Before I get into today's story (a real gem, by the way), let me apologize for missing the deadline of April 18th. Certain forgotten responsibilities made themselves present, and I was away from any electronic device for 48 hours. Now, on to the interesting stuff.

The Lost Prince is the worst thing in the history of anything ever. The first story in an unfinished trilogy, it was published on October 2nd of last year. Oddly enough, it seems to have been added to every well-known badfic group except the Badfic Bin (although I'm certain a kind reader will spare me the trouble within a couple hours). So, why am I reviewing it? Well, a couple reasons. First, the third and final installment to this epic saga is the only story actually in the Badfic Bin as of now. If a story is part of a series whose other stories are not in the group, that entire series will be reviewed. It's just a policy of mine. Secondly, this series is going to go on for over two years, and I might as well drag its corpse along for a bit more. Thirdly, by show of 's, how many of you would actually read the prequels?

Our description tells us that the 7-year-old Alicorn prince Roy (a believable pony name, for sure) is going on a "tortuous" adventure of self-discovery.

If you can't tell, this is going to be a cliché mess. Let's list a couple, shall we?

1. The obvious self-insert is an Alicorn.
2. The self-insert is related to Celestia and Luna.
3. The self-insert has a mysterious power that's never explained and makes the self-insert an outcast.
4. Self-insert has a tragic past.
5. The Mane Six befriend the self-insert for no legitimate reason.
6. The self-insert can pretty much beat up anything, despite being a fking foal.
7. You can't tell by the description, but there will be Cupcakes and Rainbow Factory "sequels" in the later chapters.

On the bright side, it makes a great drinking game for those of legal age.

So, our story starts with Roy being depressed. Celestia pokes her head into his room and essentially tells him that his parents final words were "We have no idea why he's alive." Roy tells the immortal goddess of the sun to fk off, and cries because he's alone now.

"get out." I reply to her in a soft voice
"Why Roy?" Celestia asks wondering what has gotten into me
"Get Out!" I roar at her from under my blankets

I am unhappy with their decision I would have loved to see them in their final moments tell me they didn't figure out what i was supposed to do with my life, BUT NOW I'M LEFT WITH NOTHING. I scream out in frustration.

One thing you'll learn about the author is that he likes to use the font size option. A lot. Now, using the tools in front of you isn't necessarily a bad thing, but when you use them in the way he has, your story becomes, how do you say, "an unprofessional mess and an affront to my corneas"?

One other thing about this section is that it's very, very confusing (despite the author's self-praise in the author's note). Who are Roy's parents? Where do they fit in the mythology of Equis? Why have we never heard of them in the canon? Why is finding Roy's specific destiny so important? Why is it that our protagonist's parents are more likable than him?

So, Roy decides he wants to learn to fly. At the time of writing this, I seriously considered writing a Roy x Scootaloo shipfic. I think I should be concerned.

"That's a good thing, because i want you to start jumping and fluttering your wings as hard, and as fast as you can." He replies to me trying to make it sound like a good way to learn.

"I feel like i'm going to look like a complete idiot." I say trying to not give up on this entire thing because i would have to do that.

"Many fillys feel like that when they start but it does work, so I want you to try it." He says as he sits down like hes ready for a circus show.
So there I was stumbling in the field trying to learn how to fly, but who knew the guards technique actually worked I was able to hover for about 10 seconds, but no more.

I think I found my favorite character. This unnamed royal guard just made my day.

Once again i was looking like an idiot I could hear Luna all the way from a castle tower laughing her ass off.

What do you mean it's OOC? Luna loves to laugh at the misfortune of others. Don't you watch the show?

Roy decides to hit the sack, and Luna shows up for no other reason than to rub it in Roy's face that he looked like an idiot.

Roy makes his great escape because of events that I would complain were contrived… if I understood what was going on. Seriously, the lack of basic grammar, description, and pacing makes this story a chore to read.

Here we get an author's note that confirms my suspicion that this story runs on Fanfiction.net logic and the author is making it up as he goes.

