holy ♥♥♥♥ yes. For me, it captured the nostalgia of ace attorney and made it it's own thing. WHERE IS THE SECOND GAME DEVELOPERS. I SAW A TO BE CONTINUED DEVELOPERS. I WILL THROW MY MONEY AT YOU DEVELOPERS.

마법 세계에서조차 야드파운드법이 쓰이다니ㅠㅠㅠㅠ

This game... Where do I begin?

I have never felt so strongly about an indie game before as to call it a masterpiece despite its flaws, but Tyrion Cuthbert delivers an experience that is just so unified with itself that to give it any less praise would be a disservice. The only other game I can say feels 100% unified like this is Persona 4, so this is not a compliment I give out for free. The characters, the music, the gameplay, the individual cases, the story... All of it feels like one unit, its core themes influencing everything it is, as good writing and direction should entail. An experience so great that I waited for the Steam Winter Sale to end so I could buy the soundtrack at full price just to support them!


Tyrion Cuthbert is a very continuity-centric experience. Each of its cases are related to another by various common threads, all culminating in the final act where every question related to the main narrative is answered. Along the way are many teases, and a very palpable, lingering aspect that haunts every case in subtle ways. You play as the titular Tyrion, a defense attorney who undergoes a lot of self-development throughout the game. Together with his newly met bodyguard and assistant Celeste, they face murders and trials that eventually begin to challenge even the common knowledge and history they know about their own world...

Tyrion is an excellent protagonist. He isn't a self-insert, but he's not so eccentric as to be unrelatable. His growth is something many people can relate to, and the personal issues he faces often stare us in the face too because we stagnate as people. Tyrion is growing and changing between each case, his experience and confidence grow with each story beat, and this is helped along by Celeste. This is how you make a relatable protagonist without cheap tricks that lose their edge quickly. Celeste fulfills her role as an assistant and major character in the story, but she does so much more than that. A budding romance between the two grows along with them, forming more naturally than I can even believe exists in modern game story-telling. It never feels forced, and always develops as a result of the characters dealing with their issues and emotional conflicts. It's not that the author wants them to be together, they were always going to end up falling in love with each other because of who they are as people, and that is god-like character writing. Without any involvement or influence from outside its own story, this piece of art would always end up playing out on its own. If it were a real event, these two would form the same relationship because that's logically and emotionally what would happen.

But none of that would feel as impactful and real if there weren't an opposing force trying to crush it out of existence. The main threat lurks in the shadows in every case, slowly lining things up so that it can thoroughly break every positive ideal that Tyrion and Celeste stand for. A vile antagonist that manages to depict evil in such a nuanced way while being glaringly literal in how they act. A gut feeling tells you in every case since their introduction that they are an extremely evil creature that cannot be trusted, and you work through the lies in each case with this individual at the back of your mind. The final battle between them and Tyrion is nothing short of beautiful writing and growth in service of an incredible pay-off. Nothing feels like filler, nothing wastes your time, and every moment is important in building the world, feel, and intention of the game to deliver its core themes.

The dialogue in TC is more real and grounded than AA could ever hope to be, because the tone of TC is never focused on being comedic, but instead hones in on telling a dense story of resolve and growth from the start. The characters you meet may have some comedic moments, but every one of them feel like real people with real troubles, emotions, and lives. AA is amazing for its over-the-top mysteries, incredible presentation and legacy of showing how to turn your thinking around to find the truth, but TC takes it a step in a different direction. TC doesn't directly challenge AA by doing the same things, it begins and ends with its own flair: "What if Ace Attorney was about resolve and bonds instead of just uncovering the truth?" Finding the truth is a strong theme, but the reasons we seek the truth are just as important, which is a facet that AA has never wholly focused on. Each case in AA feels separate in the reasoning you find out the truth, even every final case feels different from how each game's respective first case begins. Because TC is one unified story with a plot that never stops being progressed towards, it always feels exciting, every line of dialogue feels gripping to read, and does what it sells itself on doing without any fluff or stalling: telling a damn good story from start to finish, with you uncovering the mystery along with Tyrion.


I consider the soundtrack to be more important in this type of game than most genres, if nothing else than the fact that your brain isn't processing as much activity as other games. Visual novels and most RPGs benefit greatly from having a closely-intertwined narrative and soundtrack. As anyone who's played AA can tell you, the music carries alot of momentum in the courtroom. Cornered is a track that many who haven't even played an AA game can recognize and praise for its energy and "gotcha" type feel.

Now what if I told you that TC has no bad song? That almost every track is just as gripping and impactful as Cornered is in AA? Of course, you have moments where the Cornered-like theme (Attack of Opportunity) plays and makes revelations thrilling and exciting, and of course, the objection theme (Eye of Horus) carries a beautiful melody representing Tyrion, but even the title screen music is used in other places within the game the great effect. Character themes feel carefully crafted to ellicit specific emotions when hearing them, enhancing every scene no matter the track. Although I'm not as experienced in music as I am in writing, I can point to the fact that both the melody of Tyrion's objection theme and Celeste's theme are used as leitmotifs for the final battle theme, something that can only be done through careful planning and direction of the music. In fact, Stephen Charles, the creator of the game's idea himself, directed the music and programming for the game, and wrote all of it himself with only a consultant. I believe the unity of narrative themes achieved by Tyrion Cuthbert is a result of his efforts to make sure that everything meshed together the way he thought of it in his mind.

So, in an unlikely position to finish this review, I applaud Stephen Charles and everyone who worked on the game to help this vision become reality. Thanks to their efforts, we now have one of the best logical deduction games in existence to date. I cannot overstate the miraculous achievement this game is, how much of a masterpiece it turned out to be, and how much it has inspired me to work on something of my own. This game gave me hope that I had lost a long time ago, and for that, I can't even begin to express how happy and warm I feel inside every time I listen to the soundtrack and remember the powerful moments contained within this game. I patiently await the coming sequels and other projects Diamondhenge are working on, and will look for any opportunity to support them. They've earned my unconditional trust after producing such an amazing experience.

Be it man, king, or god, nothing will stop me from expressing my love for this game or my passion to create, which has been reinvigorated by it. No game has ever impacted me in such a crucial way as Tyrion Cuthbert: Attorney of the Arcane, and dare I say it... it's even better than Ace Attorney.


Tyrion Cuthbert has given me the resolve to realize my goals... So says the Word of Horus.