Blue Cookie Touch Caves RPG

Blue Cookie Touch Caves RPG

 One happy summer day Blue Cookie Touch the pony creator OC and his best-ish friend Flamerunner were mucking about on the small Island of Desertedness when they stumbled across Spike the samurai and Eric the soldier. Applejack the thief was there too but nobody could find him for some reason.

"Happy birthday, Eric!"

"Cookie, it is nowhere near my-"

"Want to go on a magical birthday adventure for Big Apple Ponycon?"

Eric, sighed, and shrugged. Blue Cookie, being the positive thinker that he is, took this as a yes.

"Yay!"

"Wait, nobody asked me about my opinion. Do I matter?" asked Spike, anxiously fiddling with his little claws. Flamerunner glared at the pudgy dragon and tightly gripped his Holy Lance™.


"Blue Cookie is the leader here, so keep your little lizard mouth shut and let us do the deciding."


 Spike grumbled several obscenities under his breath at the insolence of this bigmouth as the party formed a line, Blue Cookie Touch being at the front, of course. Spike was right behind him, with Eric Ludwig in the rear and Flamerunner at the very, very back. He did not like this arrangement one bit.

 And they were off! The small party wandered around the tiny island, admiring the stubby stone walls that surrounded the southern portion for no good reason and doing nothing in particular. This lasted for several moments until Eric noticed something unusual.


"Do my eyes deceive me, or-"

"Hush, Eric." Flame interrupted, I'm the lookout guy here, so you let me do the noticing things."


 Eric rolled his eyes, and Flamerunner smiled.


"Good boy. Now, Cookie!"

"Yes, Flameypoo?"

"I think that's a chest over there. Maybe we can open it up and get some loot?"

"Jolly good idea!"


 The party rushed over to the chest, only to discover too late that it was actually a door in the middle of nowhere. In an entirely irrational and unsurprising turn of events, it led to some weird place called. "Ruins of Brony Universe". For a so-called ruin it was actually quite nice: a green meadow with a bunch of tiny houses, surrounded by tiny little towers and occupied by ponies that were way too big for them.

"Hey, Welcome Back, Blue
While you were gone, The mane6
And I were building the town."

"Wat." Spike was confused, as was everybody else. His love had obviously overdosed on her medication or something, so he decided to leave her alone before she threw up on him like she did last time.


They just started to walk away from her when suddenly-

RANDOM ENCOUNTER OUT OF NOWHERE

"Oh gawd it's Chrysalis!" screamed Blue Cookie as he stood face to face with the changeling queen.

 Things looked bad. It was early in the adventure, everybody was on level one, this was a boss level character, and everybody sucked but him. Eric carefully began to examine his fellow adventurers when he noticed something very strange.


"We don't have any skills? That sucks."

"At the same time, I'm not all that surprised." snickered Spike, who was once again treated to one of Flame's nasty glares.

"Well then, we might as well-"

Blue Cookie Touch, being the genius that he was, knew exactly what to do.

"ATTACK!!!!!!!!!!!11"

 "But!-"

 It was too late; they had no choice but to battle their mighty foe. To flee was absolutely out of the question, because that would mean that they were wimps or something. Eric Ludwig picked up his mighty axe and charged, swinging it ferociously at the foe and not giving a hoot about that old rule, "Don't hit girls".

300-SOMETHING DAMAGE

CHRYSALIS IS DEFEATED

"WTF"

"Hey, at least we have loot!" exclaimed Flamerunner, who picked up two battleaxes that Chrysalis dropped after dying. Blue Cookie excitedly rushed over to them, only to be met with disappointment.


"I can't use this awesome weapon," he cried.

"That's because you don't have hands like us. Dragons/humans masterrace 2013"

"But then why can my friend Flamerunner use his Holy Lance™ if he has hooves like me?" asked Cookie.

"It's my birthday, so shut up."

"Okay."


 Then they decided to explore some more. They met a creepy girl who wanted to play cookie poker with Blue Cookie (an idea which made his face glow strangely), the Cutie Mark Crusaders who kidnapped Shining Armor to work in some mining place, and visited Rainbow Dash's really boring grass house. Flamerunner also kept flashing his Dragon Shield at Spike, which scared him quite a bit.

