I played Professor Layton and the Azran Legacy

[Finished November 24th, 2023. Rating: 5/10]

You know what’s hard? Finding a sense of identity. All throughout life, people struggle to come up with a defining sense of what makes them themselves — both in terms of how they view themselves, and how others view them. That struggle to reconcile ourselves leads us places that are bizarre, grandiose, and emotionally transformative; such journeys can end in a deeply renewed sense of satisfaction, or a harrowing feeling of loss and tragedy.

Professor Layton is a funny puzzle game series for the DS and 3DS.

I don’t think Azran Legacy is the deepest game in the world, unlike what that opening might’ve implied if it wasn’t preceded by a 5/10 rating, but it’s definitely the one that I think had the most potential. It brings up several powerful questions begging for exploration and a clear underlying theme behind them, yet it never feels as though it manages to take them all the way, instead staying mostly content with the bare minimum to be satisfying. Nonetheless, these qualities being there at all easily put it above most of the other entries.

The game opens on the titular Professor Layton visiting a snow-covered town, having been told of a ‘living mummy’ encased in an icy cave on the town’s outskirts. It’s not long after he finds her, though, that he and his companions are pursued by Targent, a terrorist organization comprised entirely of gentleman archaeologists who will stop at nothing to use the dark secrets of ancient civilizations for their own gain. I hope I don’t need to convey how completely insane this is. The first few entries are literally just quaint little tales of Layton and Luke poking around in slightly strange locales; within the first 20 minutes, Azran Legacy decides to feature an action-packed airship chase sequence complete with the main characters having missiles fired at them. It’s a huge departure from what the series used to be, even if it was built up to all throughout the prequel trilogy. But the way AL addresses this departure is also one of the most fascinating things about it.

It’s certainly not a coincidence that Targent is a terrorist group comprised specifically of archaeologist gentlemen — the (seemingly arbitrary) pair of traits iconically associated with Layton as a character. The plot of the game going forwards relates to them chasing the party throughout five locations across the world, each containing their own quaint and curious tales revolving around fabled archaeological finds, as they discuss these adventures in inflated and dehumanizing ways that perfectly mirror the increasingly bombastic and conspiratorial scope of the prequels. It seems clear to me that Targent is, narratively, about obsessing over The Plot Of Professor Layton Games. But to what end? I found the answer in Rook and Bishop, two stock henchmen paralleled to Layton and Luke (explicitly shown as such in the game’s credits!) whose dynamic is one of the main throughlines of AL’s globe-trotting escapades. In each mini-story, various scenes are dedicated to their banter, in which Bishop longs to impress their boss by performing The Plot while Rook longs for emotional fulfillment and a connection with his partner. In these moments, I saw the game arguing with itself over its own existence: ‘What good is broadly appealing action to shock and awe when there’s no genuine heart in the story being told?’ it asks. This is one of the aspects that I wish was more fleshed-out in its exploration, but it’s nonetheless really bold for a Layton game and a choice that works surprisingly well with the overall themes.

However, the true star of the show waits patiently to be revealed until the final act. In complete defiance of how substanceless I felt he was for the past two entries, Jean Descole absolutely steals the spotlight in this game and becomes both its finest quality and the crowning achievement of Layton series character writing. It’s hard for me to properly address his role without getting into spoilers, but it feels like his story was always intended to culminate this way, with Azran Legacy doing a phenomenal job unveiling his motives and personality in a way that recontextualizes his every prior appearance. It’s fitting that the villain with such an obvious flair for the dramatic would be the most closely tied to the game’s discussion of identity, and the best part is the way he owns it. Descole plays a far more active and developed role in the story than any of the series’ other characters to the point where it essentially feels like a game about him. I’m trying to be as vague as possible, but the way he struggles with his desires to fit his life into a continuous narrative and his contrasting inability to reconcile his various senses of self feels far too multifaceted for a Layton game. It’s seriously a miracle that he exists.

Azran Legacy does its best to tie these ideas together into a general theme of learning from the past and synthesizing one’s experiences to push forwards into the future with a full understanding of their history. It’s a little wonky, though. I’m not sold on how the game haphazardly tries to actually address the ramifications of interpreting history at the last minute after spending so long using archaeology as a vehicle for The Plot; I think it’s easily the aspect that would have most benefited from further development, and I mostly just appreciate it for what it adds to the previously mentioned two main appeals. Amusingly, I think this appeal comes through way better in Hoogland, one of the game’s five mini-story areas with a bizarrely compelling subplot about a long held village-wide cult mentality. It’s a great piece of the themes in theory, but the game never seems to build off of it elsewhere in the main story and leaves one of its most compelling concepts on the sidelines.

All of these are just a few of the game’s eccentricities. Azran Legacy is full of unhinged decisions, some of which more relevant to its narrative core than others, that make it very tempting to view it as a ‘beautiful mess’. Its twists are by far the most absurd in a series known for its wild plot contrivances. Some of its characterization choices are clearly extreme and unplanned retcons that massively impact the intended readings of its cast. And yet… I don’t think I’d change anything about it. This is a game that, despite everything, is packed full of the heart and soul of the Professor Layton series more than any other entry. Caught between so many opposing extremes, it still manages to imbue such an impressive amount of meaning into practically everything it tries. I can’t help but love it, and I genuinely don’t think it contradicts anything I loved about the series before; if anything, it purely elevates it.