professorlaytonparallels-blog

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‘Sometimes it feels like the side that I’m on 

Plays the toughest hand, holds the longest stand...’

- I’m not your hero - Tegan and Sara

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“I am not the means to any end others may wish to accomplish.”

- Ayn Rand

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“I’m sorry, you’re my...?”

“Assistant! You do know what an assistant is, don’t you?”

(Special thanks to @detective-kat who suggested I should try using canva for my posts!)

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Luke: Professor, quick! You have to pretend to be my dad! *Pushes phone into Layton’s hands.*

Layton, on the phone: Hello, yes, this is Luke’s father. The children are playing swords...sorry, playing with swords. They're bleeding. Oh, no. They're dead. Don't call again. *hangs up*

Luke and Flora: ....

Layton: I panicked.

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“I used my illness as an excuse...”

“...To close myself off from the world. I see that now.”

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“A shaggy-dog story!”

“How wasn’t that just a shaggy-dog story?”

...This just in, Sherl killed pig. Also, Lucy’s always is good with dogs. I can’t wait to see her interact with Sherl... or put him behind bars -

My mistake, looks like Keelan Makepeace, the man behind the Jigsaw Puzzle Killings, was the dog. 

Still, isn’t it interesting how the final cases of both Mystery Room and Layton’s Mystery Journey end in a castle...?

More on this to come  

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Espella’s voice...

Fun Fact: Espella’s voice actor, Joanna Ruiz, voiced characters in LazyTown - Pixel & Trixie. (According to Wikipedia, the most reliable source on the planet.) Also - Casper the friendly ghost, characters from Clifford the Big Red Dog, Fireman Sam, and Wakfu: The Animated Series. These are all TV shows primarily aimed at younger audiences, often lighthearted and humorous. 

She’s not the first PL voice actor to star in children’s media. Luke’s British VA (Maria Darling) was in Roary the Racing Car and Bob the Builder, believe it or not. Maria Darling made her debut as Luke in Curious Village...aaand she wasn’t brilliant. (Neither was Layton’s voice.) 

“Why not? What are you hiding?”< Was that meant to sound intimidating, or curious? Why are you so angry at this random girl, Luke? 

By the time Lost Future rolled around, however, Darling struck a good balance of sounding serious and comedic. And those crying scenes, man... (When Luke cries, we all cry.) So, surely if Maria Darling can make the jump from cute T.V. show to a dramatic mystery game, then so can Joanna Ruiz. I have no idea if she’s had any other video game voicing experience - so please feel free to enlighten me!

One might even expect a more mature performance from Ruiz, since PLvsAA is rated 12+ and Espella is one of the most tragic characters in the series. She has to be 17 years old (at tops) and spent her life believing she was responsible for destroying her hometown in a fire. This left her with an unbelievable mental trauma, so much that she often entered a trance-like state. When she finally remembers what she perceives to be her crimes, she throws herself from the bell tower. That’s dark. 

Espella’s voice ranges from an often shrill tone to monotonous when she falls into her trance-like state. Her best line reads, I think, take place at the end of Chapter 4 - The Golden Court, when she ‘admits’ to being Bezella and recites Labyrinthia’s (*cough* bullsh*t) logic for ending the witch trials. 

“Since you’re all so keen on the rules created by the Storyteller, you should know exactly what I mean. The stipulation for ending the witch trials: “Once the great witch Bezella is burned, the witch trials will end. At present, I am under suspicion. You know very well why that is, don’t you?”

She sounds so sophisticated and respectable here, as you’d expect the Storyteller’s daughter to be. She knows what her penalty will be - She knows how unjust the court is! - but she’s doing it to save the lives of every other young girl accused of witchcraft in Labyrinthia. (There. I’ve given her some credit.) Then... the moment ends and her whiny voice is back, “I am guilty... Now cast me into the flames!” (Barnham’s reactions are priceless.)

Why does she usually have such a shill, childish voice, when Joanna Ruiz could clearly step it up like during that Golden Court scene? The only reasons I can imagine is that they wanted to emphasise how fragile/insecure/unsettled Espella could be. Also, maybe they wanted to set Espella apart from Eve, the ice queen? 

I’d argue Joanna Ruiz is very overshadowed by Darklaw’s VA, Jo Wyatt. (Who also voiced Aurora - who serves a very similar role to Espella!) For one thing, they didn’t use the same voice actor for younger Eve, like they did with Epsella. That’s only going to highlight how childish Espella sounds, making it harder to separate her from her younger self. Yes, you could argue they did that on purpose, since older Espella is unable to let go of that tragic event from her past. But Eve has the same problem and that doesn’t stop her from sounding like a young adult. Sure, Eve as a character isn’t as open as Espella, but finally hearing the humanity in her voice in the epilogue, when we’ve spent most of the game being suspicious of her, is much more moving than listening to Espella’s shrill voice throughout the rest of the game - at least in my opinion!

