Pokémon Legends: Z-A is finally in the hands of Pokémon Trainers worldwide, and its release has turned the Pokémon Legends moniker from an innovative spinoff into a proper sub-series of Pokémon games that has become the de facto home for the developers and designers at Game Freak to test out new ideas or refreshing twists on the classic Pokémon formula. One of the most fun twists we’ve seen is the ability to freely catch Pokémon while you explore just by tossing Poké Balls at them, whether you’ve engaged them in battle or not. It’s a fun spin on the Pokémon formula that’s a little more representative of how catching Pokémon might go if you happened to find yourself living in the Pokémon world rather than our boring real one.
With the release of Pokémon Legends: Z-A, that manual aiming and throwing of Poké Balls at wild Pokémon has cemented itself as a constant in the Pokémon Legends titles, having also been present in 2022’s Pokémon Legends: Arceus. It’s a great feature that makes the act of catching Pokémon feel much more interactive and lively than a static throw mid-battle like in the previous 30 years of Pokémon games, but this new style of capturing Pokémon does have one downside: if your aim is a little off then your Poké Ball could go sailing right by your quarry, flying off into the distance, never to be seen again, or so it would seem.
Worry not, however, as Pokémon Legends: Z-A has introduced a handy system to help Trainers retrieve any Poké Balls that don’t hit their mark. It’s not as simple as running over to where the Poké Ball actually landed and picking it back up, however, it is the next best thing. Lumiose City has its own task force going out into the city and retrieving Poké Balls for you, and you’ll be able to find any of its members simply by stopping outside of any Pokémon Center in the city and talking to the NPC clad in blue.
These helpful NPCs are known as lost Poké Ball collectors, and speaking with any one of them will let you get back seemingly any Poké Balls of various types that you’ve lost by missing the Pokémon you’ve tried to capture. You can easily tell if one of these helpful folks has Poké Balls for you by the yellow message box hovering over their head. In my testing I’ve been able to retrieve Poké Balls, Great Balls, Premier Balls, Heal Balls, and Nest Balls from him, though we’ll be sure to update this guide if we find that there are any types of Poké Ball that the lost Poké Ball collectors can’t retrieve. It’s not possible to tell what types of Poké Ball they’re holding on to for you when you speak to them though. It’s only once you’ve actually gotten the Poké Balls from them and checked your satchel to see what you Poké Ball stash looks like that you’ll know what you’ve gotten, but so far with my testing I’ve had every single Poké Ball I’ve missed returned to me by these lost Poké Ball collectors.
Keep in mind that lost Poké Ball collectors will only return any Poké Balls that you’ve thrown and missed a Pokémon with. If you’ve managed to hit your target but they then break out of the Poké Ball before they’re captured, you’ll be out of luck and won’t be able to get them back. Still, having the ability to get any Poké Balls back at all is a huge upgrade to the Pokémon experience and I hope, for the Pokémon Legends series at least, it’s a mechanic that sticks around for future installments.
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Written by Jaxson Tapp
As a lover of gaming and the written word, Jaxson currently fills his time not only with playing games, but also writing about them. Ready for anything, Jaxson’s passion for puzzle games, JRPGs, tough platformers, and whimsical indies helps him bring a well-rounded opinion to Nintendo Wire’s reporting.
