You’ve spent hours. Maybe days. You’re staring at a screen, pressing the same buttons, hoping for a flicker of different pixels that never comes. If you’re hunting shiny Zekrom and Reshiram, you know exactly what that brand of insanity feels like.
These two are legends for a reason, but not just because they’re the faces of Unova. They are the poster children for one of the most annoying mechanics Game Freak ever cooked up: the shiny lock.
The Original Sin of Shiny Locking
Gen 5 was a weird time. Honestly, it was the start of the "no fun allowed" era for legendary hunters. Before Pokemon Black and White dropped in 2011, you could basically shiny hunt anything if you had enough patience and a functional L button. Then came these two.
Game Freak decided that for "narrative consistency," the big dragons shouldn't be shiny. Basically, because they appear in cutscenes with N, they had to look exactly like the box art. If you try to hunt them in the original DS games today, you are wasting your life. They are hard-coded to never be shiny. Even if you hit the 1-in-8192 frame, the game checks it and says "nope."
There was a myth for years that if you filled every single PC box and your party, forcing the game to spawn them at Dragonspiral Tower later, you could bypass the lock.
It’s a lie. People tried. They filled hundreds of boxes. They soft-reset until their fingers bled. The lock stays.
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Where You Can Actually Find Them
If you want a legit shiny, you’ve gotta look at later generations. It took until Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire (ORAS) for the gates to finally open. In those games, they appear through the Fabled Cave, provided you have a level 100 Pokemon in your party.
Then you’ve got Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon. Zekrom is exclusive to Ultra Moon, and Reshiram is in Ultra Sun. They’re stuck behind the Ultra Wormhole minigame, which is a headache on its own, but the odds are way better than the old days, especially with a Shiny Charm.
Let’s talk Sword and Shield. The Crown Tundra DLC brought back Dynamax Adventures. This is arguably the best way to get them because the shiny rate is a massive 1/100 if you have the charm.
The catch?
It’s a team effort. If your AI teammates decide to use "Splash" while Zekrom is charging up an attack, you’re toast.
The Pokemon GO Factor
In 2026, many of us just wait for a raid weekend. Pokemon GO is the easiest way to get them, period. We just had the Kyurem Fusion Raid Day on January 10th, where the shiny rates were boosted like crazy.
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In GO, the shiny rate for legendaries in raids is usually 1 in 20. Compared to the 1 in 4096 of the main series, it’s a joke. But there’s a trade-off. You’re spending real money on raid passes, and you don’t get that same "I earned this" feeling as someone who spent three weeks soft-resetting on a 3DS.
Do They Even Look Good?
This is where it gets controversial. Some people think the shinies are "mid" at best.
Reshiram changes its silver rings to gold and its eyes to red. It’s subtle. Elegant, sure, but subtle.
Zekrom is even harder to spot. It goes from a deep black to a very dark charcoal/navy blue with green eyes.
The real magic happens when they attack.
When a shiny Zekrom uses a move, its tail glows a bright, electric green instead of blue.
When shiny Reshiram fires up, its tail glows purple/pink instead of orange.
If you aren't paying attention to the tail, you might actually run away from a shiny Zekrom by mistake. Don’t be that person.
The Scarlet and Violet Disappointment
A lot of people hoped the Gen 9 DLC, The Indigo Disk, would be the ultimate hunting ground.
Nope.
Game Freak went back to their old ways and shiny-locked them again. You can catch them through Snacksworth’s treats, but they will never be shiny in those encounters. It’s a massive step backward and frankly, it makes no sense given how easy they were to get in the previous generation.
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How to Actually Get One Today
If you’re serious about this, here is your roadmap:
- Option A (The Grinder): Dust off Ultra Sun or Ultra Moon. Get the Shiny Charm. Find their specific wormhole. Set a rubber band on your L/R buttons and start resetting. It’s "authentic," and you can put them in a cool ball like a Premier or Luxury Ball.
- Option B (The Modern Way): Dynamax Adventures in Sword and Shield. It’s more engaging than just resetting a screen, but it takes 15-20 minutes per attempt. You’ve gotta weigh that against the 1/100 odds.
- Option C (The Easy Out): Keep an eye on Pokemon GO events. They cycle back every few months. Save your PokeCoins.
Check your Pokemon HOME boxes first. A lot of people have "genned" or hacked versions of these from the GTS. If the "met date" says 2011 and it’s from the Unova region, it’s 100% fake. A real shiny Zekrom or Reshiram has to be from Gen 6 onwards.
Stop hunting in Black and White. Just stop. Transfer your existing ones from GO or Sword/Shield into Scarlet and Violet if you want to use them in the modern meta. That’s the only way you’re seeing those green and purple flames in Paldea.