case by case apocrypha: of the devil episode 1, pt. 2
Hello again, beloved readers, and welcome back once again to Case by Case Apocrypha, the ongoing series in which we play through games that are similar to Ace Attorney games in some respect! Last week we played through the first part of Episode One of of the Devil; it logically follows that this week will be the second part. And it's true! Spoilers below.
Since I arbitrarily picked a point that seemed like a good stopping point last time (in fairness, it was a very clean break), it's not surprising that the second part is shorter than the first part by a couple hours. It makes sense; the clean break was, y'know, going into the climax. A chance to breathe before the final. Climaxes are not meant to be as long as the rest of the story. I'm not complaining, but it does mean there is somewhat less to say.
We went into this segment without a definitive suspect, and with the express goal of finding one, because nothing less would be able to exonerate Robo-Maya of the crime of doing a murder. (This works because she's not legally a person, so she doesn't have rights like "presumed innocence", which matter in this fictional world.) There weren't a lot of options: we had Ashur's ex-lover, his colleague-turned-superior in the corporation, and his assistant; of the three, only the colleague really made sense, but her alibi seemed ironclad, based on our understanding of the case.
Naturally, we seamlessly change our understanding of the case. So one of the main details of this case is that the thing that killed David Ashur was an unknown poison; here in our final investigations, we finally learn what the compound is (it's the synthetic neurotransmitter they use in the new organic androids). We know that his colleague, Dr. Hellen Jung (now his superior in the corporation despite him being more famous and valuable), helped design that compound, which seems to point the finger at her, but we still don't have the mechanism for the murder.
Then, at the trial, she dramatically drinks a vial of the substance in attempt to prove that it's not lethal, and in a classic petard-hoist we are able to deduce that the neurotransmitter has some potentially lethal interactions with alcohol. So the poisoning happened outside of the locked room; suddenly her alibi effectively does not exist.
What follows are some brilliant character moments, from Morgan, from Dr. Jung, from Serra. Dr. Jung, as it turns out, is not doing your standard corporate maneuvering, but rather discovered that David was working on AI (which are, again, extremely illegal) and concluded that he was effectively creating a slave race and resented that in so doing he was, in effect, making her into a slaver. We contrast her cynical worldview here--that of course as soon as some new form of sapience is created people will exploit it--with Serra's: if people were really as fundamentally awful as all that, humanity would have died on the vine a long time ago.
I love that. Humans are absolutely capable of terrible things (see also the state of the world as of the time this is posted), but we're also capable of so many amazing things. It is fundamentally a mistake to assume that we're monstrous by nature. We are so much more than that.
Anyway, this game rules; I'll be picking up Episode 2 and starting that next Monday. Are you excited? I know I'm excited. I'm guessing I won't finish that case on Monday; we'll find out together whether that means I'll be posting a partial summary or just putting off the final post. I'm also excited for that.
Thank you, as ever, for reading. I'll see you soon.