Nintendo's Switch release of Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen upsets NSO subscribers

Why the Game Boy Advance games won't be a part of the program available to Nintendo Online subscribers

The Switch was definitely overdue to receive some classic pocket monster games, but the announcement of Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen has been met with an equal amount of excitement as it has confusion. Normally, retro games of this ilk would be relegated to the Nintendo Classics program, the curated library of older games available to Nintendo Online subscribers. Instead, FireRed and LeafGreen are standalone releases. What gives?

Neither Nintendo nor The Pokémon Company immediately responded to a request for comment, but as explained by Serebii founder and Pokémon expert Joe Merrick, there's a very plausible explanation for the release strategy behind these games — and, moreover, why Nintendo Classics doesn't have any Pokémon games to begin with. You see, Game Freak has spent the last couple of generations trying to bridge the gap between older games and newer games. Though it is a complicated process, it's technically possible to transfer monsters from the original Pokémon Red and Blue into the most modern games in the series.

Nintendo Classics, however, often come packed with special features. Depending on the game, this could mean new online multiplayer, rewind capabilities, suspend points, cloud saving, and items or mechanics that the original games did not include. If Game Freak made its older games a part of the Nintendo Classics program, it could put the larger Pokémon ecosystem into disarray. Players could potentially save scum encounters to ensure that they get better versions of monsters, for example. Disabling the cloud saves that make scumming possible defeats the purpose of Classics — if it's even possible at all. After all, Classics games live on the cloud.

On a more practical level, the prospect of connecting save files from Nintendo Classics to Pokémon Home could be a logistical nightmare. When you transfer monsters from older games, they don't come into Pokémon Home straight from the source — they have to be progressively moved through newer games. Whatever Game Freak has built to ensure that process works does not account for transfers out of digital games that are over twenty years old.

We also can't discount that FireRed and LeafGreen are remakes of the most beloved games in the entire franchise. Why wouldn't Game Freak treat a re-release of such important games with some gravity?

If people are grousing about this, it's because a separate release means that fans have to pay $19.99 to play these classic Pokémon games. For the same price, you could get an entire year of Nintendo Switch Online as well as access to the entire Classics library. On the other hand, you wouldn't actually own FireRed and LeafGreen if they were available on Nintendo Classics. The upside? A separate release means that you can get a swanky physical version of these beloved games... if you're in Japan, at least.