Play Pokemon Leaf Green Gameboy Advance GBA Online Emulator in Browser
When Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire came out, I was very distraught to learn that some of my favorites from the original Game Boy generation, particularly Nidoking and Persian, were absent from them. Furthermore, since the Advance Generation employs a different system for Pokemon stats and is on vastly different hardware, I could not upload my power Pokemon from Crystal or Blue. And there were some things that annoyed me about Ruby/Sapphire, including the spineless rival and outlandish town concepts (Who builds a town atop trees or inside a crater?).
Enter LeafGreen. This game, along with the companion game FireRed, takes us back to the world where Pokemon got its start, but now with all of the Advance generation upgrades. The graphics are pretty good, and the lead girl character is the cutest I have seen in a Pokemon game.
Most of the dialogue remains unchanged from the original games. You have the shorts-obsessed youngsters, the really sensitive Lasses, and that poor scientist that was shipped off to the Russian Tiksi Branch of the regions major corporation. Team Rocket and its enigmatic boss Giovanni are here in all their glory, as are the original crew of gym leaders and Elite Four.
In addition to the main region, there is a chain of islands. Here, there are some new quests and some of the Johto Pokemon are found out there.
The controls are pretty much exactly as they were in Ruby/Sapphire, which means the menus and commands are well designed and intuitive. A device called the Vs Seeker allows you to challenge trainers you’ve already beaten. It doesn’t take too long to recharge and is a great way to level up your army and earn cash.
There is a help function triggered by hitting the shoulder buttons, but it’s only for newbie trainers and gets annoying because I have a tendency to hit the shoulder buttons by accident. At least the help menu can be turned off. The game also does a “recap” of your recent accomplishments. It’s cool the first two or three times, but then it just becomes a waste of time. There is no time function in this game, so time-dependent evolvers must be traded back to Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald, and that isn’t possible until you’ve beaten the Elite Four and tackled an island sidequest. The music is remixed from the original games, but you’ll still want to have your iPod handy.
Other than that, though, this game is an excellent RPG and involves a lot of strategy. Is it better than Emerald? Yes. This game takes place in a far more engaging world, the characters look better, and some of the Pokemon animations in Emerald look just plain dumb.
Note that the wireless battling is essentialty the same as before except without the hassles of cables. The wireless chat room is a good concept, but limited range of the included wireless transmitter really limits it.
If you can only pick up one of the GBA-generation Pokemon games, LeafGreen is the best of them all. The selection of Pokemon gives it the edge over FireRed, and the better-looking sprites and nostaligic feel combined with the current game mechanics places it well above Ruby, Sapphire, and even Emerald.
Again, I stress that the girl lead character from LeafGreen is super cute!
