Pokémon and their accompanying items/clothes: Why does being shiny change the items' color, too? And why only for some species?

[Thagnoth]

As soon as I saw Shiny Mimikyu for the first time, I was confused. If Mimikyu is really the creature inside, then why is the costume the discolored part? This led me off on a huuuge tangent to find all the Pokémon whose clothes/items could be considered separate from the Pokémon, and to try and find an answer as to why some of their clothes/items are discolored along with the Shiny Pokémon! I've tried to make a list of Pokémon that are actually wearing clothes (i.e. Sewaddle, Mimikyu) or use items (i.e. Farfetch'd, Alakazam), not that simply appear to be (i.e. Diancie, Gardevoir, Raboot), and split them by whether or not their clothes/item changes color along with the Shiny form of that Pokémon.

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Pokémon's items/clothes do not change from normal to shiny:

Diglett & Dugtrio's Ever-Present Earth Rings

Meowth's Amulet Coin¹

Machamp's Power-Save Belt⁰

Kadabra's & Alakazam's Spoons

Cubone's & Marowak's ...Helmet¹

Happiny's Faux Egg; Chansey & Blissey's Eggs¹

Burmy & Wormadam's Leaf, Sand, and Trash Coats

Spiritomb's Keystone

Timburr's Squared Log, Gurdurr's Beam, and Conkeldurr's Concrete Columns

Throh's & Sawk's Belts²

Braixen & Delphox's Sticks

Flabébé's & Floette's Flowers (& Florges's floral mane...?)

Pancham's Chewing Leaf & Pangoro's Chewing Twig

Binacle's & Barbaracle's Rocks

Klefki's Keys

Comfey's Flowers

Passimian's Berries

Minior's Comet Shell

Grookey's & Thwackey's Sticks

Cramorant's... Meals

Alcremie's Berries

Snom's Ice Shell

Stonjourner's Earth Stains

Zarude's Dada Blanket :)

-----HONORABLE MENTIONS
Tyrogue's & Hitmontop's Bandages, and Hitmonchan's Tunic/Skirt. The bandages are white and the tunic is lavender whether the Pokémon's shiny or not, but nowhere does it say it's actually wearing a tunic or bandages that aren't part of their bodies. Hitmonlee is clearly wearing nothing, so it's curious where the bandages go and where the tunic/skirt comes from when they evolve. I'd say it's safe to say the punching gloves are just Hitmonchan's fists, though.
The Pearls in Primarina's Hair? I mean... they come off (or vanish) in the anime while Primarina uses Sparkling Aria, so, I dunno. Neither the starfishes nor the pearls have a different color in their shiny version, but this is just to match their nose's color. Hard to say!


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⁰{Machoke's Power-Save Belt has a shiny variation whose letter P is blue, rather than the un-shiny one's red letter P. (Shiny Machoke has blue eyes, opposed to normal Machoke's red eyes.) In Machamp, this difference doesn't exist, and they're both red!! (Machamp and Shiny Machamp both have red eyes, so their belts match their eye color.) How strange?}
¹{Note: Pokémon Home gets these ones wrong—their color is identical in every other sprite (except for the older generations with color limitations).}
²{Note: It is stated that Throh makes its belt with vines, and presumably Sawk does, too. Their Gi do not change color either, though, and are probably also clothes. Although, animators for detective Pikachu were conflicted on this: Nordby says there were about 25 Pokémon that were cut during the process after being deemed too complicated to translate. The martial arts fighter Sawk, for example, was discarded when animators failed to agree on the texture of its judo-inspired outfit. "For Pokémon, what might feel like clothes is actually skin," he says. "We would have hour-long conversations trying to wrap our heads around that." So, I dunno.(Also, I can't post links yet; check out the article at TIME. The title is Here's How Detective Pikachu Brought Pokémon Into the Real World}

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Pokémon's items/clothes are different colors in their shiny version:

Machoke's Power-Save Belt⁰

Farfetch'd's Stalk

Spoink's Clamperl Pearl

Sewaddle, Swadloon, and Leavanny's Leaf Clothes

Dwebble's Rock and Crustle's Squared Boulder

Oranguru's Fan³

Komala's Log⁴

Mimikyu's Costume⁵

Rillaboom's Drum Set⁶

Eiscue's Ice Cube Helmet



-----HONORABLE MENTIONS
Yamask's Mask or Shard, Runerigus' Vessel, & Cofagrigus' Coffin. While it's safe to say Yamask's objects were once items (The shard of a cursed painting that Yamask holds replaced their mask forcefully because of the powerful curse), it's unclear whether or not they still are truly separate items after being infused with the ghost. Cofagrigus and Runerigus evolve without the need of a spare coffin or giant rune painting laying around, so I think it's safe to say it's created during evolution as part of its body. The Pokédex says Cofagrigus eats gold nuggets, presumably to replenish the coffin.
Togepi's & Vullaby's Eggshell. I mean... It's technically a part of that Pokémon...? Sorta?
Zacian & Zamazenta's Armaments???

