Pokémon Legends: Arceus: Does Big Buizel exist?

I have spent a significant amount of time looking for a large Buizel over the 20 or so hours I’ve played in Pokémon Legends: ArceusThis is the end of it. You may have done that too, looking for a Buizel taller than 2 feet, 8 inches for a guy named Dorian — he’s got an early request, called Big Buizel, Little Buizel — who is Very concerned with Buizel’s size. The size of Buizel, and its evolved form Floatzel, is not what Buizel shoots out from their butt.

Dorian and I spent the morning hunting for large Buizels. Was I successful? Yes. Was it worthwhile? No. All right, people: Get together. Here’s the story of my life in hope you can benefit from it.

I’d been catching Buizels for the entire 18 or so hours I’d been playing at this point, throwing PokéBalls whenever I saw one in the wild. This didn’t produce any results except for the fact that there were plenty of them in my area. This morning, I started the Buizel hunt by scouting locations where I’d seen Buizels before: in Obsidian Fieldlands, that’s Horseshoe Plains, Windspent Run, and Worn Bridge. For Cobalt Coastlands, it’s Aipom Hill and Bathers’ Lagoon. From my research, Obsidian Fieldlands is the best bet — specifically Horseshoe Plains and Worn Bridge.

Image: Game Freak/The Pokémon Company via Polygon

It’s easily where the most Buizels spawned — including an Alpha Buizel. I spent hours scouring these areas and caught a ton of Pokémon, around 30, before an Alpha Buizel spawned. Unfortunately, Dorian was not able to catch all of the Pokemon, save for one: Alpha.

If you’ve beaten the Noble Pokémon Kleavor, Alpha Pokémon can spawn in Obsidian Fieldlands, according to Serebii. Alpha Buizel is one such Pokémon; I found it in Horseshoe Plains, but I needed Basculegion, which is unlocked around rank three, to reach the island it was on.

Image: Game Freak/The Pokémon Company via Polygon

With multiple pasture’s worth of Buizels, I gave Dorian my Alpha, which satisfied him. As a journalist and investigative reporter, I continued to search for Buizels taller that 2 feet 8 inches in the Obsidian Fieldlands. In that same trip, I was able to find a Buizel who met this height requirement. It is believed that there were 10 of them. The annoying thing with this request is that you can’t check a Buizel’s size until you’ve returned back to the village and search your pastures. The best tip I have for you with this in mind is that you can check Buizel’s height in the pasture, by scrolling through the Pokémon’s summary; before I learned this, I was trying to give Dorian every goddamn Buizel only for them to be rejected each time.

It is possible to find big Buizels who are not Alphas. But from my extensive, painstaking research, I can tell you that they’re very rare. I would advise him to give the Alpha. Don’t cry. Be prepared to spend too many hours looking for Alpha. If you don’t trust me, trust the other people of the internet. I’m not the only person who’s struggled.

Dorian presented five Oran Berries to me and one piece candy in exchange for our participation in the Big Buizel/Little Buizel challenge. Like I said before, it was not worth the prize — save for the relief that I never have to catch a Buizel again. However, the bad news is that I’m still looking for Cherrims for my To Bloom or Not to Bloom request. This is equally terrible.