Though, I will say in that scene on the bell tower, both voice actors do an amazing job. In fairness to Espella, I’d be shrieking too if I was hanging from that height. And she even has that quiet, beautiful line about Eve keeping her pendant.

I sill think they make a cuter couple than Eve and Barnham 

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“You are worth fighting for...”

“You know we’ve all got battle scars.”

- Paradise Fears - Battle Scars

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“If you ever come back”

“...There’ll be a smile on my face and the kettle on

And it will be just like you were never gone

There’ll be a light in the hall and a key under the mat...”

The Script - If You Ever Come Back

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Design Trivia from The World of PL! (Bill Hawks and Clive)

‘I made sure to give that “Professor Layton” series flavour while maintaining a certain level of realism. As a result, Hawks is not one of the more interesting or silly characters, but he definitely looks like he could be based on someone from the real world.’ - Nagano

To this day, I still have never met someone in real life with Carl Fredricksen’s cube-shaped face...

Carl from Pixar’s Up is one of my all-time favourite movie characters. Why? Because he’s a cranky old curmudgeon who flies off in a balloon house. He’s about as square as they come, but he has such a well-rounded personality. He becomes bitter after his beloved Ellie dies, but moves on and becomes a better person despite this. And he’s hilarious. 

I love how Pixar can take human characters and make them look so... cartoony? (Incredibles, Up, Ratatouille etc.) They’re a lot like Level 5 in that respect. There are some exceptions, like during Toy Story 3 and Inside Out, where the humans are meant to appear less zany than Andy’s Toys or Riley’s emotions. 

Bill Hawks is a Level 5 character that’s meant to look more ‘realistic’, which makes sense, given that he’s a politician. But unlike Andy or Riley, we’re not meant to care about him one bit. Okay, so are we meant to see him as a threat, like the rotoscoped humans in WALL-E? In a way that warns us of what mankind could become? No..?

I love how Nagano outright admits that Bill wasn’t meant to be an interesting character. You’re probably rolling your eyes and asking, Why does it even matter? It doesn’t even matter in the grand scheme of the game. Bill Hawks isn’t the final villain we have to save London from. That’s Clive.   

As far as PL villains go, Clive doesn’t have a very... extravagant design either. He doesn’t get a feather boa and cape like Descole. He doesn’t have Don Paolo’s ridiculous nose. Bronev’s hair is much spikier. Even Randall has his Masked Gentleman disguise! Clive, however, has something Bill Hawks doesn’t have.

A pretty face. 

...Plus, a backstory, interesting motives, and a cunning mind. Honestly, though, making Future Luke ‘handsome’ is something Nagano emphasises when talking about his design. I think Future Luke’s design, though a facade, is much more interesting than Clive’s design. I know all he did was take off his cap, but it’s the thought he put into the Future Luke getup that made it so interesting. It was fun comparing older Luke to his younger counterpart - how could happy-go-lucky Luke become so serious in ten years? What did Future Layton do to turn Luke against him? Of course, those question can’t truly be answered, because Future Luke is a fake.

Clive may not look as flashy as the other villains, but he certainly has the evil laugh, the tendency to cause wanton destruction, and the sad backstory. Guess to doesn’t get a sad backstory?

That’s the one thing that probably sets Bill apart in the PL universe, and I guess, makes him more ‘realistic’. As far as we’re told, he just went ahead with the time machine experiment for money. He isn’t left scarred or amnesiac from the accident. He just... oh, goes on to become Prime Minister. A scientist, working in a lab above an apartment block, goes on to become Prime Minister in ten years. I know he became stinking rich, but HOW did that happen?!

We never find out, which really doesn’t matter amidst the overwhelming feels fest that is Lost Future. Bill’s just an *sshole, and sometimes life gives you *ssholes. They don’t even need a reason for being *ssholes. It really hammers home how bleak the ending of the third game is. All we get is that line from Chelmey about criminals not being the only ones who are blind. 

(Once again, I hope this post hasn’t been overly critical of Nagano’s designs. Many of these are his designs, so he can do what he likes at the end of the day, and we should respect his creative choices. But at the same time, there’s nothing wrong with discussing these designs or hoping for more diversity in the Layton series.)

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Ernest Greeves and Hippolyte de Courtène from the French TV series "Profiling"/"Profilage" please? :) They are both very cute and 'adorkable' and have curly dark hair and dark eyes

Sorry for the late response!

