Z-A Leak Confirms Controversial Change

Pokemon Legends: Z-A will force auto-saves to be active at all times, according to a leak ahead of the game’s October 16 launch. While it is unclear how frequently auto-saving will occur in Pokemon Legends: Z-A, the decision may frustrate trainers who are trying to Shiny hunt for specific creatures to add to their collections.

Auto-saving has long been a staple feature of RPGs and has been utilized in other Nintendo titles, such as The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. The feature was first introduced to the Pokemon franchise in Pokemon Sword and Shield as an option that was enabled by default. By the same token, Pokemon trainers were also given the option to turn off auto-saves and stick with manual saving. Auto-saving was once again utilized in Pokemon Scarlet and Violet. However, Pokemon Scarlet and Violet will automatically save players’ progress during certain activities, such as connecting to the Internet, trading Pokemon with other players, and completing a Tera Raid battle while online.

Pokemon Legends: Z-A Players Can’t Turn Off Auto-Saving at All

While Pokemon Legends: Z-A will still provide trainers with ways to hunt Shiny creatures, some methods may no longer be feasible due to a controversial change. According to Centro on Twitter, Pokemon Legends: Z-A will no longer allow trainers to turn off auto-saving, as the feature appears to be on by default. Centro stated that the only game settings that Pokemon Legends: Z-A players can change are the text speed, minimap rotation, and the controller rumble features. Though it is not clear how frequently Pokemon Legends: Z-A will automatically save the game, the move has already drawn the ire of social media users. Pokemon fans stated that this would hurt trainers trying to Shiny hunt for specific creatures. The move to keep auto-saving on could also make soft resetting for specific Starter Pokemon parameters much more difficult to manage from the beginning, as that would likely require trainers to start new save files each time.

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The leak occurred as a result of players obtaining copies of Pokemon Legends: Z-A days before its official release on October 16. Additionally, datamining on Pokemon Legends: Z-A has already begun, since trainers who pre-ordered the game on the Nintendo eShop can now preload it onto their Nintendo consoles. As of this writing, the Nintendo Switch 2 version of Pokemon Legends: Z-A requires at least 7.7 GB of available storage space.

Between that and other changes to how Pokemon‘s buff and debuff systems work, Pokemon Legends: Z-A is already mired in controversy ahead of launch. Only time will tell if the Pokemon development team will give trainers the option to toggle auto-saves on and off again.