Pokémon Home Update Fuels Speculation That Ruby, Sapphire & Emerald Are Coming To Switch
by uGames Editors
Pokémon Ruby (Image: Pokémon Company)
A new Pokémon Home update has fans convinced that Nintendo Switch ports of Pokémon Ruby, Sapphire and Emerald are on the way, even though neither Nintendo nor The Pokémon Company has announced anything.
The update, released Oct. 7, lets players move Pokémon caught in the recently re-released Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen into the cloud storage app and on to newer games in the series. The transfer is one-way, meaning creatures cannot return to their original Game Boy Advance games once they leave.
Fans noticed the wording. As a user on the ResetEra forum pointed out, the new option in the app’s menu is labeled “GBA games” rather than naming FireRed and LeafGreen specifically. Many fans took the generic label as a sign that The Pokémon Company is preparing to add more Game Boy Advance titles, with the Hoenn trio from the series’ third generation as the obvious candidates.
Experts cautioned that the label could mean nothing, since a short, general button name simply takes up less space on a menu. Still, the outlet noted that FireRed and LeafGreen have climbed significantly higher on the list of the franchise’s best-selling games thanks to their Switch re-releases, giving The Pokémon Company a strong commercial reason to bring back the rest of the generation.
The update follows another clue that surfaced last month. An official Japanese Pokémon account on X posted footage of Ruby and Sapphire that fans found suspicious for two reasons. The clip looked unusually crisp for a 2002 handheld game, resembling the Switch versions of FireRed and LeafGreen, and it ran exactly 30 seconds, the maximum length of a video clip captured on a Switch console.
Rumors of the ports have circulated since the summer. In August, industry commentator Shpeshal Nick claimed on social media that ports of the three games were “planned for late September/October,” according to GamingBible. That window hasn’t closed yet, and fans are watching for a possible surprise shadow-drop.
FireRed and LeafGreen, which are remakes of the original Pokémon Red and Green, arrived on Nintendo Switch and Switch 2 in March as part of the franchise’s 30th anniversary celebrations. The straightforward ports made the games playable on modern hardware without the full-remake treatment.
Ruby and Sapphire debuted on the Game Boy Advance in 2002 and introduced the Hoenn region, along with series staples such as abilities, natures and double battles. Emerald, an enhanced version of the pair, followed in 2004. The games were remade for the Nintendo 3DS in 2014 as Pokémon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire, but the originals have never been available on a Nintendo home console.
Nintendo’s next major Pokémon release, Pokémon Winds and Waves, is slated as a Switch 2 exclusive next year, leaving room in the schedule for smaller nostalgia-driven releases.
For now, fans are left reading between the lines. Neither Nintendo nor The Pokémon Company has made any official announcement about the Hoenn games.
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