Pokemon Legends: Z-A's Shiny Charm is Virtually Impossible…

It's hard to argue whether Pokemon Legends: Z-A is an upgrade over its predecessors, like Gen 9 games and Pokemon Legends: Arceus, when it comes to shiny hunting. Pokemon Legends: Z-A has a broken shiny hunting method for Wild Zone 3, but generally speaking, it's a great game to look for shiny Pokemon even by fast traveling, as all the critters in the area are reset. At the same time, PLZA has autosave enabled by default, and with a day/night cycle that resets all the spawns, some shinies can be lost if it happens in the middle of a battle. As such, the Shiny Charm would be a prized possession, but it's extremely hard to get for some, and impossible for others.

Shiny Charm in Pokemon games is typically awarded for completing the Pokedex, which makes sense as a requirement because it means that players have seen all the species in the game, so they know what they look like normally vs. Their shiny color palette. Pokemon Legends: Z-A breaks this rule, and instead, it requires players to get to Research Rank 50 with Mable, which has its pros and cons. These are:

Requiring Research Rank 50 means that players don't have to complete the Pokedex for the Shiny Charm in PLZA.
Reaching Research Rank 50 in Pokemon Legends: Z-A requires trading to get enough Research points. So, players have to either trade locally or they need to pay for Nintendo Switch Online to complete this task.
One of the mandatory tasks includes playing 1,000 battles in Pokemon Legends: Z-A, which can be extremely time-consuming and potentially quite boring, even with existing tricks.

It's worth noting that most players typically have between 200 and 300 battles done by the end of the main story in Pokemon Legends: Z-A, meaning they need 700 or more to complete the 1,000 required for the Shiny Charm.

Pokemon Legends Z-A: How to Shiny Hunt

Shiny Pokemon in Pokemon Legends: Z-A function a little bit differently compared to previous games, making the process of shiny hunting a bit unique.

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By Hamza Haq

Pokemon Legends: Z-A's Shiny Charm Requires 1,000 Battles and Trading

Some of Mable's Research Requests in Pokemon Legends: Z-A are mandatory because one wouldn't be able to reach Rank 50 without the points they provide. The mandatory Research Requests are:

Surveying Wild Zone 1 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 1
Surveying Wild Zone 2 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 2
Surveying Wild Zone 3 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 3
Surveying Wild Zone 4 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 4
Surveying Wild Zone 5 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 5
Surveying Wild Zone 6 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 6
Surveying Wild Zone 7 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 7
Surveying Wild Zone 8 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 8
Surveying Wild Zone 9 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 9
Surveying Wild Zone 10 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 10
Surveying Wild Zone 11 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 11
Surveying Wild Zone 12 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 12
Surveying Wild Zone 13 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 13
Surveying Wild Zone 14 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 14
Surveying Wild Zone 15 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 15
Surveying Wild Zone 16 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 16
Surveying Wild Zone 17 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 17
Surveying Wild Zone 18 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 18
Surveying Wild Zone 19 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 19
Surveying Wild Zone 20 (1,000 points) - Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 20
Evolving Via Link Trade 1 (2,000 points) - Participate in 1 link trade
Evolving Via Link Trade 2 (2,000 points) - Participate in 3 link trades
Evolving Via Link Trade 3 (2,000 points) - Participate in 5 link trades
Winning Pokemon Battles 15 (2,000 points) - Win 1,000 Pokemon battles
Investigating Anomalous Alphas (1,000 points) - Catch or defeat the anomalous Alpha Pokemon in Wild Zone 3, 5, and 9

It's The End of An Era For Pokemon's Shiny Charm

The reason these are the only mandatory quests for the Shiny Charm is that by completing all of Mable's Requests in the game, players get a surplus of 900 points. What follows is that one can skip some other tasks, as long as the total number of points missed this way doesn't exceed 900. For example, one could skip the final Filling Your Pokedex request for 500 points and one of the type-specific catching tasks, ending up with just 100 points surplus and an incomplete Pokedex in Pokemon Legends: Z-A. This is a first for the series.

Pokemon Legends: Z-A's Best Methods to Get the Shiny Charm

Pokemon Legends Z-A Dratini Location Restaurant La Nah

Since some trade evolutions in Pokemon Legends: Z-A are hard to get, it would make sense to skip them as a solo player. However, trading is indeed mandatory to get the Shiny Charm, so it's wiser to also complete the Pokedex this way. This makes the Shiny Charm impossible to get without a Nintendo Switch Online subscription or without a way to trade locally.

It's worth noting that Pokemon Legends: Z-A's trade codes make the trading experience much easier online. However, some players are trading critters without their evolution item, meaning the receiver doesn't actually get the evolution.

pokemon-legends-z-a-mega-gyarados-online-battle

Furthermore, the task requiring players to win 1,000 battles is incredibly frustrating, as it's a long grind that many are already cheesing rather than actually partaking in battles manually. An example is how some players go to Restaurant Le Nah to repeatedly challenge trainers with just a button press and a turbo controller, accompanied by a bulky Pokemon holding Rocky Helmet to deal damage passively. Another popular choice also involves Restaurant Le Nah, but instead has fans manually completing all battles with a powerful, max-level Mega Evolution like Pokemon Legends: Z-A's Mega Excadrill to defeat all opposing critters with one attack.

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