Holy crud. I think we just found a live-action Ernest. And the fact that he’s French is even more awesome. 

Also... Profiling? Like that thing Emilianna does? It fits so well!

Now I’m going to watch this new series I heard about…

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Design Trivia from The World of PL! (Arianna)

Last time we looked at Emmy... and now, we have more Spectre’s Call characters! Let’s start with Arianna, since most of the plot of the fourth game revolves around her...

Going back to ‘balance proportions’, Nagano comments that Arianna has ‘the same physical balance as Luke, as they are supposed to be around the same age’. Though she dresses quite formally, I think it’s much easier to guess Arianna’s age (she must be at least 12 or under) at first glance than say, Flora’s.

Terrible quality is terrible

I’m not sure why I feel this way, since there are a lot of similarities between them. Both wear ribbons, both are petite and both can have quite whiny voices (granted, they have a lot to whine about). Maybe it boils down to their interactions during scenes with other characters. Arianna spends several scenes with Luke, looking at the stars, mourning for her father, letting go of her pain and saying goodbye to Luke. Based on her bond and conversations with him, we can garner they’re roughly the same age. Also, we see so much emotion from Arianna during those scenes - grief, rage, joy and acceptance. She tries to keep her feelings bottled up when Layton and Co first meet her, but that’s no easy task for a grieving adult, let alone a child. 

Flora shares several sweet, sibling-like interactions with Luke during Pandora’s Box and Lost Future... but they all appear outside of cutscenes. You very rarely hear any voiced conversations between them, which really is a shame. Arianna spent more on-screen time with Luke in one game than Flora did in a whole trilogy. Yes, Arianna likely had feelings for Luke, so of course they wanted to focus on that connection between them. But Flora didn’t even share a goodbye-scene with Luke at the end of Lost Future. 

ANYWAY, Arianna and Luke’s shared ‘physical balance’ is obvious from their similar colour pallet. Luke mainly wears light blue and white. Arianna mainly wears dark blue and white. A perfect contrast for the ‘oracle’ and the ‘witch’. The two of them are also small, which Luke points out when they’re stargazing. Two little kids vs. the world.  

I said this in a previous post, but Arianna’s eyes are also interesting as ‘they play an important role in her many facial expressions’. Arianna was the moodiest characters in the games, after Lady Dahlia (but even she didn’t get many cutscenes). That’s not even a complaint! Holy crud, a female PL character who speaks her mind, has outbursts and isn’t refined to a corner looking cute! That’s how KIDS ACT! Between Emmy and Arianna, Spectre’s Call was the first game to give us two girls who truly felt dynamic. 

Perhaps that isn’t a fair thing to say to the previous characters... Both Flora (during CV), Katia and Claire had more mystery surrounding them. Katia is described as being ‘reserved’, and for good reason. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it means we don’t see much of her true colours until the final chapter of Pandora’s Box. A lot of emotions were probably going through Claire’s head, but due to her role in Lost Future, she isn’t allowed to reveal her true self until the end of the game. All the memories Layton has of her are from happy times. The most angry she ever looks is when she bursts in to stop/save Clive. She knows there’s no point in shouting at Bill Hawks, because it won’t change her fate. She even restrains herself when she says goodbye to Hershel, only tearing up slightly and turning around a corner when she finally disappears.   

Arianna’s character is shrouded in mystery too. We see both Luke’s memories of her and scenes taking place during the game. It’s hard not to feel something for her after watching her weep over her father’s dead body.

Am I suggesting we should’ve seen Flora crying over her father’s deathbed? Um... no.... but some more scenes between her and Layton, or her and Luke would’ve been nice. More scenes of actual human emotion, maybe? 

Again, saying goodbye to a boy she probably regards as a little brother?  

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Creating characters and forgetting to give them a name or their own purpose

Accurate representation of Level 5.

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How about Flora and Violet Baudelaire from A Series Of Unfortunate Events?

“The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious.”

-Violet Baudelaire, The Invincible and Imitable Inventor 

Dangit, now I want a PL/Series of Unfortunate Events AU. Flora is obviously Violet, Luke is Klaus and Sunny can be… baby Alfendi? Don Paolo can be Count Olaf.

Also, THIS is one of the many directions Level 5 could’ve taken their first trilogy “”heroine”” in. Orphan girl becomes an invincible inventor.  

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“All my life...”

“...I’ve tried to make everybody happy while I

Just hurt and hide

Waiting for someone to tell me

It’s my turn to decide.”

- King of Anything - Sara Bareilles 

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Bouncy Lukes jumping on couches

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I love Emilianna’s expressions.

...They both work for the police and have a rocky relationship with the main character (to start with). Also, so much snark.