Since there was nothing else to do they decided to go back to town, and got killed in a random encounter with a walking box. Good riddance.

Starswirl Academy Debut Trailer

Starswirl Academy

 About time they released a trailer for Starswirl Academy, and it has everything you might expect. Humanized ponies in schoolgirl outfits, pretty backgrounds, synthesized music, etc. Now about that protagonist...it's probably for the better if I don't say that much about him, although I'm honestly not all that surprised. At least this is almost guaranteed to turn out better than, ahem, that other pony visual novel did.

I would write more, but things are kinda hectic around here; the boiler room flooded while the cat was taking a dump in it. Needless to say, she got more of a shock than you will when you discover the main character's identity.

New Fighting is Magic Build at CG

Mane6, creators of Fighting is Magic, are doing quite a bit of stuff at Canterlot Gardens as many of you have probably heard. They have a panel, and will be livestreaming a new build of the game (with Rainbow Dash included) at the con. You can see the stream here, or on their website. Also, tomorrow they'll be hosting a massive Fighting is Magic tournament starting at 12pm, with prizes. The competition may get heated - too bad I'm not there, because I would definitely take first place (not really).

Starswirl Academy at the Crystal Fair

Starswirl Academy

 Strangely enough for a visual novel, the identity of Starswirl Academy's protagonist has remained unknown ever since its unveiling, with the promise that they'd reveal him "soon enough". Now that they're holding a panel at the Crystal Fair in Saint Louis, we might finally get some answers. They're showing off a demo of the project at 11:00 am CST on Saturday, and afterwards the demo shall be released for the general public to play. Now, hopefully they remember to release OS X and Linux builds of the demo...

 Come to think of it, I'd be rather amused if the demo never actually revealed anything about the main character, or featured an entirely different protagonist from the real thing.

Rise of the Clockwork Stallions BUCK Edition

  
Rise of the Clockwork Stallions

 As a promotion for ongoing BUCK convention, Darkera Studios has decided to release a special demo for Rise of the Clockwork Stallions, along with a trailer featuring art from the talented DragonGirl983. Thing is, given that this is a special demo you only have until Tuesday, August 27th to download it before the link is taken down, so you should probably pick it up as soon as possible. There's also a fancy wallpaper for those of us whose desktops lack six-eyed robots, which can be found here.

There's also a trailer for their Magic Shards remake, but it deserves its own dedicated post so I'll put it up later.

Filly Gamez at BronyCon

 
Filly Gamez

 Conveniently, a video of Filly Gamez's BronyCon panel was just released on Youtube, in which they finally admit the truth about their shutting down (which had to do with that unofficial Flash port we posted a while back) and showcase some footage from their new game, A Foal's Errand. Unlike their previous effort it actually appears to be pretty good, although unfortunately there's no indication as to when it will be released online.

There used to be some other stuff in this post, but I removed it for being flamewar bait.

EQG at Everfree Wrap-up

Successful con? Definitely.

A huge round of brohoofs to all of you who turned out and made Everfree Northwest a rousing success! Everyone we met was cheerful and upbeat, and even if you didn't run into our little delegation, we hope you had a fantastic time. 

Pony gaming was in full swing at the 24-hour gaming room when we arrived, and between Super Smash Bros., karaoke, ponified games of Magic: the Gathering and the Fighting is Magic leaked beta, it stayed packed the whole day. We even witnessed a few massive sing-a-longs. 

Unfortunately, due to Enigma's underhanded tactics and the severe lack of best pony in the game at the time of the leak, I lost our Equestria Gaming Fighting is Magic grudge match. Good thing the con comes around again in less than a year - hope to see you all there!

Horse Game and more at BronyCAN 2014

Horse Game

 The development team behind Horse Game, a 3D game about... something, will be hosting a panel at BronyCAN 2014 next weekend. The Horse Game panel begins at 3PM on Saturday, and will feature the developers as they (as described in the press release) showcase gameplay, detail the development process, and explain their goals for where this project will lead.

 Pre-registration for the event closes tonight at midnight, for those interested in attending. Other games present include Twilight Sparkle's Secret Shipfic Folder, which will be on sale in the dealers' hall, and Legends of Equestria.

