I wasn’t going to do it. 20 dollars on a game from 2003? No new updates/content to come with it? INSANE, I said. But something kept calling me. Something kept telling me to pick up the Switch. Something I haven’t done much of lately other than to change some settings for my 5 year old daughter to play Smash Bros. Ultimate. This was surely a bit of nostalgia calling me but also something more. You see, I was around when the original Red/Blue released on the Gameboy. I was part of the news stories of Pokémon sweeping the nation/world with teachers taking away consoles and banning any Pocket Monster speak in the classrooms. The original cards, the mini figures, the Prima Official Strategy Guide. All of it. After spending hours upon hours listening to and attempting rumored ways to catch an elusive Mew, my Pokedex was complete. All 150 captured. Then I didn’t play Pokémon again. Until Sword/Shield.

While I saw the likes of the sequels and then FireRed and LeafGreen as they came out, I was in a different part of my life then. I cared less about handheld gaming experiences and was into the Final Fantasy, Suikoden, type RPGs. Pokémon slowly slid down my list. While I have always had love and that crazy nostalgic feeling for the original Kanto crew, with each new entry, the list of “who the heck is that” grew. I played through Sword/Shield on the Nintendo Switch during the start of the pandemic and had a great time. Discovering new mons in a way I haven’t really seen them before. But it wasn’t enough for me to go back.

February 27th, 2026. Pokémon day. Pokémon is now 30 years old. 30?! Since when?! I watched the presentation from Nintendo. At this time, I was happy FireRed was getting a release on the Switch, I just wasn’t sure it was for me. After the presentation, I picked up that console, and like I was under Mewtoo’s control, purchased the game without any more thinking. Then I played it all weekend. Then the thoughts came. “Nintendo needs to release all these old ones! I missed out on SO much!” And it’s true. While I know FireRed/LeafGreen are Kanto remakes, they still offer me something new. First, it’s not the awkward coloring and sprites of the originals. All my favorites have been updated. They’re how I remember them but…cooler. Wow I am a kid again.

FireRed/LeafGreen have been getting a lot of flack online for their price-point. In which, I mostly agree. A 10-15 dollar price would have been a much easier choice. But for me to pick up a console I have barely played in years, to rekindle that love for Pokémon I haven’t felt since I was a child. That alone is worth it. I even started searching Amazon for deals on the newer titles so I can discover much more. Yeah, so you cannot name your character Butthole anymore. Big deal. I’m teleported to a time where I didn’t care about EXP share. I just wanted my coolest looking Pokémon to be the strongest and it didn’t matter who that was.

So thanks, Nintendo. Thank you for bringing me back to these times. Thank you for allowing me to be fully reinvested in the little monsters that I used to draw on the insides of all my text books in school. Let’s hope we get more releases like this so that we can all go back and experience that joy again (or have it for the first time).

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