Bracelet

Apollo Justice's bracelet.

Apollo Justice's bracelet is an important object in Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney and Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: Dual Destinies that is used by Justice to "perceive" subtle hints of tension in a witness. It is among the many items that Phineas Filch tries to steal over the course of The Monstrous Turnabout.

Usage

When Apollo Justice talks to people, they sometimes display subtle twitches or other habits while they are talking. Once this happens, Justice can "sense" that it has occurred with the help of his bracelet. The bracelet is represented by an icon in the top center of the touchscreen of the Nintendo DS or 3DS, and it can be activated by touching it (or with the "X" button).

In Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney, this icon only appears during cross-examinations. If Justice has sensed a nervous habit during the testimony, the bracelet slowly spins at the top of the screen, and Justice must pinpoint a point in the testimony to focus on. Otherwise, it appears gray and does not spin. In Dual Destinies, the icon is instead only used in "Talk" menus during investigation acts. If Justice has sensed a tell during a conversation, the conversation topic in question becomes "locked" with an eye symbol and the bracelet icon appears. There is also a special instance of using the bracelet in Turnabout for Tomorrow, where it is used during a trial, but not during a cross-examination.

When Justice focuses, he is able to watch the witness very closely and in slow motion as he or she goes through the statement or statements in question. Once the tell is found, the player can press the "Perceive" button that is located where the bracelet icon was (or press "X" twice), causing Justice to yell, "Gotcha!" From there, Justice must deduce the meaning of the habit, based on its nature and the specific part in the testimony in which the habit occurred, by presenting a piece of evidence from the court record. In Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney, although no penalty is incurred from incorrect perceiving, presenting irrelevant corroborating evidence does result in a penalty.

Despite being introduced in Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney, use of the bracelet does not strictly require any inputs that would be impossible on the Game Boy Advance.

How it works

Justice using the bracelet to look for Myriam Scuttlebutt's tell.

In-game, the bracelet is made of a special alloy that changes in size in response to body heat. This allows the bracelet to fit perfectly around the wearer's arm. When the wearer senses a nervous habit, the wearer becomes slightly tense as well, and this causes very small muscle contractions that he or she would not normally notice. However, since the bracelet is always a perfect fit, the wearer can feel it "tightening" slightly when he or she becomes tense. Only Magnifi Gramarye and his descendants are known to be able to focus on nervous habits, so the bracelet would likely not work in this manner for other people.

Perceiving requires great focus, and Justice cannot perceive if something breaks his concentration; Simon Blackquill was able to break Justice's concentration by setting his hawk Taka on Justice and prevent him from using his power, which Blackquill himself considered cheating. Justice also appears to need both eyes to perceive, as he at one point covered one eye with a bandage in order to suppress his ability.

It is possible to learn to sense a nervous habit without the use of a bracelet if the person knows when to focus. This was how Trucy Wright was able to help Phoenix Wright win his poker games.

Known bracelets

Only two bracelets are known to have existed in the Ace Attorney universe; Thalassa Gramarye previously owned both of them, but one was passed on to Apollo Justice a year after he was born.

See also

• List of episode-specific game mechanics