Great Sword

A Great Sword is a common Long Sword-class weapon available throughout the Golden Sun series. It is the strongest, and most expensive common weapon available in any game.

Basic Description by Game
In all appearances, a Great Sword increases the wielder's base attack rating by 90 points. As a common item, it can be bought repeatedly from Vendors for 7000 coins each and sold for 5250 coins each.

In Golden Sun, Great Swords are sold in the towns Tolbi, Lunpa, and Lalivero, and can be equipped by Isaac and Garet. In The Lost Age, Great Swords are sold in the Apojii Islands and the town of Contigo, and can be equipped by Felix and Piers.

In Dark Dawn, Great Swords are sold in the towns of Harun Village, Yamata, Champa Camp, and Tonfon. Great Swords can be equipped by Matthew and Tyrell. As part of the changes to the Unleash system, the Great Sword gained three Unleashes: Critical Strike, Spin Strike, and Fearless Attack. Critical Strike and Fearless Attack are non-elemental physical attacks that strike respectively with 1.5 and 1.7 times the power of a normal attack. Spin Strike is a Jupiter-based attack that hits three adjacent targets.

Analysis
In Golden Sun, Great Swords are the strongest common weapon in any shop. However, it's entirely possible it will never be bought and equipped because at Tolbi Springs you can redeem your Lucky Medals to acquire all sorts of strong weapon and armor artifacts, including the Assassin Blade which is a Light Blade-class weapon with the exact amount of attack as a Great Sword and a deadly Unleash effect, and these items can be won as prizes without having to pay a single coin for them. Ideally, the party should outfit itself with the superior equipment at Tolbi Springs with all its Lucky Medals before even shopping around at the normal vendors.

In Golden Sun: The Lost Age, much of the game's focus is on completing puzzles in the dungeon-style locations that provide as rewards weapon artifacts far superior to commonly bought weapons and even weapon artifacts that can normally be bought in vendors, so you should not buy and equip this weapon because you can find and buy stronger artifacts easily in the Great Eastern Sea quite easily even before reaching Apojii Islands. Note that if this game is being played without any data transfer or with a Password that's either Bronze or Silver-level, when Isaac's party joins Felix Isaac will be equipped with a Great Sword, which is of course far inferior to the equipment Felix's party will surely have amassed by that point.

In Golden Sun: Dark Dawn, Great Swords will be inferior to the forged equipment and Artifacts the player can get while traveling the Eastern Sea, not to mention the equipment that they player already possesses. Thus, they player may avoid buying and equipping a Great Sword. In the beginning of the game, when Isaac joins the party as a Guest Character, Isaac will have a Great Sword as his default weapon. Since the player cannot control Isaac during this time, they will be unable to change his weapon.