useless. Seriously I like the kid and I don't think he should be a main character but at least let him so something other than providing one piece of evidence and being pushed aside because we need more Rayfa, Trucy did have a case based on her which is great but not enough, Klavier didn't even appear at all, not even a mention nor a cameo, out of everywhere they put him in the Asanine Attorney, hell even Phoenix got sidelined around Case 5 and overall they did Apollo dirty.

Ja

Awe man, I'm not gonna watch this video cause I still wanna play it on my own without spoilers, but I was really hoping this would be the game to redeem Apollo.
The original Apollo Justice game was such a mess, the worst crime that game commited though, was just how much Apollo was cucked out of his own story and how much everyone robbed him of his agency. I really wanted to root for Apollo but it just felt like everyone was just toying with him or using him, it really made me resent Phoenix on that game specifically.

Would we got an anime apollo justice l sequel??

what's the name of your outro music

I just finished dual destinies recently and really liked it but I agree with a lot of your points. I think it’s a great Athena game, but not a great Apollo game. AA4 built up an interesting story and just didn’t follow through with it and that makes me sad. I wish Apollo Justice could’ve been a trilogy like the original, with a single story drawn through all three games.

I am sure this will be an unpopular opinion, but I’ve always felt that DD was where Apollo was at his best, and it is AJ and SoJ that really hurt his character.

I actually completely forgot about that yokai case, its so forgettable and i definitely agree its the worst case.

The Great Ace Attorney has a victim that ties back to the main cast that was a total “oh shit!” moment because we spent time with them and it feels like it comes completely out of nowhere. Thats what you are suppose to do to make me care about deaths that affect the main characters. Have us spend time with them.

Bruh I watched some of your super smash bros videos, I had no idea you did any on ace attorney.

Dual Destinies hate still unjustified to this day. People are just salty that the game wasn't Apollo Justice 2.

I feel like Athena is a fine character and a good addition to the franchise and main cast... but she came too soon

I feel like the order should of been something like this
AA4: AJ
AA5: SoJ (without Athena)
AA6: (An Apollo game where he and trucy reunite with their mother near the end) (Have the new prosecutor be someone who hates him due to the whole Borginian Cocoon issue)
(Apollo leaves to spend time with their mother because of his kinda missing childhood from her and wanting to spend a year with her or smtn)
AA7: Duel Destinies (But hella reworked to exclude/minimise Apollo)

The more i encounter DD the more i like it
It's a flawed game (with most of the roots of the problem being present in both AJ and SoJ - my boi Apollo just got the short end of the stick in terms of writing), but a very fun one.

I think one problem is that in japan the game isn't called Apollo Justice. Its just called ace attorney 4. Sooo...yeah...they really bullshitted that.

I don't hate Athena or Simon, actually I like them quite well, but the problem is that Dual Destinies should have been the sequel to Apollo Justice, not Athena's story.

Spirit of Justice the next installment, although not perfect, works more as a sequel to AJ than DD. What's more, if we remove Athena from SoJ, the game remains practically the same because Athena has no contribution to the game's plot.

If you ask me how to fix what caused DD, it would be the following:

1- Remove Apollo from DD and Athena from SoJ.
2- Change the order DD and SoJ, becoming the order AJ -> SoJ -> DD
3-Use the SoJ DLC, to explain what the hell happened between AJ and SoJ, things like why Phoenix went back to court and the jury system.
4- Once Apollo's story is finished, we start DD with Athena telling her own story, and giving her all the prominence, because although DD is her starting game, just like Apollo, she only has one case that is the Turnabout Academy.

Hmm, your video made me realize something: Ace Attorney 4 (Apollo Justice) really should've been Ace Attorney 5. My reasoning for this is as follows:

Compare Apollo's first game to Phoenix's first game. In AA1, we not only get to know Phoenix really well, but we also get a really solid backstory from him. This backstory not only explains why he does what he does, but also connects him to Edgeworth and the Fey clan, all of which culminates spectacularly in the final case where you take down Von Karma, the source of all the problems of the game.

Now let's look at Apollo's game. In AA4, all we get from Apollo is that he's a funny, quirky, lawyer dude who believes in justice. That's it. Yes, there's sort of a backstory present here with the Gramaryes and whatnot, but that doesn't explain his motivations at all. Why does he do what he does? What does he want? The backstory only tells us who Apollo's mother and sister are, and he doesn't even know about them. That information doesn't impact the story at all. So it's no use other than explaining where his powers come from.

Let's talk about the tutorial case of the game. While it is very cool to see Wright big-braining it to catch the real killer, that still comes at the cost of Apollo's character. Wright is essentially running the whole trial, and Apollo is there solely because Wright can't stand at the defence bench. Let me repeat that. Apollo is present not of his own volition, but solely because he is convenient to Wright. Phoenix CHOSE his first case; Apollo's was FORCED UPON him. Your main character has no agency in his own game. He's just the proxy of the previous protagonist. That is not a trait you want your main character to have.

Wright just saw Apollo at Gavin's office, found out that he was a Gramarye, and thought "Huh, I can use him". He puppeteers him for his own ends (catching Kristoph) and leaves him on his own for the cases which aren't worth anything to him (like the Wocky Kitaki trial). Even Kristoph's takedown in the final trial is not done by Apollo, it is done by Phoenix. Apollo is using the evidence Phoenix collected, he's using the Jurist System which Phoenix built. Hell, he says so himself (which is what causes Kristoph's breakdown).

Speaking of Kristoph, let's talk about him. Why is it that Apollo has no reaction to his mentor being convicted? Hell, why does Klavier have no reaction to HIS BROTHER being convicted? Can you imagine Phoenix having no reaction if Mia was convicted of murder? Of course not. That's insane. And yet, that's exactly what happens here. Apollo supposedly worked under "the best defence attorney around" for years, and yet when Wright shows up and shatters his whole world (rather cruelly, I might add) he says nothing?

An Apollo Justice game between AA3 and AA4 solves all of these problems. Have this game be completely free of Phoenix's influence. Build a backstory for Apollo, which actually influences his path. Have Wright pick him because he watched Apollo's prowess in one of his trials, not because he just saw him at Gavin's office and figured out he was Thalassa's son. This way, Wright picking him of all people becomes a result of Apollo's own actions, not just dumb luck. Present Kristoph as a lovable and kind mentor much like Mia, and have him and Apollo build a relationship throughout the game. That way, when Phoenix takes Kristoph down in the second Apollo Justice, it isn't just heartbreaking for Apollo, but the player too. Then have Phoenix reveal Apollo's connection with Lamiroir and Trucy.

Sadly we didn't get that game, and I'm making myself sad just talking about it.