Dev says Ace Attorney turned into a successful franchise thanks to Capcom sticking with it after the first game’s “failure”

Not every new franchise is a hit out of the gate, and that’s exactly what happened with Capcom’s renowned Ace Attorney series.

Bandai Namco producer Taira Nakamura was reflecting on how difficult it is to make new IPs these days in light of increased development costs. Some franchises tend gain more popularity over time, but companies can be quick to move on to the next thing if it’s not an immediate hit.

Nakamura’s comments were noticed by Masakazu Sugimori, who was previously at Capcom. Aside from working on soundtracks for two of the Ace Attorney games, he was also the voice of voiced Manfred von Karma. Sugimori spoke about how Ace Attorney could have been viewed as a “failure” following the first title, but Capcom stuck with it.

Resident Evil and Devil May Cry were selling over one million copies in their first weeks on the market. However, for Ace Attorney on the Game Boy Advance, it was somewhere around 70,000 – 80,000 copies. Capcom may have looked down on the game’s sales at the time, but creator Shu Takumi continued to work on the series and it saw a continued rise in popularity. The franchise eventually went on to receive an anime, stage play, and more. Sugimori believes Capcom “nurtured” the Ace Attorney IP to make it into the success it is today.

The entire Ace Attorney series is now available on Nintendo Switch with various collections.