How To Find Pascal In Animal Crossing: New Horizons

Pascal isn’t a newcomer to the Animal Crossing series, but he did make his first appearance in Animal Crossing: New Horizons after wave one of its summer update went live this week. The red sea otter loves scallops and will trade you DIY recipes in exchange for them. He can also gift you pearls, a rare crafting item requires for certain recipes, including the new mermaid set.

How To Find Pascal On Your Island

You can find Pascal while swimming and diving in your island’s oceans. If you don’t know how to do either yet, check out our Animal Crossing swimming guide for instructions on where to get a wet suit and how to swim.

He waits...
He waits…

Once you’re in the water and start diving for sea creatures, Pascal will eventually appear, but only when you find a scallop. He won’t appear every time you catch a scallop or even the first time–it’s random, and we’re not quite sure what the rate is, but it seems to only be once a day. It does seem like he can appear on your island alongside other special visitors, however. Leif was in my island’s town square on the same day I met Pascal.

Of course you can, Pascal.
Of course you can, Pascal.

When Pascal does approach you, he’ll ask you for the scallop you just found. If you choose to give it to him, he’ll reward you with a DIY recipe and probably say something philosophical before swimming off to the other side of the ocean barrier, where you can’t approach him or speak to him until the next encounter.

What To Do With Pearls

Pascal may gift you a pearl, which is a rare crafting material that will come in handy for making the mermaid set, which Pascal offers DIY recipes for in exchange for scallops. You can also find pearls while diving for sea creatures.

Should You Save Up Scallops For Pascal?

Scallops count as one of the new sea creatures you can find and donate to the museum, and you can also sell them to Nook’s Cranny for 1,200 bells. Since you can also trade them in for DIY recipes, it makes sense to hang onto them–however, we’re still trying to verify how trading scallops with Pascal works. At the moment, it seems he has a chance of appearing only when you catch one, and will give you the option to trade it in, which would make saving up scallops kind of pointless. But if it turns out you can encounter him as you would any other special visitor, like C.J. or Flick, then having scallops to trade in would be useful.

We will update this section once we can verify how trading with Pascal works.

GameSpot may get a commission from retail offers.