Phoenix Wright returns in 'Ace Attorney 5,' 'Prof. Layton vs. Ace Attorney' potentially out by year's end

Capcom has not talked very much about the Ace Attorney after the second Miles Edgeworth-starring spinoff hit the DS early last year (and never got released in English).

Capcom has not talked very much about Ace Attorney after the second Miles Edgeworth-starring spinoff hit the DS early last year (and never got released in English). That's reportedly all changed with this week's issue of Famitsu magazine in Japan, which offers tidbits on two titles that series fans have been dying to hear more on for months now.

The main new reveal in the new Famitsu is for the fifth game in the main Ace Attorney series (called Gyakuten Saiban 5 in Japanese). The Nintendo 3DS title will make the return of Phoenix Wright to the starring role; he's apparently decided to return to his original lawyering duties after Apollo Justice played the lead character in the last game. Phoenix's partner this time around is new, though, a girl in yellow dress that the preview doesn't reveal much of anything about at this point in time.

There's no release date announced for the new Ace Attorney yet, although presumably Capcom will have a lot more to say about the title at the Tokyo Game Show in a couple of weeks.

This week's Famitsu also hints at the release date of Professor Layton vs. Ace Attorney, a Capcom/Level-5 crossover title for the 3DS that both companies first announced in October of 2010. There's an ad for the game in the inside front cover of the issue that offers a puzzle for the reader to solve, the solution coming in next week's edition. The puzzle: a set of four LED digits reading "6211". Layton, in the ad, hints at "turning it about" (a key term from the Ace Attorney series) -- which, if you do that to the number given, produces "1129". This has led Japanese games to conclude that a 11/29 (November 29) release date is in the works for the title. Is it? That confirmation will probably come in a few more days.