Equestria Gaming at Everfree NW

Yeah, you heard that right. Enigma and I have dipped into the vast EQG treasury and chartered a plane from  our headquarters in rural Mongolia, and thus will be seeing you all at Seattle's first annual pony convention. We'll be there all day on Sunday the 19th, and might be hanging out around the gaming room. We won't be doing any panels or interviews, just seeing the sights - so if you see us, don't hesitate to come up and say hello!

Megamare X

Megamare X

 For those of us who either went to BronyCon or were following @NebularFusion on Twitter this is already old news, but the nature of Starlight Studios' Project Cygnus was revealed via playable demo at the convention to be a sidescrolling action game named Megamare X (cashing in on the name that MegaPony should have taken long ago). I haven't come across any clear pictures of the gameplay itself, but the overall reaction from those that have played the demo seems to be positive. And don't worry; according to the official post on the subject the game will available for download on their website, and will have builds for Mac OS X and Linux thanks to it using a souped up version of the MLP:Online engine.

The original post on the subject can be found here. Also, I'm having some trouble finding recordings of the various fangame panels (along with Stable Softworks' infamous "fnagame"), or details on A Foal's Errand. If any of you happen to have anything, post it in the comments and I'll throw it up on the site.

BronyCon 2013: Friday

BronyCon Stream

 BronyCon is off to a raring start, and thankfully there are quite a few fangame-related panels on today's schedule. First off, at 11:30 AM EDT in the Hall of Dusk there is the panel for Guild of Unicorns: A Game Project, which should be fairly interesting as it is for a fairly unknown fangame. I myself have never heard of before, but apparently the creator been interviewed on Derpy Hooves News a while back so his game is probably decent enough. Then at 4:30 PM one can see the Ponycraft: Tainted Skies panel (again in the Hall of Dusk), and at 6:00 PM one can play a build of the game in the Baltimare Arcade. Also at 6:00 PM one can find the Outside the Stable Softworks panel in the Hall of Dawn, where you can learn how to make your very own fnagame (whatever that is). Also, make sure to check out the Starlight Studios booth in the games room to check out their Project Cygnus demo.

 For those of us who are unable to attend BronyCon, there's always the official livestream. Hopefully I'll be able to attend the con someday...



There's also a Ponychan panel at 4:30 PM in the Hall of Dawn, but nobody gives a hoot about Ponychan these days because it sucks.

A Foal's Errand

A Foal's Errand Announcement

 After a hiatus of decent length, Filly Gamez has proclaimed that they are "rising from the ashes" and are releasing a brand-new game at BronyCon, titled A Foal's Errand. Unsurprisingly, it is a visual novel, and from what little I've seen I must say that it doesn't look half-bad. Hopefully the team will have learned from the mistakes they made in Welcome to Ponyville, although I'm still a little worried that it'll still end up being an unnecessarily massive download like the original. They also mentioned that it'll feature "a little horror", which should be at least somewhat interesting (as long as they handle it better than they did in WtP).

Anyhow, below the break you can find a screenshot of the game, a vector of Sethisto throwing up, and a sneak peak for a very special surprise...

A screenshot of Applebloom talking, obviously.

 

There's something wrong with that tail... 

 

You can probably guess as to what this is. We'll probably post about it in a few days, don't worry ;)

Starlight Studios: Project Cygnus

 

Project Cygnus

 The team behind MLP:Online, now Starlight Studios, game have been working hard since December on Project Cygnus. The game itself, and its development, has been kept secret and shrouded in mystery, but not anymore! We are pleased to announce that at BronyCon 2013, you'll be able to play the demo at their table in the games room. Find out the secret behind the lemons between Aug 2nd - Aug 4th or lose your chance, for it will not be released online.

Be sure to follow @NebularFusion on Twitter for announcements regarding Project Cygnus. Also, you should totally check out their awesome new website at http://www.starlightstudios.org/.

Dashcon Simulator 2014

Sort of pony related, I guess?

One of these days I should just retire from EqG or something: it's not like I even post anything these days.

