Golden Sun 3 Prerelease Speculation

Golden Sun 3 is the common name for a hypothetical third game in the series, taking place after Golden Sun: The Lost Age. Ever since the second game's release, fans have speculated nearly unwaveringly on when a third game in would come out and for what system, what new gameplay features would be featured, and most of all, the story and what happens to the characters. As of October 2007, there is still no confirmation that a new game in the series is actually in the development stages, as Camelot has only confirmed long back that they are making a new RPG for the Wii. Whether or not this is a new Golden Sun game is purely speculation.

In this October 2007 Game Informer interview, Camelot's Hiroyuki Takahashi has this to say in response to the question about whether they might bring the series to consoles: "We think we have to make another one. We have to do it! Not just that we have to do it, but we want to do it. Nintendo has asked us to please make it. But at the same time we haven’t gotten around to making it. We’re not really sure why." Shugo Takahashi follows with this: "One of the reasons that we haven’t made golden sun is because there are so many fans of the game and we don’t want to do something half-assed. We want to give it the time it deserves."

Speculated elements
Series fans speculate that among the plot elements and gameplay elements that could be featured in a third game in the series are the following:
 * Alex survives his episode at Mt. Aleph and plots revenge against the Adepts, against Isaac in particular because Isaac possesses the portion of the Golden Sun Alex lacks, and he is made to be a foremost villain in the series;
 * Sheba's mysterious heritage and apparent link to the Moon, which is described as the Floating City of the Anemos, may be a central plot element.
 * Based on what the citizens of Prox say and think (through Mind Read) after the final battle in The Lost Age, it is believed that there is another landmass located north of Prox.
 * The subplot involving Babi and how it was wrapped up seemingly so inconsequentially in The Lost Age may be further addressed, with Iodem taking Babi's place as ruler of Tolbi and managing the politics of an increasingly unstable, tense Alchemy-imbued world. Iodem may create a League of Adepts of sorts, with the eight playable characters members alongside many other new Adepts.
 * What lies beyond Gaia Falls may be explored. It could be a second underworld of sorts, allowing room for an entire new quest's worth of content.
 * Albeit a less widespread theory, some fans think that the portion of the Stone of Sages sealed within Isaac is unleashed, and the Stone itself becomes a central plot element.

Confirmed hoaxes
There have been a number of fan attempts at hoaxing a new game in the Golden Sun series over the years beyond The Lost Age's release in 2003, made in apparent attempts to taunt the fandom and generate controversy.

Golden Sun: Alex's Road
One noticeable false rumor was a fake Nintendo DS screenshot of a Golden Sun 3 title screen. It features the false title on the top screen (with the symbol being a moon curving around a sun), a sub-title (Arekkusu no Michi&mdash;lit. "Alex's Road"), and a mysterious lighthouse in the background. In the bottom screen, there is a Send Letter icon in between a DS card icon and a GBA cartridge icon, symbolizing the transfer of data from The Lost Age into the DS card. Interestingly enough, Alex is spelled wrong&mdash;his name is actually spelled アレクス (Arekusu) ingame, making it quite clear this is simply a fake. Another give away is that the GSTLA cartridge pictured has the American released blue background, while the Japanese released cartridge has a gold background. It was created by a fan named Takam.

Golden Sun: The Solar Soothsayer
A more recent new rumor hoaxing Golden Sun 3 was found July 11, 2007 on Joystiq, concerning their E3 Special Coverage. According to the article by John Bardinelli, a user identified as "gobo_4227" stated that Nintendo held a small pre-E3 gathering to test a small handful of Wii and Nintendo DS games not scheduled to be shown at E3. Among these games were Golden Sun: The Solar Soothsayer; it was also said that all of these games were in very early development. It was stated that "The story seems to continue where previous Golden Sun games left off, putting you in control of Felix is a pseudo-3D world" and will implement similar controls as to Animal Crossing DS.

gobo_4227 managed to take shots of it from his cell phone, which can be seen on the right and left side. Some issues had been found with these screens which throw some doubt upon the authenicity. For one thing, the game is already in English. Both the first and second game were announced some time before translation to English, and released in Japan some time before the US, so it is strange that we would see an English version before Japanese. Also, the © symbol is missing. In the previous games, the © was always next to the 'Nintendo/CAMELOT (years)' line, and that is not the case with these screens, which is strange, since there is no reason to take away the copyright symbol. On another note, the bottom screen's picture is simply reused official art of Golden Sun: The Lost Age. It seems unlikely Camelot would take a picture they drew years ago and not make new content instead.

After the site dsfanboy.com wrote this blog post decrying the pictures as part of a hoax, the user, now known as Opium, has admitted to perpetrating this hoax and said as much in an interview with Vooks.Net, claiming he created the images and story in an attempt to stir up conversation among Golden Sun forums and hopefully cause Camelot to notice the continued popularity of their games, and be prompted to make a new GS game.