Update: Kotaku has received confirmation from Capcom that Ace Attorney 5 will be coming to North America:

"Capcom is planning to release Gyakuten Saiban 5 (Ace Attorney 5) in the West. We'll have more news soon."

This month's Famitsu has confirmed that Ace Attorney 5 is in development, and provided the first exciting new details for the 3DS game. First and foremost, Phoenix Wright will be back in the saddle as the game's protagonist. That's right, it has been 8 years since Trials and Tribulations was first released on the GBA in Japan, 5 since it was released worldwide, but Phoenix is back and ready for action. It's been long enough, Phoenix, these mysteries won't solve themselves.

Other details include the reveal of a new sidekick for Phoenix, a mysterious girl who wears yellow, along with a look at the game's first tutorial case. There's an explosion at the courthouse and Phoenix is defending a high school girl who has been charged with causing the mayhem. The young girl is apparently frail and prone spasms; Phoenix's courtroom opponent will be Winston Payne's brother. As per usual, everything gets crazy from there.

In terms of changes, Ace Attorney 5 will be shifting to full 3D models -- 3DS standard. Whether this means sprites will be dropped entirely or not, we'll see. Hard to let go of those beautiful graphics, though. The three screenshots in the magazine also tease a facial gesture system for the courtroom, but again doesn't go into detail in the article.

While Ace Attorney 5 is sitting on a TBA release date, it's worth noting that the sooner you want this game in NA or EU you'll have to get hyped and let Capcom know about it. Capcom ports faster when there's higher demand. Also of note, Ace Attorney creator Shu Takumi is still hard at work with Professor Layton vs. Ace Attorney and has little involvement with the current AA5 project. Hopefully this isn't to the game's detriment. Look forward to more info soon, as TGS starts September 20. Let me just be blunt here -- this game needs to come out right now. I need it.