This looks fantastically interesting.  Will be looking forward to reading the instant I get the chance.  

I always want that the good stories should never end, so I am very glad that "The Empty Room" gets is a sequel, but you have to fill in very large foot stomp. I hope it will turn out good.

I've never heard of your work before but lets see how this jazz flies!

Sequel to TER? (and great opening chapter)

WD blogged it?

Alicorn Twilight group?

Inb4 Featured (woo i got to say it first )

And so came the Game, a ritual competition where powers disputing the patronage and prizes of a world can act through proxies, through tools, through lesser allies, and through subtle manipulations. The fiercest competition of late has been for the rich prizes of one of the rare worlds entirely immersed in the Light, peaceful and generally safe where even the villains drift naturally away from true Evil, and one such game has recently ended.

the Game

one such game has recently ended

What are you...Did I just see what you did there? Post-Endgame, you say?

What are you implying here?

Edit, Post Read: ...I'll be watching you...

Nice.  TER practically dragged me into this fandom.  Let's see where this goes.

I would suggest working on comma placement a bit more. Some of your sentences, especially in dialogue, are run-ons.

>>12488971248897 I think the implication is that TER was the result of a game. This does make me wonder if Celestia knows about these "games."

Very interesting so far, and at least seems to have a scope that can rival the source material.

TER is by a wide margin my favorite Fanfic ever and while my first reaction to a fan sequel was.... lets just say not optomistic. From a purely writing capability stand point It seems many of my fears are ill founded.

I will say that the dialogue can be a bit hard to understand at times, the entire first section was almost completely incomprehensible to me the first time I read it. A touch of lead in and possibly some spacing to distinguish new speakers could have helped with that.

Still all and all it looks very promising and I will certainly be here and look forward to the rest of the ride!

>>12492241249224

Which one? The current (CGotG) one, the (TER) one, or games in general?

Well it seems to be that Lily speaks with a slightly archaic speech, Twilight has a stalker, and explosives are already on the field...

this'll be good, especially if it's a TER continuation. Good luck filling the shoes,

Good luck, Mr. Phelps.

10 paragraphs in, I became aware that this is probably the best grimdark adventure fic I have yet read.  You have created a masterpiece, and I look forward to seeing it through.

I can't help but imagine Twilight already had to put up with a lot of those things before.  She was hardly unimportant before, and more than one stallion has probably wanted to use her for political power before.

I started reading this going: Why the hell is Twilight an alicorn? Why does she have a sister? Then you mentioned, the Guardian and it all clicked. TER continuation. Nice strong start and good to see WandererD give you some props.

Odd background, makes the end of TER seem normal but an interesting read nonetheless seeing as this is TER's first spinoff sequel and I just love the character of Twilight Spark/Dawn

>>12492111249211 Yeah, commas have always been my nemesis. I do what I can with them but there are always too many or not enough.

>>12492601249260 I'll try to edit it to clear it up a bit. Thanks for the heads-up.

>>12496411249641 Um... Mr. Phelps?

>>12497701249770 *blushes* I am but a pale imitator of greater authors, but thanks.

>>12502071250207 To be fair, the description of the story explicitly says that nothing here makes sense unless you read TER first.

A sequel to TER and by a talented author, oh hell yeah

>>12505661250566

It all makes sense now.

>>12506111250611

Nope, my fault entirely. The unexpanded description sounded interesting so I dove right in. Just was sort of going WTF, this better all get explained for those first paragraphs.

>>12506111250611 - To be fair, not much on the 'players' level makes much sense yet as is... still, tracking. Looks interesting to be sure.

Well, you've certainly got my attention.  Please, do go on.

>>12509641250964 That will take a while and honestly, I foresee very few opportunities to expound on the "inside baseball" aspects within the story itself. I'd really like to because I've spent years playing with this canon in my head, but there're limitations to what an author can expound when there's no reason for the information to be included.

>>12511531251153 - Understandable. I'd find a way of breaking their bits away from the 'pieces' a bit more... not that I like them being referred to as pieces, but I can understand it seeing how the story may go. Just a lot of oddities about Lily Shell (odd name) and the unknown voice watching Twilight. Really... it's hard to judge it from one chapter though, so I hesitate to draw conclusions.

>>12514321251432 Yeah, both of the 'pieces' on the board at the moment are a bit unusual but this is bound to happen since in the general universe, every creature from every mythology is quite real and are equally liable to be brought in as 'pieces' on the board.

I'd read that.

>>12509641250964 Brainwave! Perhaps I can add an A/N section at the bottom of each chapter providing a quick explanation for elements that won't be explained during the course of the story? It'd help with the "inside baseball" complication and I've seen the method work well in a couple other stories.

ooooh.  I like this story muchly.  The concept is very cool, and I'm enjoying reading this.  Let's see what happens next, shall we?

Hm... I like how this is starting to pan out.  Everything is so mysterious, I love it!

Dammit, I have homework and it's due in two hours!!  

