Question: How would one evolve a Pokémon through friendship now?

Apologies for any typos, I'm typing this from my 3DS. The keyboard is just... bleh.

It's been bugging me for a while, but, uh, the title. How would you evolve if you were, say, a Riolu, if there were little to no humans anywhere? Would you evolve via a Soothe Bell and leveling (or some other item like the Sun Ribbon from PMD), bonding with another Pokémon, or still only be able to evolve by befriending a human? It wouldn't leave much choice to anyone who creates a Pokémon that evolves in this way if it were still only by human... I think there's less than five on teams as of now, and I haven't heard anything about them opening recently.

I believe that the "friendship" requirement can loosely be interpreted as simply being joyful; that is, the Riolu would evolve if he or she felt true happiness on a very deep level, which could either be triggered by an event of some kind, or by feeling a constant sort of joy. Because the idea of the "friendship" evolution method is making the Pokemon happy.

Mind you, this is speculation and I could be wrong. However, if memory serves correctly, others have interpreted this evolution requirement in the same way.

Azelf's explanation would be sufficient, I think.

OK, that works. Thank you.

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