Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective is one of the finest pieces of gaming that has ever been created.
OK, that's about all the bad I had to say about it. So let's talk about it.
The primary premise of Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective is that you're dead. Not only are dead, though; you come back as a ghost with no memory whatsoever. And that's a problem, because you'd sure like to remember things... such as, well, how and why you died. Thus embarks Sissel - that's your name, as you find out soon enough - on his quest to solve his own murder.
Of course, although that's really all that Sissel wants to do, nothing in life is that easy. In order to solve your own murder, you're gonna need the help of several other people you'll meet along the way, and they're not going to help you for free. Of course, they're also not going to help you at *all* if they don't even know you're there, since you're, well, a ghost, and those tend to be hard to see. To that end, there are essentially three main gameplay mechanics to be found without Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective.
The first is motion. You're a disembodied spirit, so in order to exist in the physical world you need to inhabit something. As it turns out, human bodies are out, which leaves only inanimate objects. Every object that you can possess has a "core", visible in the ghost world (a realm on top of the human world where time is stopped). You can stretch yourself out a limited distance from your current position, and if you can reach another core within that distance, you can move to it and change position.
The second is the manipulation of inanimate objects. Many objects you can inhabit serve a distinct function, and once you're inside it and back in the human world, you can operate it. This might involve opening a door, unfurling an umbrella, rolling a cart, or any number of other things. You can't directly interact with the environment in any way, so if you want to help someone, get someone's attention, or otherwise impact the real world in any way, you're going to have to do it like this.
The third is the reversal of someone's death. Any time you find a dead body that's been dead for less than 24 hours, you can link to that body and rewind time back to four minutes before that person's death. Once there, you can watch their death play out, and then, once you understand what's happened, attempt to find a way to interact with your surroundings to avert the death. These sequences often require good timing, but you can replay them as often as you'd like, and if you alter someone's fate along the way, that serves as a checkpoint so you don't have to start *all* the way back at the beginning. Once you succeed in saving the person from death, they nonetheless retain the memory of the death and of what you did, and as such, from that moment on that person recognizes who you are and becomes something of an ally.
There's also a fourth that comes along eventually, but to tell you what it is would be spoiling the game - so I won't do so.
And that's about it, really. So, does this mean that the game is pretty simple? Well, not really. Just about every game has simple *mechanics* behind it; it's in the application of those mechanics that it shines. Despite there being a ton of scenarios in this game, it never began to feel like it was getting old. Somehow, the writers kept thinking of new sequences of events required for solving a puzzle - one time you might need to be in a piece of paper that gets carried across a room on a breeze in order to transport yourself to where you need to go, while another time you might need to pop open an umbrella to get it out of a tree. A lot of what you do also has to do with getting the attention of or affecting the fate of humans, which adds another layer of complexity to the sequences of events you need to go through, as well.
The gameplay by itself isn't really the reason why I enjoyed this game so much, though. The real reason to play this game are to see two particular elements in it: the story and the characters.
The story in this game is - well, let's just say that the fact is evident that the guy responsible for the Ace Attorney series is also responsible for this game. It's very, very complex - it set up mystery after mystery and resolved them in even more bizarre ways than I had hypothesized in my head - and is nothing short of excellent. It's no secret that I get emotionally engaged with and attached to games pretty easily, but this game was something different. I'll often get a little misty or shed a tear during an emotional moment, but the last time I started sobbing uncontrollably was when I watched the movie "Reign Over Me" back in 2007. I can now say that that dry spell has finally been broken, because a particular point in this game caused me to completely break down emotionally once again and start sobbing again. Yes, I'm a 25-year-old man, and I completely bawled my eyes out at a handheld game I was playing. Probably says something about either me or the game. I'll leave it to the reader to determine which of the two it is.
The fantastic story is greatly buoyed, as well, by fantastic characters. Much as in Ace Attorney, the main character, Sissel, is probably the most boring character in the cast - and he's not boring at all, mind you. The varied character roster includes Lynne, the red-headed girl Sissel first saves from death (and becomes quite acquainted with the process...); Inspector Cabanela, a rather peculiar police officer clad in white who cannot move without being ridiculously flamboyant; Ray, who manages to have character even though he's... a desk lamp; and - the one who in my opinion stole the whole show - Missile, a Pomeranian who is quite possibly the most adorable and lovable character ever, yet who fails to be boring or cliche at the same time. It's worth picking up the game just to watch the dynamics between the incredibly awesome characters therein, really. Even a simple security guard who is only seen in a couple scenes has his unique quirks, such as a propensity to do an interpretive dance in order to express anything and everything.
The graphics in the game definitely contribute to the experience in a very meaningful way, too, and specifically the character models. The animation in this game reminds me a lot of the old Prince of Persia games in terms of how incredibly fluid and enjoyable to watch it is. Every twitch or tug of an extremity is carefully animated with a meticulosity that is just incredible, and makes the game just fun to even watch.
Finally, the soundtrack in the game definitely isn't quite as much of a standout feature as the rest of it, but it most certainly get the job done, and I've found myself looking up tracks from it after the fact to listen to them again and again - so it certainly must have something going for it!
All in all, Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective is a rather strong reminder that, even though the sun will very soon set on the Nintendo DS as it gives way for the 3DS, it most certainly is not yet dead and buried. Everyone who owns a DS and who likes Ace Attorney, who thinks this game's premise sounds interesting, or who just in general likes puzzle mystery games owes it to themselves to pick it up. This is a gem that absolutely should not be missed.