A new trick has been discovered that lets players swap out which Shiny Pokemon spawn in Pokemon Legends Arceus. The new method allows Trainers to load in a new character in the rare variant. 

Pokemon Legends Arceus has launched and features some of the series’ biggest changes ever. One feature Game Freak overhauled is Shiny hunting which has now been made easier than ever to find the rare variants.

A week after its release, however, YouTuber Austin John Plays has further discovered a new trick that potentially lets players to swap out the Shiny Pokemon that have spawned on their map.

Shiny switching discovered in Pokemon Legends Arceus

The new method was discovered on February 5 when the popular Pokemon YouTuber uploaded a video titled “How to SWAP Shiny Pokemon – Pokemon Legends Arceus.” In the video, Austin John Plays showed that he is able to force the game to spawn another Shiny Pokemon after discovering a Shiny Drifloon in the Cobalt Coastlands.

In a demonstration, the content creator spotted a Shiny Drifloon on his map and ran far away from it. He then waited for it to turn from night to day and saved before shutting off his game. After booting it back up and going back to the Shiny’s location, the Drifloon had been swapped out for a Shiny Starly.

According to Austin John Plays, it’s possible that the Shiny ID stays in a pre-determined spawn radius, and since the Pokemon that spawn in changes based on the time of day, the Shiny then switches out to a different ‘mon.

“What I’m thinking is, the game has in its memory that this Pokemon with this ID should be Shiny,” he explained. “But since I’m outside of the range that the game is actively calculating what’s going on in changing the Pokemon, only once I approach the area does that Drifloon despawn. And a new Pokemon will respawn. Now I’ve just saved the game during the day cycle where this Pokemon should have already despawned and now we are at a state where this Pokemon is now going to be changed but it still has this Shiny ID information.”

Austin John Plays was also able to replicate the method by having the Shiny Starly switch back to a Shiny Drifloon after going back to nighttime. Despite that, the content creator cautioned that more testing would need to be done to verify the method.

While the jury is still out on how this new trick can be used in the future, it’s extremely promising for trainers who might run into Shinies that they don’t want or need. Having the option to swap them out with another character would be game-changing.

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