Pokémaniac builds automatic shiny finder for 3DS, deserves all the rare candies
One of the aspects of Nintendo's Pokemon series that keeps players hooked is the occasional appearance of shiny creatures, or ultra-rare Pokemon that have a different color than usual. The odds of running into a shiny wild Pokemon in Pokemon X and Y are reportedly 1 in 8,192 battles, though crafty players have taken to special "chaining" and "chain fishing" tactics to speed up the process of finding one of the rare, elusive beasts.
YouTuber dekuNukem took that a step further by creating a mod for the 3DS game that detects and alerts players when a shiny Pokemon has been encountered in Pokemon X and Y during a chain fishing sequence with the game's fishing rod item. The mod connects to the 3DS' button logic to control the console, reading the audio signal for the correct moment to virtually press the A button and initiate the battle. Then, a sensor placed on the system's bottom screen determines the length of time the screen is dark, as a shiny Pokemon has a longer introduction in a battle. If a regular Pokemon appears in battle, the system tells the game to run away and start the cycle over again. The modder says the system took less than 300 lines of code in addition to a little soldering.