Cheerio,
- Tuxxy

Review:Adventure Ponies

Adventure Ponies

It is not often that the Hub releases official My Little Pony games, and when it does they are usually simple little puzzle games intended for the target audience or underused pony creation utilities. The problem isn't that the games are bad, it's that your average Brony doesn't find them all that interesting. But all this changed a couple weeks back when the Hub announced an 8-bit pony platformer. It was supposed to be exclusively for attendees of the San Diego Comic Con but somepony kindly leaked the code to Equestria Daily (the code is HUBMLP8BIT by the way). Now you probably know what comes next...

It's review time, obviously! Check out our review after the break.

At it's core Adventure Ponies is a rather simplistic platformer. You start out with Twilight Sparkle as your character and unlock the other ponies with their own abilities (well, except for Rarity: she's a Twilight clone). Twilight and Rarity can both teleport when standing on special bases and fire magic projectiles, Applejack can climb ladders and use a powerful buck attack, Pinkie Pie can also use ladders and fire exploding balloons from her party cannon, and Rainbow Dash can fly and use a ramming attack. Meanwhile Fluttershy is ridiculously overpowered as she can both fly and use a hard-hitting stare attack that will have any boss begging for mercy (and make brick walls crumble to the ground).

The game features six levels, although you will find that the levels undergo slight modifications depending on which pony you play as. Scattered around the level are apples that you can collect to increase your score, hearts to replenish health, and extra lives. There is also a timer for each stage that will give you bonus points when you beat the clock, and at the level's end a boss shall be found. Overall it's pretty standard stuff, but the old formula has withstood the test of time and remains fun as ever.

I must say that the 8-bit graphics are quite well done and have a nice, retro feel. It actually feels like a game that one would play on an Nintendo Entertainment System or another older console, a feel that most of our 8-bit fangames lack except for Story of the Blanks. Come to think of it several boss levels use a parallax scrolling effect in the background which looks pretty but probably would have been impossible for a NES to handle. This is not a bad thing (especially when you consider my infamous love for that visual effect), but it might end up offending some ultra-sensitive retro games out there. As for the music...it's just there. Not particularly memorable music I might add, but at least it doesn't get annoying after being played over and over for most stages.

The game sounds pretty good so far, eh? It is, but sadly there are a couple issues that detract from the overall experience. First off, jumping feels somewhat off, making precise landings difficult, and for some strange reason the clouds are slippery! Even if you land on a cloud (which can be fairly difficult in itself) you might slide right off and fall to your death, and since the game has no savepoints you'll have to start the level all over again. Eventually one gets used to the weird controls, but for your first couple playthroughs you'll feel a strong urge to ragequit (thankfully it's not quite as frustrating as Crazy Pony).

In conclusion we must say that Adventure Ponies is a great game. The 8-bit style looks fantastic, the gameplay is fun, it has bosses, it's official, etc etc. If it weren't for the maddening controls and those slippery clouds I would have had no complaints about this game, but since these get in the way of the fun I'm going to have to give this game a 7/10. Sorry Hasbro!

...What? It's not like 7/10 is a low score, right?

Game: Quickspell

Download it Here!
Note: You'll need 7zip or similar extraction software to play on Windows, plus additional software to play on Mac or Linux. 

If you were at Everfree NW this past weekend (it was an absolute blast, by the way), you may have noticed this game being played extensively in the Gaming Room. It's called Quickspell, and it was created in 48 hours by Sind and Amadiro for the Crystal Games Challenge. It was programmed using the LÖVE Framework, and features sprites from Urimas and music from RoccoW.

The game is a simple two-player game where the object is to knock your opponent off their pillar using magic. During each players' offensive turn, they cast up to four different spells using either the arrow keys or WASD. The other player must cast defensive spells that correspond to the color of the spell being cast. If the defensive spells are correct and are timed well, very little damage will be taken.

Quickspell is a very fun and quick multiplayer game, and it's still in development. I'll definitely be watching for the revamped version of this game. Edit: Download link updated to newer version.

Pon-E3 Promo Video!

Yes folks, we just went though the trouble of putting together another of those trailers just to reveal who is attending Pon-E3. Why didn't we just put it in text like the other announcements? Because videos have been scientifically proven by totally reliable sources to be 20% cooler then plain text when used for announcements, that's why! And if you disagree with us, you can take it up with my cat (he's quite smart you know).

