Shiny Pokemon that are gone forever when Pokemon Bank closes
Posted on February 4, 2024 by Ethan in 3DS, 3DS eShop, Guides
Nintendo recently announced the almost-complete closure of 3DS and Wii U online services on April 8 – and just about every single game is losing online functionality on that day. Pokemon Bank, however, is the exception. It won’t remain open forever, but eventually Nintendo will cut the cord on all of its online services. When that happens, Pokemon Bank will become unusable and it will be impossible to transfer Pokemon from previous generations to the Switch.
More than a few Pokemon can only be Shiny on Game Boy Advance, DS, and 3DS titles – on Switch, there’s no way to Shiny hunt any of these Pokemon (at least, not yet). Today, we’re going over a list of Pokemon whose Shiny forms will become unobtainable once Pokemon Bank closes. Again, we’re not entirely sure when this will be, but if you’re looking to save some cool Shiny Pokemon now might be a good time to start hunting.
List of standard time-limited Shiny Pokemon
First up, we’re starting with Pokemon who are completely unavailable on Switch. At the time of writing, there are only a few. Patrat, Watchog, Pansage, Simisage, Pansear, Simisear, Panpour, Simipour, and Furfrou are currently the only Pokemon that do not appear in any of the Nintendo Switch titles. As a result, you also can’t obtain their Shiny forms on Switch. Patrat and Watchog are probably the most difficult of these Pokemon to obtain Shiny; Patrat in particular has not been available in the wild since Pokemon Black and White 2 over ten years ago. If you want to obtain a Shiny Patrat, your best bet is to find a wild Watchog on Route 15 in Pokemon X and Y and then breed it with a foreign Ditto in the same game. Kind of rough, but it’s all we’ve got for now.
Pansage, Simisage, Pansear, Simisear, Panpour, and Simipour are a little bit easier. They’re readily available in Pokemon X and Y via the Friend Safari feature. Grass, Fire, and Water-type Friend Safaris can have Pansage, Pansear, and Panpour, respectively. Otherwise, the only way to get them is full-odds encounters in Santalune Forest or catching them in Pokemon Black and White. If Pokemon Black and White remakes are really down the line, then these Pokemon may soon be available outside of Pokemon Bank. That being said, the elemental monkeys have not been natively available in a Pokemon game since X and Y. Game Freak must not like them very much!
The last standard Pokemon here is Furfrou, who did at least appear in Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon. That means you can technically hunt it via the SOS method, though Furfrou’s call rate is a little bit lower than that of other Pokemon. Otherwise, you can breed Furfrou in either Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon or X and Y. It also appears in the Kalos region on Route 5, so you could hunt it via the Poke Radar if that sounds more fun. It’s important to note that Furfrou reverts to its normal fluffy form when you deposit it in Pokemon Bank. The only way to get special trim versions of Furfrou in Pokemon Home is to import them directly from Pokemon Go.
Mythical Pokemon who can’t be hunted on Switch
There’s another category of unobtainable Shiny Pokemon that we haven’t even gotten into yet: Shiny Mythical Pokemon. Generally speaking, Game Freak has been a little bit stingy with these in Generation 9. Most of the time, Mythical Pokemon are Shiny locked, but there are a few of them that you can only obtain from previous generations. There are a lot of Mythical Pokemon to cover here, so we’re going to discuss all of the ones whose Shiny forms will no longer be available after Pokemon Bank’s closure. For the sake of completion, we won’t be including Pokemon Go as a reliable source of Shiny Mythical Pokemon – we’ll just be sticking to the core series games.
- Mew: Only available via Pokemon Bank. You can hunt and capture a Shiny Mew in Pokemon Emerald’s Faraway Island event – which means you can catch it in a Dive Ball there. However, the item that activates this event – the Old Sea Map – was only ever distributed to Japan. That means the only legitimate Shiny Mew are Japan-origin games or Pokemon Go.
- Celebi: Only available via Pokemon Bank and Poke Transporter. You can hunt Celebi via the event distributed to the 3DS Virtual Console’s version of Pokemon Crystal. Unfortunately, the odds there are 1 in 8192, making this a particularly brutal hunt. Even if you start the hunt now, there’s no guarantee you’ll find a Shiny Celebi before Pokemon Bank eventually closes. This is a tough one.
- Jirachi: Only available via Pokemon Bank. More specifically, it is only available via events. There is one way to hunt a Shiny Jirachi for yourself, but it’s so rare that it would be almost impossible to obtain. The Pokemon Colosseum Bonus Disc distributes a single Jirachi to players, and that Jirachi has a standard 1 in 8192 Shiny rate. This means the only legitimate Shiny Jirachi are from Japanese events or have the OT WISHMKR.
- Deoxys: Only available via Pokemon Bank. You can hunt it via the Birth Island event in Pokemon Emerald, FireRed, or LeafGreen. This event was distributed to all regions, so a Shiny Deoxys can originate from any of them. The Deoxys you catch as part of the Delta Episode in Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire is Shiny locked.
- Manaphy: Only available via Pokemon Bank – more specifically, only available via a glitch. Copies of Generation 4 Pokemon games can receive a single Manaphy Egg through Pokemon Ranger. This Egg is supposed to be Shiny locked, but the developers messed up – instead, the Egg is Shiny locked only for the person who receives it. That Egg can technically hatch Shiny for any other player – but it’s a 1 in 8192 chance, and the steps required to reset the Egg after it hatches take a really long time.
- Darkrai, Shaymin: These two Shiny Pokemon were available in Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl, but only through event distributions. These Wi-Fi distributions are no longer active, and it’s almost certain that the developers will never bring them back.
- Genesect: Only available via Pokemon Bank. It was distributed Shiny during an event in 2013, so this Shiny Pokemon will technically become
- Diancie: Only available via Pokemon Bank – more specifically, only available through Japanese events.
- Zeraora: Shiny Zeraora is technically no longer available – it was distributed through Pokemon Home after a big Max Raid Battle event in Pokemon Sword and Shield. That being said, this Shiny Pokemon does exist on Switch. You just can’t get it anymore without trading.
- Meltan, Melmetal: This evolutionary line is still available in Pokemon Go. Problem is, the developers like to disable Shiny Meltan spawns and only activate them again during events. We’d recommend staying up to date with official Pokemon Go social media accounts if you want to know when you can start Shiny hunting.
Phione and Arceus are legitimately available in Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl, and don’t require time-exclusive items or distributions. Victini, Keldeo, Meloetta, Hoopa, Volcanion, Magearna, Marshadow, Zarude, and Pecharunt are all completely impossible to obtain Shiny with or without Pokemon Bank, so keep that in mind.
With that, we’ve discussed just about all of the Shiny Pokemon that will become unobtainable once Pokemon Bank closes. Of course, it’s entirely possible that future event distributions or games in the series will make these available again. If there’s one that we missed, feel free to let us know in the comments. Otherwise, which of these Shiny Pokemon will you be hunting before Pokemon Bank closes sometime in the future? If you’re looking to read some more Pokemon, check out our full list of Pokemon Scarlet and Violet guides while you’re here.
