ST. JOHN'S (CUP) - Available on the Nintendo 3DS eshop, Phoenix Wright: Dual Destinies came to North America late last year. The game marks the fifth main game of the series, and starts off with a literal bang — a bomb goes off in the main courtroom mid-trial. While the beginning may seem intriguing, the end of the game leaves the story feeling incomplete, and audiences feeling ripped off.

For those unfamiliar with the series, Phoenix Wright is an attorney character in a series of adventure/ exploration/logic/novel games for Nintendo. The series follows the bold defense attorney as he takes on strange cases with stranger companions. The game play involved uncovering evidence and mysteries, while the other half of the game is court room battles where you duke it out with the prosecution, using logic and evidence to prove your client innocent — or at the very least, not guilty.

The new game, Dual Destinies, doesn't bode well as an introduction to the series. The game constantly drops references to the past four games, and introduces characters with large build-ups that mean nothing if you haven't played the series.

The game play is a little stronger, however. The new game has removed many of the redundancies of the series, such as searching endlessly in a room for something when it's in another room (once you've fully searched a room, the game pushes you to move on). As well, when you get game over, instead of returning to the beginning of the last save point, you just go back to where you got game over. While at first, this may sound like it made it easier, all you're doing is skipping redundant dialogue that you've already been through that was more of an irritation than anything else. As well, the game play mixes many of the past mechanics — such as Apollo Justice's wrist band lie detection, and Phoenix Wright's psyche-lock breaker — and introduces new ones, like a psychology profiler, which detects when emotions don't match particular statements.

As for the story, the game features five main trials (and an extra one, available on the e-shop). The game has the longest story to date. The beginning cases are well done, building up the story line and leaves players with a lot of intrigue. However, after building up the ending right from the very beginning, the end result is anticlimatic and will leave audiences feeling like the writers copped out on a much better — and realistic — ending.

If you're a fan of Phoenix Wright, then I would play this game just to keep up on the storyline. Further more, the game play is well-done. However, if you're looking to start playing the series, this title is not for you.