Part 10: Episode 1, Epilogue: Celebration and Foreshadowing

Part 10: Episode 1, Epilogue: Celebration and Foreshadowing



He posed as a newspaper salesman to check and see when people were out of the house!

That day...



After he left, Mr. Sahwit let himself in to do his dirty work!



Flustered, Mr. Sahwit grabbed the nearest blunt object he could find...







Same day, we're back in the lobby a couple hours later...

Music: Victory! The First Victory



Me either!



Congratulations!

Even Mia is happy!



Literally. Even if we made every right choice, it's Mia's intervention at the end that kept us from giving up.



It's been awhile since I've seen a trial end on such a satisfying note!

(I've never seen the chief looking this happy...)

(If she's this glad, imagine how Larry must feel!)

Oh, no...







Aww, Nick...



Man wtf with this guy.





...

But... but my Cindy-windy's gone, man! Gone forever!

(Larry, she was a... Nah... Never mind.)



Now who doesn't know our client's name, hmmmm?

H-Harry...?



Did we switch places or something? Also, Harry Butz, Hairy Butts, haha. I don't usually find those funny but this game has broken through to me.



I won't forget this, ever! Let's celebrate! Dinner? Movie? My treat!





Dude Larry would have been executed by sundown without Mia keeping us in line.

Oh, hey!



...Larry how did you get your hands on the murder weapon, and why do you think it would make a good present for someone?



Wait... Wasn't this the evidence that...



I made one for her and one for me.

It's hard to see but Larry's left arm is swinging back and forth in this sprite and appears to be missing a hand. What the hell? Actually, let me go into my second file with the transparency maxed out and snap it:



Weird, right?



...

Well, thank you. I'll keep it as a memento.

The last girl he gave one to wound up dead....



What is with this dude pulling out new sprites at the last minute? One sec...

Can you believe it? I was so into that chick...

And... And she was just playing me for a fool!

Don't that make you wanna just cry? *sob*

Larry...

...



Ex-squeeze me?

I think she thought quite a lot of you, in her own way.

Nah, you don't gotta sympathize with me, 'sokay.



Isn't that right, Wright? Don't you have something to show your friend?

Something that proves how she felt about him?

H-huh? Oh, yeah, right!



This guy just won a murder trial, everyone.



Obviously we're showing him the murder weapon/statue/clock.





Huh...?

What about that clock?

Wait, why do we have the murder weapon? Eh, never mind.



And she took it with her when she traveled.



You think so? It's a pretty heavy clock to take traveling.

...

Well, make of it what you will.

...

Hey, Nick.



Really, I am. Thanks.




Music: Silence



I hope you see the importance of evidence now.

Also, hopefully you realize, things change depending on how you look at them.

People, too.



All we can do is believe in them.

And in order to believe in them, you have to believe in yourself.

Wright...

Listen. Learn. Grow strong.



Music: Victory! The First Victory



Yeah, I guess so!



We'll drink a toast to innocenct Butz!

Yeah!



You were saying part of why you became a lawyer was because of him.

Er, yeah. Part, at least.





Larry slapped me on the back and said, "Gee, Nick, it's good to have friends!"

But I'm pretty sure he's not going to pay us. Unless you count the clock he gave Mia.

...



...but that clock was soon going to be at the center of another incident.

You better not kill Mia, game.

Music: Silence

And my promise to tell the chief about me and Larry...



...Dammit.



That's the first episode (finally) complete!



And a new one unlocked!

Music: Jingle - It Can't End Here



We get prompted to save, so I take advantage of the opportunity.

Episode 1 review: Despite some cringeworthy moments and a legal system that doesn't seem to make sense, the game is both charming and fun. (The legal system is a lot closer to that of Japan, despite seeming to take place in the US west coast area, and wow does that look horrifying if you're actually innocent.) Phoenix is actually a relatable main character as a fresh attorney thrown into a murder trial right out of law school in order to defend his best friend. The gameplay conceits, despite not making sense sometimes, actually work to make for an enjoyable experience, and I'm looking forward to more complicated cases later on in the game.

Now I have to sidetrack on some excerpts from that Wikipedia article I linked there:

• Japan has a conviction rate of over 99.8%, even higher than contemporary authoritarian regimes
  
• Those arrested may be held for up to 23 days without trial and prevented from contacting a lawyer or family
  
• Japanese judges can be penalized by a personnel office if they rule in ways the judicial office dislikes, and face biased incentives to convict
  
• The judge conducts the trial and is authorized to question witnesses, independently call for evidence, decide guilt, and pass sentence

That's more of a culture shock to Americans in particular than necessarily bad. Japan also has an incredibly low incarceration rate (37 per 100,000, compared to a staggering 358 per 100,000 in the US), the prosecutors have a lot of discretion to not try cases at all, and an accused that isn't brought to trial has their identity kept secret so they can more easily re-enter society. The Japenese government also only employs 2,000 prosecutors for a population of 125 million (compared to almost 10,000 prosecutors for a population of 330 million in the US), so prosecutors are motivated to only spend their limited time on trials where they are certain of guilt and a conviction.

Anyway, back to the game. One thing I can point out now after the fact: For the main contradiction on which we originally caught out Mr. Sahwit, the time being 1:00 PM (and specifically him hearing it), the witness wasn't actually lying! He was wrong, but that line was the only substantial part of his testimony where he wasn't lying, and the one he was most confident about, and it's what we used to unravel his whole story. That's a well-crafted narrative, and impressive for what's really more of a tutorial episode.

I can also see why these are so hard to LP. That episode took me a half-hour to play through the first time, without exploring any of the extra dialogue. Yet actually posting it all took up 10 updates and more hours of re-recording footage and writing it all up than I'm willing to admit. Luckily I have an efficient workflow I worked out while LP'ing another visual novel, and doing this game blind means I'm still looking forward to experiencing the rest of the game (at least so far). I'll try and keep it up!

Next time, we'll dive into Episode 2!