At last, Nintendo is bringing two of the Game Boy Advance's best RPGs to Nintendo Switch Online. Stand up, Golden Sun fans, because we're finally getting Golden Sun and Golden Sun: The Lost Age on the service next week, on January 17.
We knew Golden Sun would make its way to the service eventually – it was teased last year, when Nintendo first unveiled its plans for GBA games coming to Switch Online. But with Golden Sun and its sequel effectively being two critical halves of a full story, it makes a lot more sense to drop them both at the same time.
Two epic adventures dawn…
Golden Sun and Golden Sun: The Lost Age are coming to #NintendoSwitch for #NintendoSwitchOnline + Expansion Pack members on 1/17! pic.twitter.com/d3Y5Lx5RX0
— Nintendo of America (@NintendoAmerica) January 12, 2024
For those unfamiliar, Golden Sun was a 2001 RPG from developer Camelot, better known now for its work on the Mario Golf and Mario Tennis franchises. It follows a group of four heroes wielding elemental magic on a quest to stop a team of villains from lighting four elemental lighthouses and plunging the world of Weyard into chaos. However, Golden Sun only tells half of the story – its sequel, The Lost Age, was released two years later and follows some of the supposed "villains" from the first game as they work to finish the job they started in Golden Sun, while the first game's heroes are in hot pursuit.
Both games are still beloved for their interesting and nuanced class systems revolving around elemental spirits called Djinn, the hybrid ways the game's magic, or Psynergy, could be used both in and out of battle, and their incredible soundtracks by renowned composer Motoi Sakuraba. We reviewed both Golden Sun and The Lost Age very highly back in the early 2000s when they came out. Camelot did eventually release a third Golden Sun game, Dark Dawn, for DS in 2010, but it wasn't as well-received as its predecessors, and we noted that it felt "somewhat dated."
The debut of both Golden Sun and The Lost Age on Nintendo Switch Online is great news for fans of the series who were struggling to find ways to play these games in 2023 without digging up ancient handheld gaming devices. Now, if only we can convince Camelot to tackle a fourth Golden Sun game…
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to [email protected].
