All my characters are tricked out in the strongest gear they could possibly use. So my main team is sporting stuff like Sol Blade, Tisiphone Edge, Excalibur and Lachesis' Rule... and I think I have Piers with cursed weaponry. I always did love the critical attacks in Golden Sun though. Like you said, it wasn't enough to just hit for more damage than normal. No, it got all flashy as the artifact weapons got better.
But I digress. Very enjoyable GBA RPG. People will immediately throw out the overrated card, but it's still a very shining portable RPG. I guess the only fault I can bring up is that it can get wordy at times, usually a character rephrases what another just said and, to make sure you're still alive, they ask you questions that can be answered Yes or No which, while it might change some dialog at best, doesn't have much of a difference on the story (with the exception of one instance at the very beginning of the first game: if you refuse to accept the burden of saving the world, the screen will go black and white and you'll get the "bad ending.")