Anyhow, the event will start at 6:00am, PST on July 13, and end at 6:00pm, PST on the 14th. The entire thing will take place online and it won't cost you a cent to drop in. And in case you want a detailed schedule of the event you can find it at https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TlIHQqEOlpF_y5LGVekI8LizpRcU5Gq3NMgwnV8WcAE/edit?pli=1.

See you there!

TODAY:Legends of Equestria's Open Server Weekend

Legends of Equestria

  As announced last month, the Legends of Equestria Open Server Weekend begins today after their Everfree Northwest panel ends at 6:30PM PST, although it looks like their server isn't able to handle the excitement and thus their website is down right now. Not all is lost though, as we were able to grab some download links and information about the game's current state to make things a bit easier for you. Hopefully the game's servers will be able to handle the huge amount of traffic that this will generate...

 Even if the event isn't live just yet, you can download the game client in the meantime so you can be ready the moment it's live. Downloads and copypasta after the break!

Downloads:
Windows
Mac
Linux (I know, right?)

Here are some things you can do in the game!
Customize your pony with our new mare and stallion models, new hair styles, and eyelashes
Buttercup and Bluebell the Wearable Items mares are ready to get you all dressed up!
Explore Ponyville
Explore Sweet Apple Acres
Explore the inside of Golden Oaks Library, Sugarcube Corner, and Carousel Boutique
Explore the Everfree Forest and go face to face with the Timberwolves! Look out for Zecora's Hut and the Moon Castle Ruins!
Visit majestic Canterlot! Have you talked to Astral Charm lately? I hear she's looking for you!
Dance your heart out!
Earth Ponies can do the "Ground Pound" attack
Unicorns can do the "Firebolt" attack and teleport
Pegasi can do a barrel roll in mid-air by pressing Q or E and a loop-de-loop by pressing R

Here's a helpful list of commands!
/listfriends Lists all your friends.  

/logout Logs out of the game.

/players Lists all the players in the room.  

/help Lists all the commands. 

/report <player name> Lets you report a player to the moderators. You can also click on a pony to report them.  

/playervisible <true/false> Toggles your player invisible for you only, everyone else can still see you. 

/cinemacamera <true/false> Your player will disappear and the camera turns into a camera-fly mode.  

/time <##> Sets the game time. 0-24. 

/stand Makes your pony stand.  

/sit Makes your pony sit. 

/dance Makes your pony dance.  

/unwearall Removes all items from your pony. 

/facehoof Makes your pony facehoof.  

/inventory Opens your inventory. 

Esc opens up the main menu
W, A, S, D to run
Shift + W, A, S, D to walk
Double tap W to sprint or fly faster
Double tap Spacebar to fly
Q, E to do a barrel roll
R to do a loop-de-loop
Arrow keys or holding down and dragging middle mouse button moves the camera
Scroll wheel zooms in and out 

Visit Maplesweet in Ponyville to get the elusive Dandelion Bracelet!

Do the "High Time for Pie Time" quest from Geizhufe in Canterlot to get the fancy pie tin hat!

Game Developer's Panel at BroNYCon

Edit: And it's over. Hope you enjoyed the stream!

In a little under half an hour the Pony Game Developer's panel will be airing, featuring various developers of fangames talking about their projects and exhibiting them. I'm really excited for this particular panel and what it promises to reveal to us, and after it's done we will post a summary of new and interesting things from it for all you that can't watch for some reason. If you can we would highly advise to put away whatever you're doing, sit down and watch the stream.

Enjoy!

Welcome to Ponyville at Bronycon + Interview

Filly Gamez

A little while back Filly Gamez (the developers of that visual novel Welcome to Ponyville) announced that a couple of their team members are attending BroNYCon. Specifically Raish Dash and Writers Block are going, and they will be on the game developer's panel in the tail hall at 2:00pm. Apparently they're answering questions about the game (most of which will probably be on the romance feature) and will present a playable demo for everypony to check (which most of you will presumably use to test romance). They also said they will be handing out free vinyls to fans of the game, although I'm guessing that they will have a limited supply so try and get a hold of one as quick as possible.

Oh yeah, they also had an interview with The Lighting Round podcast. Find it after the break!