Just as insiders had heavily teased, the rumors of a release of Pokemon FireRed and LeafGreen onto the Nintendo Switch 2 have finally been confirmed. Quietly appearing on the Nintendo eShop were separate listings for both Pokemon FireRed and Pokemon LeafGreen, originally released for the Game Boy Advance. Support for Pokemon Home will be included in this digital re-release as well. Both games will launch on February 27, 2026. Each game will be priced at $19.99.

Celebrate 30 years of Pokémon™ with this Nintendo Switch™ version* of the Pokémon FireRed Version game originally released on the Game Boy™ Advance system! Explore the Kanto region, discover wild Pokémon around every corner, and aim to complete your Pokédex as you battle your way to success. Earn badges as you develop winning strategies to use against each experienced Gym Leader, and uncover amazing secrets in your quest to be the best Trainer.

This digital exclusive contains the Sevii islands, where even more Pokémon await. You can also visit the Pokémon Wireless Club to trade, battle, and chat with other players via local wireless**!

Support for Pokémon HOME is coming soon

You’ll be able to bring the Pokémon you catch and train to the place where all Pokémon gather—support for Pokémon HOME is coming to Pokémon FireRed Version!

Source

 

[Necron]

I was considering on buying these, but the price (was expecting $20 or at most $30 for both), no multi language (they could have perfectly done this, save files are compatible between every version) and probably no built in distribution events, hard pass for me now.

 

[The Catboy]

Fire Red is probably one of my most played games of all time, but with all the QoL romhacks and improvements that fans have made over the years, it's kind of hard to go back to the originals? So this doesn't feel as exciting as it could be. Hilarious how it just accidentally went live on the eShop though, what a blunder.

Which QOL hacks would you recommend? I wanna try em

 

[Gozaburo]

The price isn't the major issue. But it also means that we won't see these games on a physical cartridge which means that you don't really own these games. You can also get these games for free and play them on countless other systems with a much better emulator.

 

[purple_bandit]

The Pokemon companies greed is boundless. Shocking prices.

 

[Kioku]

you know maybe this is a good thing, as i hope this causes prices for US copies on ebay to drop, this doesn't always happen with a re-release
but i'm hoping it does.

Wishful thinking... But I've rarely seen a virtual console release cause price drops on the original copies of games.

 

[ChronoCrossfangirl2002]

Wishful thinking... But I've rarely seen a virtual console release cause price drops on the original copies of games.

if this was on NSO i wouldn't have said what i did, but either way it's pokemon and knowing how stubborn resellers can be yeah it's def wishful thinking either way

 

[SAIYAN48]

How will they do the event items? Once R/S/E are re-released on VC, will they add e-Reader support like Mario Advance 4?

 

[KingVamp]

A physical release with both games would have somewhat justified the price. In fact, a whole collection of Pokémon games before the ds, would have been neat.

 

[BlusterBong]

This is pure unadulterated greed. There were full ass Wii games on the eShop for less at one point.

And the gall to sell you each language separately, too. My god.

Then don't buy it? Literally nobody is forcing you to buy this. Even more so, This was something people were clamoring for just like having lgbt rep in the new Tomagachi Life and when the time came, people complained.

Same goes for the multi languages, if you were going to buy it (even if you just bought one of the two like 99% of people do), just get the one for the language you natively speak.

But hey, anything to avoid talking about Sony killing one of thier studios amirite?

 

[TheStonedModder]

The price is a bit high in my opinion, however I’m glad of two things:

1. The OG Switch is supported - this means you should be able to import your OG GBA saves on a hacked Switch and send them over to the Switch 2.

2. It's not locked behind an online sub.

In the event Pokebank / Poke Transporter stop working, its good these games will be accessible another way.

I did. It even consider importing the game saves that’s a good idea

I just finished fire red so that would help immensely with finishing the dex

 

[LusoPlayer]

How will they do the event items?

It's not known that they'll do those to begin with.

 

[JK_]

Honestly the most exciting aspect of this release is that it'll likely be possible to rip the save file from my actual cartridge and inject it into the switch version to upload my Gen 3 pokemon to home... I wonder if Nintendo seeing me upload an original Jirachi from Pokemon Colosseum's bonus disk via the Nintendo Switch version of Leaf Green is enough to warrant a ban? Guess I'll see.

You might not even need to pay for it to accomplish that either. If someone uses JKSV to export the data required, it should be able to create a save for the game without you actually buying the game. The only part I'm not sure about is Pokemon Home reading the save for sure. Someone will probably figure it out.

