Though Miles Edgeworth is a primary character in the Phoenix Wright universe, Ace Attorney Investigations is his first time carrying an entire game on his shoulders. I played the first two of five chapters and, so far, found the game to be the next evolution of the franchise rather than a simple spinoff as the Capcom seems to have framed it.

Like Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney, Investigations blends in fan service with an easy entrance point for newcomers. If you’ve never played previous games in the series and were always curious, this is a great place to start. The script drops in any back story fills or character bios you may need, and since it takes place outside of the primary Phoenix Wright trilogy you don’t have to worry about connecting overarching lore points. But the best reason to start here is that several legacy issues with the series have been tweaked with the new zoomed out perspective.

The third-person sprite animations do a great job of showing how characters interact with the environment and each other. Previously, you kind of had to imagine what the characters were doing unless it was purposefully animated (Franziska’s whipping tendencies, for example). This also allows a large group of people to be displayed onscreen at once, so you don’t have to keep track of who’s all at a scene when seven characters are all taking turns jabbering.

The cases so far have all been contained to a relatively small area. This means you won’t be hustling all over town to talk to that one guy who gives you the clue you need to progress. Now it’s more about examining the crime scene, talking to witnesses, and connecting pieces of logic. This new logic data is essentially clues you collect along the way that eventually form a cloud of information. To progress in the investigation, you must fuse two of these pieces together, resulting in a “Eureka!” moment. This provides a nice new dimension to gameplay outside of the traditional testimony pressing and evidence presenting.

The story is just as quirky as ever, including plenty of appearances from old favorite characters like Detective Gumshoe. As usual, the first case is pretty light – a murder in Edgeworth’s office. The second involves a mysterious killing in a jetliner where everyone onboard could be a suspect. On the surface these cases seem like unrelated one-offs, but as the second one winds down it hints toward an overarching plot that could ratchet up the intensity the way fans are accustomed to.

If you can’t wait until the February release date to try it yourself, there’s some good news. Right now you can go to the Investigations website and play a flash demo of the first case. Go check it out and tell me what you think in the comments section.