Edit:  And the plot thickens!  Very nice chapter.  A few errors here and there, but overall well-written.

>>12585401258540 If you have a moment and the inclination, point these errors out to me? The entire point of comments, beyond feeding my ego () is to make the work better, after all.

Lily = Blueblood.  Calling it.  

>>12587261258726 O.O

...hmm...

...but... Blueblood = male, yes? o.O

...and yet...

...cutting off his block and tackle?

>>12586381258638

Alright, lemme see what I can pull up....

"I believe that I implied that yours is the first bid open this second of my patron worlds." - Was this intended to be "first bid TO open"?

"and just like a rookie, the instinctively and thoughtlessly reacted by doing exactly that." - The?

"The biggest challenge was figuring out how to tie her momentum to Dash’s without creating drag that the hyperaware pegasus would notice and the key, according to her research, was to tie herself to the magical corona of flight magic that was unique to every pegasus and allowed them to bypass pesky physical laws problems like gravity: a hovering pegasus quite literally sat on the invisible corona that the mere movement of wings created even when those wings were moving at a languid pace." - A little bit of a run-on.

"she was airborne and riding the pegasi’s wake" - pegasi is plural.  Try "pegasus' ".

I have to go to work now, but afterwards, I can come back and see if I missed anything.

>>12595731259573 You're a gem, hauntu4ever.

>>12587261258726 You're wrong. Lily = Angel bunny.

>>12598101259810

I agree with these other folks, very enjoyable so far.

It does remind me a lot of the source material these early chapters will all leave us wondering who what is and why they matter and it's great fun.

I do look forward to the first "Great Reveal" and hope that all of these sub characters are in fact native to the plane but with the centuries old line from the wolf maiden I doubt that is the case.

>>12639641263964 Thanks. And with a few future exceptions, the 'pieces' in the game won't be native, partly because there's just not that many twisted, monstrous, sadistic evils wandering Equestria. Metric tonnes of noble, selfless, generally good types but if it was Equestria-only, the "minister" would have one, maybe two 'pieces' and then the story would end after like 5 chapters.

The change in Pinkie sound legitimate.

Minor suggestion: Tone down Applejacks accent a bit. 1. Her speech has as much to do with unique colloqualisms as it does an accent. 2. While noticable in the show, its not overbearingly heavy. 3. In its current form, her lines are hard to read. We know what she sounds like from the show, changing every 3rd word is a bit much.

>>12652801265280 It's a good suggestion but I'm not really sure how. I've heard her accent and speech but don't know how to portray the heaviness correctly.

“By the time everypony had welcomed her back and hugged her and—Pinkie, I can see that cupcake box, stop trying to sneak it under the bed—asked questions, precious time could be lost. So I think it’d be best if we took turns.”

Oh that made me laugh

>>12654471265447 You don't really need to portray it all that much, just enough to let us know it's there. Like Cyclone said, we already know what she sounds like. You don't need to try to get us to hear what we already know.

>>12658161265816 Fair enough. I tend to forget that I don't need to make it too obvious to miss if other people can know what the person i'm depicting sounds like.

>>12658991265899

(aaaaa misaimed reply)

As was mentioned before, everyone here (should) have a basic grasp of her manner of speaking.  The "Ah'"s are alright, but you should leave out most of the other stuff,  like the "an'"s.  At the moment I end up absently skimming her dialogue because it's tedious to decipher.

It's less about pronunciations and more about capturing her overall manner of speaking.  At the moment I think you're doing that well, but its hard to see it through the emphasized pronuncations.

Compare:

"Ah mean, Ah don't get it,” Applejack repeated. “We just got Rainbow outta bed and ask her to zip down the road a bit and deliver a message that somepony who doesn't feel comfortable spyin’ herself is sending some wolves to follow Lily. And about two hours later, the hospital’s sending messages to the lot of us saying that she got so thrashed that she’s in a coma. How the hay does it get from delivering a message to one of the fastest and most skilled pegasi in all o’ Equestria cata… cata…”

vs.

"Ah mean, Ah dun get it,” Applejack repeated. “We jus’ got Rainbow outta bed an’ ask ‘er to zip down th’ road a bit an’ deliver a message that somepony who dun feel comfortable spyin’ herself is sendin’ some wolves t’ follow Lily. An’ ‘bout two hours later, th’ hospital’s sendin’ messages t’ the lot o’ us sayin’ that she got so thrashed that she’s in a coma. How th’ hay does it get from deliverin’ a message t’ one o’ the fastest an’ mos’ skilled pegasi in all o’ Equestria cata… cata…”

More readable, right?  It's good to throw in a southern pronunciation here and there to remind the reader of her accent, but consistency is not good, especially in common words like "the".

Very good story so far but... Nobilis much?

>>12661011266101 "Nobilis"?

>>12660041266004 OK... I'll try to remember not to write what I hear. I think, though, that the occassional throw-in sabotages the flow more than the literalism. Maybe a hybrid approach...

Thank you, Biglulu and Likeness for your helpfulness.