UK PonyCon details announced!

This is a very brief post as I don't have time for a longer one, but the essential details are that UK PonyCon 2017 will take place on 22-23 October at the Exhibition and Conference Centre of the UWE in Bristol. Tickets are not yet on sale, but will be released on Saturday 6 May. Here's hoping the convention enjoys another excellent iteration!

Pony Music Library 41: "Someone Like Me"

Surprise! I haven't given up on the PML at all. I just haven't happened to have had a time when my being motivated to induct something coincides with the time I have to do so. Now I do, even if today's entry is one some of you will have been expecting me to post since the start...

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What? "Someone Like Me"

Who? Aviators

Which? Original song

When? June 2013

Why? Oh, come on – who do you think's choosing these entries? A lovely ballad, set before the Mane Six become a thing. Fluttershy begins it with feelings of loneliness and frustration, but by the end she's both embraced her uniqueness and discovered true friendship. I'm a big Aviators fan anyway (what, you can tell?) but this is way up the list of his songs. It's gentle and warm and everything Fluttershy should be.

Text Review Roundup: "A Flurry of Emotions"

I have to admit to finding this particular shot adorable

Thank goodness it's a one-episode week this time! I suppose I'd better enjoy this relative peace, given what's coming up in the way of early Canadian releases. :P I can't find a review by Cuddlepug this time; there also isn't one by Thrond Media Pony Corner, or at least wasn't when I was writing this last night. On the plus side, the Super Mario blog has updated in time for TRR this week. (To bring you up to speed: they felt E01 was "incredible" but E02 was "meh".) Back to the Flurrysode!

ArthurCrane – mixed (has its moments and is quite cute, but "just doesn't have the same appeal" [as "Baby Cakes"])

Batbrony Reviews – extremely positive ("this episode was a blast ... immensely enjoyable")

Derpy News – fairly positive (graded B+; "good episode ... some issues")

Louder Yay – positive (three stars; "a solid-but-not-spectacular [episode]")

MLEEP Reviews – fairly positive (7.5/10; "managed to surprise me")

One Man's Pony Ramblings – fairly positive (fun fluff despite poor moral)

The Super Mario Brony Blog – very positive (four stars; "fantastic and memorable portrayals from Twilight and her niece")

Super Recaps – mixed ("plenty to like" but moral "depressingly simplistic and judgmental")

TheDragonWarlock – fairly positive (graded B; "good character developments for Twilight" but "minor annoyances")

And so, the first Flashfic 150 comes to an end

Text Review Roundup will appear tomorrow.

It's certainly been quite the learning experience for me! At first I wasn't sure whether anyone would be interested, then I had to keep up with queries and suggestions during the event itself, and finally I got myself into a little bit of a pickle over feedback (tl;dr version: some people weren't expecting so much of it, while others couldn't get enough).

Despite these little wrinkles, though, there does seem to be enough interest in the concept for me to keep running with it. I'll probably tweak one or two things next time – such as allowing people to state on their entries whether or not they want feedback – but the general format will remain the same. The 150-word limit is certainly staying, as it's something a bit different.

The winner was Pascoite, who submitted this lovely Celestia piece and now gets the chance to choose the prompt for the May contest. I hope the experience I've gained over the last few weeks will allow me to improve the way I handle forthcoming events. And of course, if anyone's reading this and is thinking of having a go: you'd be very welcome to join us!

Ponyfic Roundup 154: Spotlight on The Immortal Game

Two wins out of two for Worcestershire at the start of the County Championship season. Joe Leach's ten wickets against Northants is good and it's bad. He's a great bowler and seems to be a good captain, but he's also going to be a target for the posher clubs soon. Still, promotion does seem a possibility this year.

Read it Later story count: 447 (+1)

Remember me saying that I never DNF a story? Well, here's the proof! I began reading The Immortal Game as part of my ill-fated liveblogging experiment a couple of years ago. It really nagged at me that I hadn't finished it, so I resolved to do so. And eventually I did. This is a review I should really have written a long time ago, especially as it's of a much longer fic than I usually read. (For those who care, my next 300k story will be Through the Well of Pirene, but don't expect a review of that for many months to come.)

The Immortal Game by AestheticB
Celestia, Luna, Mane Six and OCs
Adventure/Dark; 297k words; Oct 2011–Jan 2013; Mature (Gore)

Princess Luna leads the Elements of Harmony against the corrupted Twilight Sparkle

This is one of those "an old enemy has awoken" stories – although in this case, it isn't just the one. This means a good deal of fighting – and be warned, that M rating is there for a reason. There are a lot of detailed, graphic fight scenes. Actually rather too many, I think. Most of the canon characters are pretty solid for the time they were written, although the OCs are rather variable and I find one or two of the backstories hard to credit. Technically, it starts iffy and gets better, like Fallout: Equestria does, so it's worth pushing through. There are niggles, but by the end nothing deal-breaking. It goes on a bit for my liking, but manages a three-star rating for being grimdark without being gratuitous. ★★★

I'll talk a little bit more, which means spoilers, after the break.

Some news from UK PonyCon

UK PonyCon comms supremo daisyd has posted this update on the convention's forum. It's not the announcement of any specific details, but it is (to my eyes, anyway) a reassuring and sensible piece. One major change from last year is that the con has moved to the limited company setup that several other events use. That's a sign of UK PonyCon's success, so it's a good thing! There's also a very reasonable reminder that, just because UKPC might have got a venue very fast last year, that doesn't mean it's always going to be that way.

I still very much want to go to the convention again, having had such a wonderful time there in the past, but I'm happy to wait and see what gets announced before making any firmer plans than that. Whatever the case, I wish UK PonyCon 2017 every success. They've earned it.

Episode review: S7E03: "A Flurry of Emotions"

It's looking as though we're in for another example of the US not getting an episode first. The UK doesn't have the honour this time, though: episode five will be shown in Canada next Sunday, the day after E04 and six days before it airs south of the border. EqD is now reporting that the same thing will happen with E06. I haven't yet decided what to do about review scheduling here.

"They'll be dancing on air when they meet you..."

Back to episode three now! I'll confess that I wasn't looking forward all that much to "A Flurry of Emotions". This was partly since I hadn't really warmed to Flurry herself and partly because I was fearful of a rehash of "Baby Cakes", one of my all-time least favourite episodes. We had new writers for this ep: Sammie Crowley and Whitney Wetta. They'd apparently worked together before on The Loud House, but that meant nothing to me. How did they do? Well...