*I'm assuming it will just based off of the application ID because I doubt a Pokemon management app written in C# and Unity has access to the functions required to check if a game is actually installed, but I could be wrong.

 

[ChronoCrossfangirl2002]

You guys pay for a 20-year old game on a next-gen console?! It's also stupid expensive to get a physical cart nowadays, so your best bet is to emulate it for free or buy a flashcart.

my switch is basically a paperweight at this point, i remember this being rumored for the longest time and now that it's true i don't see a point in getting it especially since after playing FRLG+ on a flashcart, i respect that these games are re-released at all but it's definitely not worth it for many reasons

 

[noctis90210]

RSE will be next for sure, pokedex cannot be completed without these 3

 

[Asia81]

I hope they will patch to include mew deoxys ho-oh and lugia as they did with celebi on crystal, as well as online communication for trades (at least local)

 

[DiscostewSM]

$20 is criminal. On the other hand, I'm glad it's for purchase instead of part of a subscription. On the other other hand, digital licenses are just renting without knowing how long you get to rent for.

This kind of struck me because it's like saying PC these days is just one full-blown rental service.

 

[DeadSkullzJr]

I'm going to be honest, I don't understand a lot of these complaints.

1. The original MSRP of these games for the Game Boy Advance were $39.99 USD. Obviously price varies between different regions, but the point is, it's $19.99 USD in the eShop. That's HALF the price you paid back then for these games. It's infinitely better than paying $100+ for a used copy, and whatever stupid absurdities for a new old stock copy. It's still better than paying hundreds if not thousands collectively through subscription, for mere temporary access.

2. Separate language releases makes sense here, as the original games were NOT released with all the languages in one game cartridge. Each regional release had languages dedicated to that specific region, if you wanted a language version outside the normal languages of your specific region, you purchased and imported another version outside of your country. That's how it was back then. We didn't see true to form "World" multi-language releases until the Nintendo 3DS and Wii U. So the fact anyone here is somehow off put by the fact the languages are separate, shows you don't know your history, assuming you were even alive to know this. It's not like you need to own every version with every language anyways, just like you didn't back then. Buy the version according to the language(s) you speak or prefer. These are emulated, not native ports. It wouldn't have made sense for them to recompile the games with all the languages crammed into one version anyways, considering that would require a rework of what the emulator supports and understands.

3. Virtual console generally wasn't something you got to own physically in majority of instances. Nintendo would have made a massive killing with physical rereleases for sure, but it's the principle of the matter. Anyone complaining about the lack of physical releases here, yea it sucks, but that's been the design philosophy since the Wii's virtual console stuff. Unless Limited Run or others like that company does something, you expected something that was never a standard to begin with. This is coming from someone who is a total advocate for physical media, I don't normally do digital if I can help it. Again, it's still better than the alternative of being stuck behind a Nintendo online membership, meaning you wouldn't even get to make a one time purchase, instead you dump hundreds if not thousands collectively over time only to have temporary access. You should be complaining about that, not a one time digital purchase.

Tons of people want Nintendo to make these things accessible to purchase.... Especially the Pokémon games... They just started doing this, and it's STILL not good enough. The heck is wrong with everyone, should they crawl across broken glass, bleeding out too? I'm no boot licker here, but Nintendo just did something decent than what they have been doing, and you guys are torching them for it.

 

[Moe87]

Believe or not, I was in 11th grade when Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen released and had 17th birthday in December 2004.

 

[skawo]

Then don't buy it? Literally nobody is forcing you to buy this. Even more so, This was something people were clamoring for just like having lgbt rep in the new Tomagachi Life and when the time came, people complained.

Same goes for the multi languages, if you were going to buy it (even if you just bought one of the two like 99% of people do), just get the one for the language you natively speak.

But hey, anything to avoid talking about Sony killing one of thier studios amirite?

Oh, not to worry, I definitely won't buy it.

Are you implying that a discussion forum should only contain praise?

It wouldn't have made sense for them to recompile the games with all the languages crammed into one version anyways, considering that would require a rework of what the emulator supports and understands.

No, no it wouldn't. You make a menu that loads the localized ROM in question. Or, do what the Switch eshop allows you to do - allow downloads of all the versions with a single purchase.

 

[Samus12345]

Nintendo being a monkey's paw again. "I wish I could buy GBA games on Switch to keep instead of having to use NSO!"

"Granted."

"For a reasonable price, for a reasonable price! DAMMIT!"