Pokemon Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald Nintendo Switch ports seem likely, fans speculate as official account shares suspiciously high-quality footage

It seems a nice surprise could be coming from Pokemon this holiday season. Footage of Ruby or Sapphire from an official account is doing the rounds, and fans reckon it could suggest ports of the beloved games for the Nintendo Switch are on the way.

An official Japanese Pokemon account shares a short clip from the third generation of Pocket Monster games today, September 21. It shows the player character chasing around Mr. Briney, who's trying to grab Peeko-chan, his precious Wingull.

The colors are unmistakable, this is a capture from one of Ruby or Sapphire. But acknowledgement of these games by one of the franchise's social channels has people thinking we could be seeing them on Nintendo's contemporary systems soon... especially since the footage is surprisingly crisp for a GBA game, looking more like what you'd expect from the Switch versions of FireRed and LeafGreen. It's also a 30-second clip – the exact video length you get from the Switch and Switch 2's in-built capture function. Coincidence?

A number of Twitter accounts centred on news and speculation around the collectible critters are wondering what's going on here, because in typical fashion, this has come out off left field. I'm the same, because this is a very specific thing to just randomly put up.

The video looks bright and smooth enough to be part of the Switch's Game Boy Advance library. The timing is right for us to get Ruby and Sapphire if they're coming to Switch, since FireRed and LeafGreen got ported earlier this year, in March, for the property's 30th anniversary celebrations. This would round out the series' collection of mainline third-gen games, assuming that Emerald was also brought in to round out the Hoenn trio.

Likewise it'd fit with Pokopia in terms of giving us filler releases rather than something new and mainline. Pokemon Legends: Z-A arrived last year, and Wind and Waves are coming in 2027 – these will all help kill time for the next generation of pocket monster adventures.

We'll keep you informed. Of course, if these ports do arrive, we're all picking Torchic to start, right?

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