Adalson clicked absently through his tabs. He stopped on the news (hoping half-halfheartedly that it would be positive). His hopes were burned after the first word: "Muzlem". He sighed, reading the rest: "...shoots out theater." He moved his mouse in position to terminate the "MSN" tab, and was about to do so, when the article switched to another. His eyes jumped to read it, even though he'd rather not. But, he was pleasantly surprised. "Friendship Really is Magic!" The title read. Desperate for a feel good story, Adalson clicked on it. Sadly, it was only about a video game.
"But hey, at least it's a video game about friendship." Adalson muttered to himself, thinking about the positive. "Maybe there is hope for humanity yet." He felt happiness well up as he read about the game-play. He didn't want to read anything about a "turing test" (whatever that was). It seemed negative, and he didn't want to hear any of it.
After a little thought, he realized, he wanted it. Every picture he had seen thus far had bright, happy faces, and everything had said as such. Sure they were pony faces, and ponies were girly (which would surely cause any one of his co-workers to silently mock him behind his back, should they find out he owned this game), but dang it! It was a positive game. This sort of thing didn't come along that often. Usually, a game like this would have reallybad reviews, but these was incredible!
"Best game I've ever played, I think it was definitively, the best 25 dollars I've ever spent, on anything." Adalson quoted one review. Most of the other review were to the same affect. Every other review was a troll. He decided to buy it. So, he clicked over to amazon, and typed in "Equestria Online" in the search field. He clicked on one. It was 48 dollars (which was a little rationalized when you take into account it was being shipped from Germany). Finally, Adolf clicked the "purchase" button. What he failed to realize however, that it was a bundle item (and that shipping was free).
It took a few hours for the amazon drone to get to his house, but it eventually got there. When the drone rammed itself into the door (to "knock") Adalson sprinted to the door, more eager that he'd let on for some levity.He opened the door and was surprised by the size of the package. It looked like it stored a large bulky computer monitor, with extra width.
"How big is this thing?" Adalson asked himself. For it's size, it was surprisingly light, and easy to carry inside the large apartment. Once on the table, Adalson grabbed a knife and cut open the box.
"What... is this?" He remarked on seeing pastel hoof shaped boots, along with a headset with goggles and a pony ear'd head band connected to it. He also noted the earbuds on the sides. Below it, was the pony pad. Below the pony pad (and it's cables and standing arm) was two instruction pamphlets. One had a picture of the pony pad (below the words "Equestria Online Pony Pad"), the other had a picture of the goggle and boots, and read: "Magical Tiara instructions." He picked up the latter book (being interested as to what this new object did).
One long reading later,
"VR goggles... Cool." He exclaimed. The headset and boots were VR (or, "virtual reality") equipment. Wearing them was almost like being in the game. "Haveing a game like this... but going there too? You spoil me." Adalson joked. He picked up the pony pad, and examined it. The pad was larger than the reviews of the games made it out to be, and was a metallic gray, also unlike the reviews. It was supposed to be a character's color and bear one of their "cutie marks..." Not that he was complaining about it though. It would be less recognizable as a pony video game. After reading the setup for the pony pad, and preforming said setup (for both devices), Adalson was finally ready to jump into Equestria Online. And boy, what a doozy was waiting for him.