With a few days left to go, Pokémon’s in a narrow lead. Still time for it to be unseated or gain more votes.
What are the pros and cons of a Pocket Monsters win, from a game availability perspective? (And minor notes on dialogue/gameplay differences.)
Game Boy Release
Game Boy games use a battery to retain saved game data.
How are my Japanese Pocket Monster saves looking?
| Game | Release | File Selection Screen |
|---|---|---|
| Red | 1996-02-27 | |
| Green | 1996-02-27 | |
| Blue | 1996-10-15 | |
| Yellow | 1998-09-12 |
Green’s battery is dead. Others are still going. But for how much longer?
How do you keep your saved game data if the game has a dead battery?
- Option 1: Buy a new battery and specialized tools to open a Game Boy cartridge.
- Option 2: Play on a system where you can keep the game turned on and running 24/7:
- Official Game Boy with a battery pack that can be plugged in (if one exists).
- Third-party Game Boy system that you can plug in to power/recharge the battery (I imagine they’re all like this, but haven’t checked).
- Play on a GBA and keep it plugged in and turned on.
- Play on a Super Game Boy on the SNES and keep it turned on.
- Option 3: Get hardware that lets you copy the game to your computer to play it there instead.
- I have a Raphnet USB cable that lets me plug an N64 controller into my computer. With a Transfer Pak plugged into the controller and the game plugged into that, I can copy the game over and the saved data in either direction.
A note on dialogue: Yellow has additional characters and dialogue, and some added minigames. Otherwise, the dialogue matches the other color games.
Virtual Console Release
These games were also released on the 3DS Virtual Console, but 1) you had to have a Japanese 3DS to buy them and 2) the 3DS eShop is no longer available.
There is currently no first-sale option to buy the Game Boy titles, physically or digitally.
Game Boy Advance Release
Pocket Monsters Red and Green were remade for the Game Boy Advance, released as Fire Red and Leaf Green.
We have reached the era of solid state storage, so no battery needed to keep that saved game alive!
How does this remake differ from the original?
Surprisingly not much until the new post-game content.
The male player character is changed, you get faster movement (eventually), and managing your inventory of monsters is much improved.
While there’s probably an allowance that people playing different releases of a Game Club pick may see differing dialogue here and there, the dialogue in Fire Red and Leaf Green was rather intentionally left unchanged for the game’s main content.
If you try to buy English copies of Fire Red and Leaf Green online, there’s a 99% chance you’re getting a bootleg copy. I don’t know if that’s the case for Japanese copies. (I bought my copies back when they came out in Japan.)
You can also buy these titles for the Switch:
But expect a hassle to get a copy in Japanese:
Not only do you need to either switch your Nintendo account to Japan/Japanese or else create a second account as such (I recommend the latter), but even then you probably can’t use your debit or credit card, or your PayPal account, unless you are in Japan. If you’re not in Japan, then you can only give Nintendo your money via buying a prepaid Nintendo eShop card.
Let’s Go Switch Release
This one’s an interesting one.
It differs from the Game Boy and Advance versions in the following ways:
- You can select Japanese text even on an English copy of the game.
- The player and rival characters are replaced.
- This isn’t just a character sprite swap, as was the case with the Advance remakes. The rival in this release is a whole new character with new dialogue and interactions with the player.
- The original player and rival do appear, having set out on their journeys before the events of Red/Green occur.
- Battling wild monsters was replaced with a Pokémon GO-inspired catch system.
- Offhand, dialogue looks to match the original release outside of character changes and new cut scenes, but I’m sure there’s a fair bit of new dialogue added here and there.
There’s also an option to play with kanji. But it’s an either/or between kana and kanji. There’s no furigana option.
I saw in one game, I don’t recall if it was Let’s Go or Sword/Shield, where some dialogue differed slightly between the kana and kanji options, with the kana version using simpler words at times.