Pokemon-Y: O-Powers and Earning Lots of Poke $$$

In my opinion, O-Powers are VERY poorly explained in the game.  I hope this clears up a few things about O-Powers. ^^

O-Powers
Can I say screw Mr. Bonding and his terrible explaining skills?  I did not understand O-Powers at all for almost my entire time of gameplay.  I always thought he was just this weird guy you would find in a hotel room and he would *ahem*, "bond" with you when the screen turned black.  I'd be left wondering what inappropriate things he was doing to me in the dark...  After bonding time, he would give me some kind of bonding power that I didn't know how to use.

Back to the topic, O-Powers are found on the PSS (Player Search System) screen that's located on the bottom screen of the 3DS.  Simply toggle with the R or L buttons to get there.

PSS screen

Once there, click on the icon circled in red.

This screen should pop up.  If not, click the arrow to the right to get to it.  Click the 'O-Power' icon.

This screen should show up presenting you with all the O-Powers you've collected from Mr. Bonding.  The bottom part of the screen shows a sort of battery kind of feature with several circles that are highlighted green.  This is like a gauge.  When you use O-Powers, it takes a toll of around 2-5 or more 'green circles' when you use O-Powers on yourself.  The toll is less when you're generous and use it on other players/friends. 

The effects of these O-Powers last 3 minutes each.

There's also a timer clock on the far right of this bar and as the seconds go by, the 'O-Power Battery' slowly recharges.  It actually refills quickly.

One of my personal favorite O-Powers is the "Prize Money Power."  I'll tell you why in a bit...

I only recently got Prize Money Power Lv.2.  I didn't know it existed until now...

 

 You can see here it states the toll for using it on yourself and for others.  It's 5 circles for yourself and 3 circles for others.

Here I clicked on Prize Money Power Lv.2.  My 'Prize Money Power' leveled up after using it several times.

So here's the deal.  Most people who've played Pokemon already know about the 'Amulet Coin' and how if there's a pokemon in your party that's holding it AND participates in the battle, the prize money will double.  Well what if you could add even more money to that?

I've been using my Prize Money Power while battling the Elite-4 and it's significantly raised my Poke-cash winnings.  Here's the layout of how much I earned in different scenarios with the amulet coin attached:

- Without Prize Money Power: Around 15000 for each of the Elite-4 members and around 20000 from Champion Diantha

-  Prize Money Power Lv.1: Around 26000 from each of the Elite-4 and around 30000 from Champion Diantha (sorry, don't remember...)

- Prize Money Power Lv.2: 52000 from each of the Elite-4 and 65280 from Champion Diantha

As you can see, by using O-Powers the amount of money increases significantly.  So please, use your O-Powers while playing throughout the game and increase your earnings.  Another way to earn extra money is by going to the Battle Chateau and issuing a Writ so more NPC's are available in it.  The Writ expires at midnight so if you want to make the most of it (it costs 50000), issue the Writ as early as you can. 

What's so great about extra money you ask?  Well, I guess it depends on the player.  Personally, I enjoy buying clothes from boutiques in the game and dressing up my character.  There's also the 'star' restaurants in Lumiose City that require you to pay a fee to get into the 'nicer' areas of the restaurant to possibly battle more NPC's.  Although the Pokemon League is my personal favorite way to level up pokemon.  

And O-Powers are not only good for earning extra Poke-cash, but it's also good for hatching eggs faster, increasing exp points, raising attack stats for battles, and much more.

I hope that this explanation was helpful to you.  

Here's a few more tips I'd like to share:

1.) The soothe bell isn't necessary for evolving Eevee into an Espeon or Umbreon.  So if you somehow lose it through trading (as I did), don't panic!  Pokemon amie works just fine for getting an Eevee to evolve.  A good way is to breed an Eevee at the Pokemon Daycare and with the newly hatched Lv.1 Eevee, play with it in Pokemon amie until it has at least 1 heart level.  My Eevee evolved into an Espeon during the day when I did this and I only had to level it up to Lv.10.

2.) Pay close attention to Pokemon 'natures', especially if you're going to get a special Pokemon like a legendary or an exclusive like Charmander, Squirtle, etc.  Make sure it's a desirable nature before you take the pokemon.  NOTE: You can always save before the scene where you get the pokemon so you can turn off your 3DS and start over if the nature of the pokemon is undesirable.

3.) IMPORTANT!: Try to refrain from saving in Lumiose City, especially outside.  I heard that there's a game glitch that can ruin your save file if you save outside while in Lumiose City.  I personally stay away from saving in that city at all.

4.) If you want to fill up your pokedex early, an easy way to do it is to go on Wonder Trade which is one of the icons besides O-Powers.  You can offer up any pokemon you want to Wonder Trade and you'll get random pokemon back.  Beware though, you don't know what you'll get in return (meaning it's not exactly a fair trade) so don't go sending off your rares and legendaries on Wonder Trade.  Some people are nice and give decent offers but there's always the chance of getting that lame Bidoof-us.  lol