ZA shiny charm is practically impossible to obtain

Hard to argue whether Pokemon Legends: ZA is an upgrade over its predecessors like the Gen 9 games and Pokemon Legends: Arceuswhen it comes to shiny hunting. Pokemon Legends: ZA it has a broken method of hunting shinys for Wild Zone 3, but generally speaking, it's a great game to search for shiny Pokemon even with fast travel, since all the critters in the area are reset. At the same time, REPTILES has autosave enabled by default, and with a day/night cycle that resets all spawns, some shinies may be lost if this happens mid-battle. As such, a shiny charm would be a prized possession, but extremely difficult to obtain for some and impossible for others.

Shiny charm inside Pokemon games are usually awarded for completing the Pokedex, which makes sense as a requirement because it means players have seen every species in the game so they know what they look like normally compared to their vibrant color palette. Pokemon Legends: ZA breaks this rule and instead requires players to get to Research Rank 50 with Mable, which has its pros and cons. These are:

• The Research Rank 50 requirement means that players do not need to complete the Pokedex for Shiny Charm v REPTILES.

• Reaching Research Rank 50 inches Pokemon Legends: ZA requires trading to get enough research points. So players must either trade locally or pay for Nintendo Switch Online to complete this task.

• One of the mandatory tasks is to play 1000 battles Pokemon Legends: ZAwhich can be extremely time consuming and potentially quite boring, even with existing tricks.

Pokemon Legends: ZA's Shiny Charm requires 1000 battles and trading

Some of Mable's research requests in Pokemon Legends: ZA they are mandatory because without the points they provide one would not be able to reach rank 50. The mandatory research requirements are:

• Wild zone measurement 1 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 1
• Wild zone measurement 2 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 2
• Wild zone measurement 3 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 3
• Wild zone measurement 4 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 4
• Wild zone measurement 5 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 5
• Wild zone measurement 6 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 6
• Wild zone measurement 7 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 7
• Wild zone measurement 8 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 8
• Wild zone measurement 9 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 9
• Wild zone measurement 10 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 10
• Wild zone measurement 11 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 11
• Wild zone measurement 12 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 12
• Wild zone measurement 13 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 13
• Wild zone measurement 14 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 14
• Measuring Wild Zone 15 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 15
• Wild zone measurement 16 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 16
• Measuring Wild Zone 17 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 17
• Measuring Wild Zone 18 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 18
• Measuring the Wild Zone 19 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 19
• Measuring Wild Zone 20 (1000 points) – Register all Pokemon found in Wild Zone 20
• Development through Link Trade 1 (2000 points) – Participate in 1 link trade
• Development through Link Trade 2 (2000 points) – Participate in 3 link trades
• Development through Link Trade 3 (2000 points) – Participate in 5 link trades
• Winning pokemon battles 15 (2000 points) – Win 1000 pokemon battles
• Investigation of anomalous alphas (1000 points) – Catch or defeat an anomalous Alpha Pokemon in Wild Zone 3, 5 and 9

It's the end of an era for the shiny magic of Pokemon

The reason these are the only mandatory quests for Shiny Charm is that completing all of Mable's Requests in the game will give players an extra 900 points. It follows that it is possible to skip some other tasks as long as the total points lost in this way do not exceed 900. For example, you can skip the final Pokedex Completion requirement for 500 points and one of the type-specific catching tasks, ending up with only 100 points left over and an incomplete Pokedex in Pokemon Legends: ZA. This is the premiere of this series.

Pokemon Legends: The Best ZA Methods to Get a Shiny Charm

Since certain business developments in Pokemon Legends: ZA they are hard to come by, it would make sense to skip them as a solo player. However, trading is actually mandatory to get a Shiny Charm, so it's wiser to complete the Pokedex this way. This makes it impossible to get a Shiny Charm without a Nintendo Switch Online subscription or the ability to trade locally.

Additionally, the quest, which requires players to win 1,000 battles, is incredibly frustrating because it's a long grind that many are already whining about instead of actually participating in the battles manually. An example is how some players go to Restaurant Le Nah to repeatedly challenge trainers by simply pressing a button and a turbo controller, accompanied by a bulky Pokémon holding Rocky's helmet to passively deal damage. Another popular choice also includes Restaurant Le Nah, but instead fans will manually complete all battles with a powerful Mega Evolution at max level, such as Pokemon Legends: ZAMega Excadrill to defeat all enemy creatures with a single attack.

Systems

Released

October 16, 2025

ESRB

Everyone 10+ / Fantasy violence, in-game purchases

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