In the world of the Pokémon franchise, shiny Pokémon are the rare variants that excite even the most experienced Pokémon trainer when they find one, but some of these shiny Pokémon have changed quite a bit over the generations. Sometimes they are strikingly different from the original form, and other times it is a subtle change, but their rarity makes them extra special
The Pokédex shows that a few shiny Pokémon designs have changed over the generations. In some cases, the early generation games had to make color choices for a shiny Pokémon simply based on the restrictions of the older technology. With today's technology allowing for any color imaginable, those same Pokémon can become much more impressive, however, there are other examples where the early generation shiny versions were actually much more striking than today's offerings.
Pokémon's Shiny Bellossom Changed In Every Way
Bellossom is a cheerful Pokémon who loves to come out when the sun is shining. It's often dancing and makes a pleasant sound by rubbing the flowers on its head together. The current shiny changes the usual green to a violet skin tone and the flowers on its head to pink, with very subtle hue changes to the leaves. The dark blue skin tone and reddish-orange leaves and flowers of the original shiny Bellossom, however, appear much more like the Gloom. The Bellossom is one of the Pokémon Gloom's evolutions which may be the best explanation for the coloration of the shiny originally in Generation 2, which looked a bit like a happily dancing gloom with a skirt.
Shiny Cyndaquil Was A Pretty Purple Pokémon
Some of the changes to shiny Pokémon over the years have been noticeable improvements, but there are others that seem to have gotten duller. The Cyndaquil's current shiny form swaps out its normal blue and tan coloring for a dark brown and light brown and keeps the basic red and yellow flames. The original version of Cyndaquil's shiny, however, was very different, featuring dark purple replacing the standard blue and vivid magenta details on the skin and flames. Overall, this gave it a much brighter and more impressive change than today's brown. This beloved Pokémon was one of the choices of starters for Pokémon Legends: Arceus and perhaps deserves to have the more impressive shiny variant.
Pokémon's Swinub Changed Multiple Times
Swinub is one of the very few Pokémon to have gone through multiple variations over the generations. This simple-appearing Pokémon features light brown with dark brown stripes in its standard form, but the original shiny contrasted this look drastically with blue colors and some red highlights. Eventually, in Generation 3 it started to be a little closer to the current shiny model by having a grayish-green color pallet. Finally, today we have a more pastel green shiny Swinub with olive green stripes.
Shiny Politoed Leaps In With A Brighter Look In Pokémon
The Water-Type Pokémon, Politoed changed for the better, or at least brighter, between Gen 2 and 3. While both are strikingly different from the green and yellow of the common Politoed, the Gen 2 shiny had a much darker feel. While Pokémon fans love the design of Politoed, it was a good move of Game Freak to change up the look of the shiny from the original, which had dark gray skin with violet accents. The later shift to cerulean blue and pink lends itself to a happier and more cartoonish feel.
Spinarak's Shiny Made A Drastic Color Change
Spinarak has had perhaps the most drastic of changes to its color palette. Originally, the common Spinarak was a very dark purple and its shiny was a brighter purple and magenta. Rumors state that the purple hues were meant to represent shadow as this Pokémon could only be found at night. Beginning in Gen 3 and carried forward to today, this arachnid took on the greenish color for its standard style, which coincidentally looks very similar to the real-life Hawaiian Happy-Face Spider. The shiny form has adopted that of a light blue with blue and pink accents, which looks much less scary for those with arachnophobia.
Ponyta Went From Boring To Beautiful
Shiny Ponyta in Legends: Arceus is a guaranteed find for trainers, which is extremely rare for the shiny experience. This beloved Pokémon is currently shiny when it has exchanged its orange flaming mane for blue-colored flames and the skin has slightly darker cream coloring. In its first appearance, however, Ponyta's shiny looked much more like that of a normal horse. Rather than the flaming orange mane and tail, the shiny had a dull brown, which appeared more like hair than fire and which made this fire-type Pokémon much less impressive to look at.
Even Pokémon's Gyarados Changed Slightly Through The Years
While not a huge change, even Gyarados has evolved some in the coloration of its shiny form. The common Gyarados is a beautiful light blue, but the Magikarp it evolves from is a ruddy-orange tone. Perhaps that's why the first appearances of the shiny Gyarados showed it as that same orange on its scales, rather than today's vivid red. There are many things players never knew about Magikarp and its evolved form of Gyarados. Originally named the Skullkraken, Gyarados evolves from the most useless of all Pokémon: Magikarp. Yet both the Magikarp and Gyarados continue to be two of the most iconic Pokémon ever made.