Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen Guide | How To Get Shiny Starter Pokémon Fast

Getting a shiny starter in Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen takes patience, but there is a faster way to do it. If you want to shiny hunt Bulbasaur, Charmander, or Squirtle as early as possible, the process starts in Professor Oak’s Lab. A few small setup choices can save time on every reset. That matters a lot when the shiny odds are so low.

Set Your Text Speed To Fast

Before choosing your starter, change the text speed from Mid to Fast. This makes a big difference because you have to go through the same dialogue over and over. On the slower setting, the text drags out every reset. You can press B to move faster, but doing that every single time is not efficient. With FastText, the dialogue moves much quicker and helps cut down the total time spent hunting.

Know When The Shiny Check Happens

One important thing to remember is that the shiny form does not appear when you first look at the starter on the table. You have to fully choose the Pokémon before you can check whether it is shiny. Unlike some later games, you cannot check all three starters at once on every reset. Because of that, it is best to decide which starter you want first, then focus only on that one.

Save In Front Of The Starter

After choosing which starter you want to hunt, save the game right in front of that Poké Ball. It is also better to save while facing the starter. That way, you do not need to walk over or turn around every time the game reloads. Even a small movement wastes time when repeated hundreds or thousands of times during resets.

In this method, Bulbasaur is used as an example, but the same approach applies to Charmander and Squirtle as well.

Skip The Nickname Prompt

Once you receive the starter from Professor Oak, the game asks whether you want to give it a nickname. Even if you already have one in mind, choose No. Entering a nickname slows the hunt down too much. You can always visit the Name Rater later and change the nickname then. For a shiny hunt like this, speed matters more than anything else.

After that, Blue picks his starter. At this point, keep pressing through the dialogue as fast as possible, then open the summary screen and check your Pokémon.

Soft Reset And Repeat

If the starter is not shiny, use the soft reset button combination: A + B + Start + Select. This sends you back to the title screen much faster than closing the game and reopening it. Since you saved right in front of the starter, you can load back in and repeat the process right away.

The method is simple. Press A to receive the starter, skip the nickname, clear the dialogue, check the Pokémon, then soft reset again. That is the fastest loop for shiny hunting the starter in these games.

Shiny Odds In FireRed And LeafGreen

The shiny odds are 1 in 8,192, and there is no way to increase them through normal play in these games. That means this hunt can take a very long time. You might get lucky in a few minutes, or you could be resetting for days or even weeks. The only real goal is to make each attempt as fast as possible.