How to Get All Starters in Pokemon Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl

Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl, the long-awaited Sinnoh remakes are here and it’s more or less a very faithful representation of the original games with a few changes outside of the obvious graphical overhaul. The experience is very similar and of course, you’ll be forced to make a big decision at the start of the game: which starter to choose from. Well, if you’re here, you’re probably wondering if you can get around that choice and get all three of the main starters, Piplup, Turtwig, and Chimchar, anyway. Here’s what you need to know about how to get all starters in Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl.

Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl – How to Get All Starters

Via Trade

Let’s get the obvious one out of the way first. Once you’re able to trade you can go ahead and try and wheel and deal your way to getting all three starting Pokemon: Piplup, Turtwig, and Chimchar. If you’re trying to do it without any outside help, find rare Pokemon that are annoying to catch or Pokemon with lucrative hidden abilities, and offer those up online either in-game or in a popular Pokemon trading forum such as GameFAQs.

Or, if you want to get cheeky the old-fashioned way, find a friend with another copy of the game and another Switch, and have them start new games (get a hold of them before they get started), and play until they get send over their starter and restart until you have all three. Or of course, you could do this yourself if you have two Switches and two copies of the game.

Getting All Starters In-Game Without Trading

If you can’t or don’t want to trade, it is actually possible to get all three starters without trading; this is unlike most other games in the series but it’s possible in Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl. To do this, though, you must first have access to the National Dex which is obtained after beating the game.

Once you have the National Dex, when you go to appropriate Grand Underground zones, you have a small chance of running into one of the starter Pokemon. For example, Fire-based Underground zones have a small chance of having Chimchar appear once you have obtained the National Dex, Water can have Piplup appear, and Grassy areas can see Turtwig spawn.

And those are the main ways to get of the starting Pokemon in Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl. For more FAQs answered and other tips, tricks, and guides visit our Pokemon Shining Pearl and Brilliant Diamond guide wiki and check out our review for our complete thoughts on these remakes.