A few years ago I lost my beloved Emerald Version to a jerk (sad violin music playing in the background). My brother grew sick of his Firered and decided to give it to me since I lost my Emerald (thanks Alex!). This is a cut and paste review for Firered and Leafgreen because the games are almost completely the same.

Story/ Goal: The goal of the game is to basically go on an adventure working your way to being the best is the extremely shorted idea of the game.

Now for those who have absolutely no clue what pokemon is this is what it is; A young boy decides to go on an adventure and dreams to be the Pokemon Master but on the way he has to confront obstacles and an evil crime organization named Team Rocket.

Pokemon are magical creatures that people catch (using pokeballs) and use in battle. Each Pokemon has their own strengths and weaknesses based on the type they are, it's almost like a game of rock, paper,scissors. The most common and most obvious example is the water, fire, grass combination, water douses fire, fire burns up grass, and grass drains water. To strengthen your pokemon you need to battle and battle and battle, there is no other way to get them stronger (besides one or two exceptions if you are a technical nerd.)

You start off your adventure at the famous scientist&'s lab named, Professor Oak in which he will allow you to choose one of three pokemon. When you set out you have two goals: Get all the badges so you can fight the Elite Four and become the champion, and the second goal is to catch all of the pokemon.

To reach the top you need to find and capture pokemon, once you've done that and have strengthened them to where they can challenge the Gym Leaders you go fight the Leaders. You require all eight of the Gym badges but once you have them all you are given permission to challenge the Elite Four. Battling is strategy based and doesn't require any reaction time so no need to worry about that. When you enter a battle you are given four choices: run away; which you can't do at trainer battles and some other occasions, items; which range from healing your pokemon to catching the wild pokemon (not trainer pokemon), party; which allows you to see all of your pokemons'; stats, health, moves, and more, and obviously battle; where you have a choice of four moves to make your pokemon weaker and/or give you a
higher advantage.

One of the biggest things that makes this game addicting for many is the concept commonly know as &'Gotta catch em all!'. It's addicting because other than having to find pokemon you also have to do two other things to get them all; first you need to evolve, second you need to trade. Evolving is when a pokemon has become strong enough it will transform into a stronger form of the original. Also, you need to trade. The way the game and it's counterpart, Leafgreen, are set up you need to have both games or you need to find someone
with the opposite game. One game has some pokemon the other doesn't and vice-verse.

Also for those who have played the originals, there is an addition to the original story that you will find at the end of the game.

Graphics:
Though it is obviously improved from older games it's not quite what I would like in a new game, especially when the slightly older games Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald have a slightly better graphics. Where there is dust storms and puddle reflections in these game there are none in Firered and Leafgreen. However I did notice that (at least for me) the writing in these games are slightly easier to read and aren't so sharp and tall.

Sound:
You can now hear the classic pokemon music in an updated version. It would be nice if I could have a little radio of other games music from the past. Pokemon cries are still using the same style as the original games and, frankly, is not what I want.

Addictiveness:
The Pokemon games are probably the most addicting videogames in the world because of it's one of a kind play type and idea and for it's sometimes frustrating addicting need to catch all of the pokemon. This will keep you playing for a very time.