⁰{Machoke's Power-Save Belt has a shiny variation whose letter P is blue, rather than the un-shiny one's red letter P. (Shiny Machoke has blue eyes, opposed to normal Machoke's red eyes.) In Machamp, this difference doesn't exist, and they're both red!! (Machamp and Shiny Machamp both have red eyes, so their belts match their eye color.) How strange?}
³{Note: This one's understandable, since it's made from its own fur and leaves. The pattern on the fan matches Oranguru's striped tufts.}
⁴{Note: This Pokémon doesn't actually change color when it's shiny, and only their items change color. But Komala's Log doesn't really count, since we all know the log IS the Pokémon! The koala attached is obviously just how the log imagines it looks while it's dreaming. Found an article about this hypothesis, if you wanna look it up.}
⁵{Side Note: Why does Mimikyu's shiny form not imitate shiny Pikachu? We know from Mimi-tan that the costume, though certainly a part of the ghost, is more like its clothing—Mimi-tan or Mimikins has a patch of non-shiny Mimikyu presumably to mend damage to its original costume before it died. If a Mimikyu was lucky enough to see how much attention a shiny Pikachu got, it would surely try to copy to get more attention itself. But then I guess that'd make it the only Pokémon who didn't have a real shiny form, and instead chooses to be shiny when it sees a shiny Pikachu. So maybe it just reflects its unique color (which we can't see lest we probably die) when it makes its costume, as a design choice?}
⁶{Note: The Rillaboom probably intentionally decorates its drum set to match its color scheme, so it's not strange that the item changes color in this case.}

If you're down here, this concludes both lists!

TL;DR: Some Pokémon carry items or wear clothes. When that Pokémon is shiny, sometimes their choice of clothes/item reflects that! Anyone wanna discuss why that might be, or which is your favorite? Are there any that I missed or that I'm wrong about?

 

[Thagnoth]

Apparently it automatically alters the spelling for Yamask's evolution. Neat?

 

[Sheep]

That's really interesting and not something I've ever thought about! I wonder to what extent the shiny designers realize this when designing. I'm hopeful it's all thought through because so many Pokémon shinies are based on certain things that have similar colors in real life, but I do wonder how their accessories and other trinkets translate to that.

Here's an interesting video from a series that Lockstin & Gnoggin does that explains the shinies from generation I:



But that usually doesn't include accessories/clothing. For Fardetch'd for example he cited the pink-headed duck, but the leek itself has no involvement in that reference. I do wonder why the colors swap.

 

[Thagnoth]

Oh, nice! So the Gen 1 sprites that didn't get custom-tailored just got bad RNG, XD, and their items were just modified along with the sprite.

(I'm spending way too much time on this XD)
Post-Commentary:

Some of the changes were retconned by sprite artists in later generations, like Diglett and Dugtrio's ever-present dirt ring (now that it's brought to my attention, I guess it was inconsistent of me to include Stonjourner's earth stains and not Diglett's earth rings? :P)

Machoke was given a belt to wear in Generation 2. In the normal sprite, it's entirely red to match the stripes on its arms. When its arms and eyes got color shifted, the belt went with it. Machamp was yet to be given a belt in Gen 2, instead getting his all the way in Gen 4! In Gen 3, though, his shiny sprite had already been given red eyes to match non-shiny—so I suppose, for color cohesion, they chose not to make the shiny belt blue. Machamp and Machoke's skin color is a whole 'nother story, seeming completely different until Gen 4 finally decided they were pale purple and grey.

Hitmonchan's tunic/skirt was color shifted in Gen 2, but once later Gens were capable of handling sprites with more color variation, the tunic/skirt got fixed to be lavender, to match the Pokémon TCG art. For some reason, I guess the sprite artists considered the tunic/skirt to be separate from her actual body, and kept it lavender on the shiny version, too. Also, from the video, I noticed a similar thing may have happened to tangela's shoes/feet? Edit: I'm delusional—tangela's shoes have always stayed the same color for all sprites, just normal red. :P

I could go on, but in general, the great sprite-artistry retcon has forever made its mark. The ones that irk me the most and don't seem to have any explanation are Dwebble/Crustle and Sewaddle/Swadloon/Leavanny—at least Spoink's psychic connection to its pearl could maybe alter its color (or it just prefers pearls that match its existing color scheme), or similar explanations could go for Farfetch'd and Mimikyu.

Thanks, Sheep! :D

 

[Fairy]

Wow, I gotta say, I really appreciate your work on this thread, Thagnoth. It was a good read and honestly should be a Daily article.