Developed By: Game Freak
Published By: Nintendo
Category: RPG
Release Date: 02.27.26
Price: $19.99
For years, Pokémon fans have been wanting the older games to come to the Switch. Now it’s finally happening as FireRed and LeafGreen made their ways to the Switch and Switch 2. I didn’t play the originals when they first came out since they were around the time that Emerald came out and I didn’t care for emulating on my computer, so now I was excited to jump back in to gen one.
It’s the classic Kanto story. You pick your starter from Professor Oak and venture out to tackle the gyms and Elite Four while thwarting the plans of Team Rocket. Obviously, a lot of the stuff that was introduced in later games is missing, but until Game Freak makes a third gen one remake, this is going to be the best way to play the beginning.
While it’s a classic and full of nostalgia, there were quite a few issues that I encountered. The first is the controls. Movement itself is fine, but there’s a lot of nonsense when it comes to some buttons. The L and R buttons bring up a help menu. In theory it’s great, but you have no idea how many times I would accidently press them and open that menu.
If you press all four ABXY buttons at once, it resets the game back to the title screen instantly. This is great if you need to quickly reload a save state like if you’re shiny hunting, but I accidently did this way too many times when trying to skip dialogue. If you’re like me, you’re going to accidently stop your game too many times, but it’s a minor inconvenience and easy to avoid.
There’s also no online compatibility as the game is considered to be just a port and as true to the original as it can be. But in the future, you’ll be able to transfer Pokémon out of the game and into Pokémon Home. You won’t be able to transfer them back in, but this will be another way to work on your modern teams.
But even with that said, being able to revisit such a classic game on your Switch in handheld mode or on your TV is such a huge accomplishment for Pokémon fans. It would have been nice if there were quality of life upgrades like easier skipping of dialogue, but the game is still so much fun. If you’re a Pokémon fan, you probably already played the original and maybe even emulated it once or twice in your life, but you’re still going to love jumping in again for another 50 to 100 hours.
8/10
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