Pokémon: 10 Weirdest Evolution Methods

Throughout every single Pokémon game, from Kanto to Alola, there is one overarching objective: To be the very best.

In order to beat the Pokémon League and the League Champion, the trainer must assemble the strongest team possible. A task that would be impossible without the help of evolution.

Of the 151 Pokémon introduced in generation one, just 70 could evolve into a higher form. Most of these came by the traditional way of reaching a certain level, with just a few coming via trade or evolutionary stone.

But with the introduction of more generations and more Pokémon came new, weird and wonderful ways to evolve them.

Soon Pokémon could evolve via friendship, knowing certain moves, and even by levelling up in certain areas of the map. Some ways are more unique, however, far stranger and more difficult to achieve than most others.

Introduced in generation three, Shedinja is an odd creature, sometimes known as the shed Pokémon. It gets its name from the fact that its body is nothing more than a discarded bug shell that came to life, now possessing the power to steal anyone's soul who dares peer inside.

As unsettling as this, it is not actually the strangest thing about Shedinja. Rather, it is the way the Pokémon evolves. Though not technically an evolved form of Nincada, Shedinja's sudden appearance is heavily linked with the former.

Throughout all seven regions, Shedinja is never actually available in the wild. Instead it simply appears when Nincada evolves into Ninjask so long as there is an empty space in the trainer's party, somehow finding its way into any spare Pokéball they may have.

By the time the trainer reaches Route 116 in Hoenn to catch a Nincada and can train it up to level 20, there is unlikely to be a spare slot in their party, meaning Shedinja would rarely appear unwarranted. But on the off chance that it did take the trainer by surprise, this would surely be on of the creepiest moments throughout any future champion's Pokémon journey.