Roy flies away from the castle to the edge of the Everfree Forest– Hold on a minute, Roy learned to fly less than an hour ago, there's no way he could fly what has been confirmed as a 24-hour trip by train.

Bullshit aside, Roy gets chased by some royal guards into the Everfree Forest. He runs into some changelings, who try to capture him.

"CHANGELINGS AFTER IT!" She screams with all her might looking at me, and pointing with a hoove that has a hole in it.

In that split second of fear I changed from an alicorn to a pegasus saving my life from a lifetime of I don't know what.

"Oh wait it's one of us let him be." Queen chrysalis says thinking that me changing from a alicorn to a pegasus was a perk of being a changeling.

This is our protagonist's main ability (besides a display of advanced magic not thought to be found in foals): the ability to change sub-species. It's never explained why he has this power, nor why it's never been seen before, how it's activated, or, more importantly, why it exists other than to have a bad excuse for why no one recognizes him.

Roy runs into the Diamond Dogs and kicks their asses. That's it. I would ponder how the hell a foal managed to kill a Diamond Dog, but I've seen to many of these stories to be surprised anymore.

So he flies away and crashes through Non-Rhyming-Zecora's roof.

Author's Note:
There is the 2nd part a very beautiful well made chapter in my eyes that is amazing and i can't describe it through words, but it put that feeling you get from a good reading.

I can't make this shit up.

Non-Rhyming-Zecora decides to let Roy stay because, you guessed it, potatoes.

With no hint at all a blue pegasus with a rainbow mane and tail crashes through the window

Turns out the Mane Six touched some Poison Joke all at the same time, even after their last escapade with the plant. Derpy delivers the mail, and they read the article about the lost prince. And what confuses me here is that Non-Rhyming-Zecora expressed knowledge of his escape, but Celestia's number-one student has to rely on the daily paper?

So, instead of taking Roy back to Canterlot, the Mane Six leave him with Non-Rhyming-Zecora because… I'm not even going to try, just read it.

"Because I promised myself to not go back there until I figured out why I was brought into this world!" I reply after I finally stop struggling. "Well we can't continue this conversation today because we have important stuff to do so we will continue this conversation tomorrow, and we hope all your hostility will be out of your system by then.

They all leave the room, and out of the hut

Author's Note:
I have to say I did a nice job on this chapter and hopefully I do an even better job on the next with maybe a bit more violence, and bit more how should I put it 'blood'

Roy decides to stay, because of course he does, and walks into the Everfree Forest, only to run into a changeling-eqsue creature. They duel to the death (I'll give you five guesses as to who wins), and it turns out that Twilight has created what's called a "changeling clone". Now, this part really interested me, and I'd like to know how Twilight was able… it's never brought up again, is it?

Twilight and Co. now wholly trust Roy because the plot demands it, and they decide to keep his presence a secret.

Then comes the Cupcakes chapter I alluded to. It's pretty generic and predictable; Roy gets knocked out by Pinkie, gory fun ensues, Roy escapes, and Pinkie makes a deal: "Stay silent, and I won't kill you." I don't have the energy to write a full review on the sub-genre of Cupcakes's sequels and ripoffs, so I'll copy and paste an old comment review of mine on the M-rated story pinkie secret recipe.

Hello, I'm here because of Charles Spratt's blog post. If you'd give it the time, I think you would find his review very helpful for future stories.

Speaking of helpful resources, here's something else.

The problem with those fanfic, besides the almost complete disregard for basic grammar, is that you left out everything that made the original Cupcakes great. I regard Cupcakes with a certain amount of veneration, as it really is a great grimdark story. I actually burst into laughter while reading it, what with Pinkie's saw/hacksaw joke. And that's one of your problems: the banter. It's so dry and almost non-existent that I found myself bored while reading. The dialogue has to be clever, witty, funny.

Secondly, Pinkie is seriously out of character. That was also I reason I found the original hilarious: Pinkimena Diane Pie is still Pinkimena Diane Pie, despite the circumstances.

Thirdly, the torture. In the original, Dash's torment was drawn out in agonizing detail, so that the audience could come to terms with the present situation and feel her pain. In this version, however, Applebloom's dead in less than a paragraph. Give your story substance.

