Any company that chooses to switch out the series' star for another previously unknown character is taking one hell of a risk. Yet that's precisely what Capcom have done with their Ace Attorney series. The fourth game, Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney has you playing not as Phoenix Wright, but as Apollo Justice, an up and coming defence lawyer. And you know what? It sort of works - Apollo is a fairly likeable character, who's every bit as capable of solving crimes as his predecessor. As Apollo, you get to spend half your time in the courtroom, and the other half roaming around various locations collecting clues and interviewing suspects. There are various mini-tasks such as gathering fingerprints which require you to do things like blow into the DS - which should be embarrasing if you're playing this on the train. But it does at least make use of the DS's fancier features, something that the previous games didn't really do.

All of which sounds like fun, and it is. Actually proving that a witness is a big fat liar is pretty cool, as is getting your client off and finally nailing the real suspect. However, there's one significant problem with Apollo Justice that seriously detracts from the game - and that's Phoenix Wright himself. Despite the fact that you're not playing as Phoenix himself, Mr Wright appears so frequently that it feels like you're a guest star in your own game. Add to that the fact that Phoenix himself is irritatingly smug for most of the game, and you find that the game starts to grate. You can spend a good ten minutes discovering a vital piece of evidence, only for Phoenix himself to admit that he knew about it all along. In fact, half of the cases in the game revolve around Phoenix's past cases. It would have been better for the game to abandon Phoenix altogether. It's not a bad game, but hopefully the sequel will let Apollo grow as a character, without the game turning into the Phoenix Wright Show again. Rent, but don't buy.