Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen coming to Nintendo Switch next week, but not as part of Switch Online
The Game Boy Advance remakes of Pokémon Red and Green originally launched in 2004
Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen are coming to the Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2 next week, but they won’t be part of a Nintendo Switch Online subscription.
The pair of remakes were originally released on the Game Boy Advance in 2004, 8 years after the original release of Pokemon Red and Green.
Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen will release on Nintendo Switch on February 27, 2026. The games will be available after the conclusion of the Pokémon Presents presentation, which will also air on February 27.
The games won’t be part of Nintendo‘s Nintendo Switch Online classic games collection, and will instead be sold for $19.99/£16.99 each.
One reason for the game’s lack of inclusion on NSO is that The Pokémon Company likely wouldn’t allow for some of Nintendo Switch Online’s features, like save states or rewinding, to impact the game. This could potentially lead to the manipulation of Pokémon generation and thus Pokémon Home.
Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen won’t feature online play, but they will support wireless battling via a modern version of the Wireless Club found in the originals.
The rereleases of the games will support Pokémon Home, meaning players can bring the Pokemon they’ve caught in FireRed and LeafGreen across to other Pokémon titles. Virtually every Pokémon that can be found in FireRed and LeafGreen is easily accessible in other modern Pokemon titles.
Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen originally supported Nintendo’s e-Reader; however, most of the game’s e-Reader features are present only in the Japanese version. It’s currently unclear if regions will receive slightly different versions of the rerelease or if they will be unified.