Lastly, I have to point out that even if you had followed all of this advise, you most likely would still fail, as this would be written off as "another Cupcakes ripoff". We're currently swimming in a sea of grimdark, and you have to be an excellent grimdark writer to make your voice heard.

I look forward to hearing from you.

The only other thing I have to say is that a lot of authors think that Cupcakes became popular because people like gore. That seems to be the mentality of this entire fanfic, if the author's notes are to be trusted. The fact of the matter is, most people who like gore will want a bit of tact and grace in it. Take "The Backwater Gospel" animation. That was gory, but it was a gory masterpiece. It spun a gory tale, but it spun it beautifully.

After that little bit of originality, Roy runs into some Diamond Dogs. And kills them. Why is it that whenever the Diamond Dogs are forcibly injected into this story, they die almost immediately? Oh, right, this is fanfiction I'm reading.

Here's an excerpt from the Author's Note.

and for all you people that think a pony's buck wouldn't be able to kill try getting bucked by one it hurts, and I know first hand, because I have been bucked by one before.

That actually explains a lot. Too far?

After that, we get to the Rainbow Factory chapter. Roy comes home to find a couple pegasi waiting for him.

"Hello Roy." The stallion said before tackling me down. I wasn't able to push him off in time, before the pony who actually is a pegasus wearing a mask came outside with a pretty big black bag. I flapped my wings to get out from under the stallion which worked to a certain extent before the bag was dropped over my head, and over my body tied all the way down to where my hooves were.

All this amounts to is RD telling Roy not to mess with them, and they won't mess with him. Then he leaves.

After that, he spends a lot of his time meditating and building up his magic reserves. Then he decides to get a home in Ponyville, and buys an old forge in Ponyville. The story says he brought money with him from Canterlot, but I seriously doubt he did. Anyway, he gets caught by Twilight, and then the story ends as he fixes the forge.

My closing thoughts on this story would be that it's just a bit worse than your average, cliché, "self-insert is an Alicorn" story. Perhaps it's the addition of the Cupcakes and Rainbow Factory plotlines, but there's something about it that makes it a bit easier to hate. I was certainly bored at parts, but there were points in the story where I was engaged, if only by the thought "Are you serious right now?" And I didn't talk too much about the grammar and structure of the story, because, really, there's nothing to say beyond "It's not gud." The pacing is all over the place, the action scenes are horribly executed, it falls to almost every infamous cliché on this site (except for, notably, the romance plotline with the Mane Six), and the author likes to use the font size function. A lot.

4288416

and for all you people that think a pony's buck wouldn't be able to kill try getting bucked by one it hurts, and I know first hand, because I have been bucked by one before.

Soooooooooo... the author writing this is dead? Sounds like a shitty ripoff of Sixth Sense to me.

4288646

4288416

Thirdly, by show of 's, how many of you would actually read the prequels?

It's not Rainbow Dash, but does it count? And only because I've had to review this... this.

Roy flies away from the castle to the edge of the Everfree Forest– Hold on a minute, Roy learned to fly less than an hour ago, there's no way he could fly what has been confirmed as a 24-hour trip by train.

There's also the fact that he can outfly and outwit several adult Pegasi who have been flying for years versus the seven year old who has been flying for one day.

That actually explains a lot. Too far?

Only if it was too far when I did it.

4292681

There's also the fact that he can outfly and outwit several adult Pegasi who have been flying for years versus the seven year old who has been flying for one day.

I figured that I could omit that point as people could figure out it out for themselves.

Only if it was too far when I did it.

I'm interested.

4293050 The Link to my review. I hope you enjoy.

Dang it, Derpy. I was just beginning to forget about that thing!

4303853 You got a free promotion out of it, though.

4314606 Fair enough. Speaking of, for the next one, from the list, I recommend either They Can't Take What's Ours or A Haze in Equestria!!!. Both of those make me froth hate by the gallon. Cheers

4314656 I was originally doing My little Assist me (wat?), but I'll make an exception for They Can't Take What's Ours.