Evolve 1000 steps Pokémon
Image: Nintendo Life

One of the new features in Pokémon Scarlet & Violet is that there are certain Pokémon who will only level up once you've walked 1,000 steps with them. That doesn't sound too bad, does it? Unfortunately, it's worse than it seems, because it requires having that Pokémon out of its ball, and walking around with it... and our Pokémon have a tendency to either stop moving completely, or jumping back into their ball whenever they feel like it. It's a nightmare.

But smart Pokémon players are here to save the day, because it turns out that all you need to do is just hop on top of a Pokémon Center's roof, and your Pokémon will run around like headless Torchics trying to catch up to you.

We tried it out on top of the Los Platos Poké Center, and it worked just fine, but you may have to experiment to find one that you can reach. However, we weren't able to confirm how long it took, because we just let Pawmo run around for a while as we worked. It's longer than 10 minutes... we think.

Here's proof:

Evolve 1000 steps Pokémon
Image: Nintendo Life

Other, more involved tricks include running around the circumference of a tower, or just the old-fashioned method of running up and down a long stretch of road, but there's no guarantee with those methods that your Pokémon won't get stuck somewhere stupid and give up.

Is it a little cruel? No more cruel than making Pokémon fight, right? Not for some players: