So its ten years since Pokémon Gold & Silver were released in Japan and to celebrate, Nintendo have decided they are going to release updated versions for the Nintendo DS! Like ‘Fire’ Red and ‘Leaf’ Green before them, these are going to be titled ‘Heart Gold’ and ‘Soul Silver’. This means that as long as you have a GBA slot on your DS, you can potentially have all the Pokémon available in Pokémon Ruby, Sapphire, Emerald, Fire Red, Leaf Green, Pearl, Diamond, Platinum and Heart Gold and Soul Silver on one cart for the ultimate Pokémon squad. The downside is that if you paid full price for all these titles, not to mention the GameCube/Wii games and Ranger titles that unlock special Pokémon, you would have spent approximately £350

So Nintendo are exploiting the Pokémon fans (quite understandably – it is business after all) with a re-release. But is it bad for Pokéfans? I don’t think it is. Pokémon Gold and Silver were many peoples favourites on the classic Game Boy and added an extra 100 Pokémon to the mix. Some of these are easily available in the titles already out on DS, but it would be nice to go back to Gold and Silver on current systems (as you can’t battle online with the original Game Boy) and if the same approach is taken as was with Red and Blue (Green) then it’ll be graphically updated to make use of the DS’s power.

It would be nice to see Nintendo develop a new Pokémon adventure under the main franchise, however instead we seem to be getting more of the Ranger and Dungeon series which at the moment don’t really appeal to me.  The great news is they’re not likely to change the formula too much. If Nintendo tried to make an all out massively multiplayer RPG I don’t think it would work too well. It would have to be a huge online world, and more than likely accessible on Wii to become successful. It would also have to be very closely monitored – as when Microsoft and Sony go online, its fine. But if Wii goes online, anyone who communicates is automatically considered suspicious by some news agency somewhere in the states... On the other hand, Nintendo makes games better than anyone else in the world (when they get it right) so it would be interesting to see them try.

Back to the point though, Gold and Silver introduced us to extra Pokémon, night and day in real time, and dark type Pokémon, designed to be a formidable force against psychic types who were undisputed champions in the original Red, Blue and Yellow versions. I’m just hoping they stick to the original story, keep the Kanto region involved (unlocked by beating Johto’s Elite 4) and features something new to explore at the end.

Gotta catch ‘em all^*!

^*again