Breakup

by Luna1337

Chapter 1

"Sweetie Belle! There's a zombie on your tail!" Button screamed at Sweetie Belle over the voice chat. His mother had convinced Rarity that buying Sweetie Belle an Xbuck would help her connect with Button Mash. Rarity was very eager to help Sweetie Belle connect with Button Mash.

"There's a noob in my way!"

A garishly outfitted player with entry-level weapons and the nametag 'plotzpwnsohard' was, sure enough, standing in Sweetie Belle's way. A few seconds later, two mottled pale hooves wrapped around his neck and the player sank to the ground in a pool of blood. Sweetie Belle slashed the zombie's head off and grabbed the black sword it dropped.

Button gasped. "That's the Onyx Sword of Droom! It's the rarest weapon in the game! It has a 0.000367 percent drop rate!"

"Is it any good?"

"Well...no. It's mostly a collector's item. It should get you a couple million gold pieces in the market, though."

"Sweetie Belle!" Rarity called from the background. "What are you playing? That doesn't sound like EduTown!"

"I gotta go. Rarity got me a new game and banned me from playing this after she saw how much blood was in it."

SweetieBelle123 left the game.

Button exited to the main menu. There wasn't much to do in Equestria of the Ancients without Sweetie Belle.

"Button, are you free? I have something that might interest you!" His mom pushed open the door and laid a flyer on his bed.

LOVE TO PLAY VIDEO GAMES?

LOVE TO GET PAID?

COME AND BECOME A BETA TESTER!

PLAY GAMES ALL DAY!

GET PAID AT NIGHT!

Simply fill put the sheet on the back and turn it in at the Equestrian Gaming building, located next to the arcade

Get paid up to ten bits an hour for testing video games, pointing out bugs, and recommending games to market to foals your age

Looking for foals ages 8-12. Must be accompanied by adult.

"I can get paid for playing video games? BEST DAY EVER!!!!" Button dropped his controller and ran around in circles.

His mother smiled. "We can go over there as soon as you're ready."

*******************

"All right, kids!" a scrawny stallion wearing a fake headset said, waving his hooves. "Who's here to play some video games?" Along with the others, Button raised his hoof.

"My name's Gizmo, but you can call me F4! You can get started playing games as soon as your adult pony signs a form saying what kind of games you can play!" He passed out forms and Button's mom signed it. Button loved his mom. She let him play any game he liked as long as it didn't have 'sexual content', whatever that meant.

"The first game we're going to play is a simple platform scroller game. For the foals among you who might not know what that is, it's a game where your character walks across a moving screen, killing bad guys along the way." F4 pointed at a row of shiny new Xbucks across the room. "Every time you see a bug, we'd like you to pause the game and fill out a sheet explaining about the bug. The foal who spots the most bugs gets a special prize at the end. Once you've finished the game, you write about it, what things you liked and what you didn't like. Then you get paid!"

******************

"Time's up, everypony!" the strangely peppy stallion said. "Please turn in your review and bug reports to me." Button scribbled a few more notes on his extensive review and then dropped it into the messy pile along with his four bug report sheets. F4 spent a few minutes reading through them and occasionally muttered to himself or smiled. Finally, he put the papers down.

"Congratulations to Button Mash for catching more bugs than anyone else! He found thirty-seven, over twice the amount that the second-place foal found. Come over here, Button Mash!"

Button Mash's chest swelled as he strutted up next to F4. "What's my prize?"

"We'll train you as a junior assistant beta tester!"

"Wait...WHAT? I CAN HAVE A REAL, ACTUAL JOB PLAYING VIDEO GAMES?"

"Sure. All you have to do is have your mom or dad sign a form, and you can get right to playing games."

Button's future life flashed through his eyes. He would rise through the ranks of beta testing incredibly quickly, becoming a billionaire before he turned eighteen. He would propose to Sweetie Belle in the most expensive, romantic way possible. They would have two foals. A filly and a colt.

"Um...Button?"

The filly and colt would grow up to be video game designers. They would make epic games and become billionaires themselves. Button and Sweetie Belle would become grandparents. They would retire and live in Scoltland for the rest of their lives. They would be buried in the same tomb.

"Button, take a look at your flank."

"Why? It's....AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH MY CUTIE MARK IT'S HERE SWEETIE BELLE WILL BE SO PROUD AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" An image of a game disk with a green label reading 'Beta' now adorned his flank.

******************

"You got your what? Your patootie shark?"

"MY CUTIE MARK, SWEETIE BELLE. MY FREAKING CUTIE MARK." Button stuck his flank in the air. "SEE, LOOK."

Sweetie Belle opened and closed her mouth, but no sound came out.

"Y-you got your cutie mark," she finally managed, staring either at his cutie mark or his hot flank. Button couldn't tell which. "How did you do it?"

"I dunno, I was just talking to this guy who OFFERED TO PAY ME FOR PLAYING VIDEO GAMES and imaging my life AND IT JUST APPEARED. LIKE THAT."

"I'll have to tell the CMC. Because...you know...since you're not a blank-flank anymore, we'll have to discuss what to do. Goodbye, Button." The video chat winked out and Button shut his computer. Suddenly he wasn't so sure that his cutie mark was so great.

Comments

[AdmiralSassMcAwesome]

Sweetie Belle isn't gonna leave him coz he got his cutie mark, right? Right!?

[Luna1337]

I accidentally hit 'Dislike' when I was trying to close the tab. HOW DO I UNDO

...all I had to do was like the story. Derp.

[Telaros]

That was cute. Button Mash, forever curs—BLESSED with the amazing job of being a BETA Tester! WOOT!
... I mean !

"Cutie Mark Crusader, Relationship Breaker Upper! YA—ow, I has a sad now..." - Well, Sweetie Belle, you sure earned that sad...

Now to go back back to sleep!

I'm in so much need of sleep therapy...

[multiple bronies]

3863266 lets hope so. maybe this writer is kindhearted or maybe hes a ruthless destroyer of feels

[Nishi]

That can go either in three ways. They will break up and stay that way, they will break up for a while and then come back to each other, or they will go trough that hardship and stay together and their relationship will grow stronger.

[Galaxy Knight]

3864063 I see the last two being the more likely options. Probably the second one because that creates drama but for all we know the author could make Button Mash a very cool guy. Only time will tell.

[110calligraphybrony]

More like sweetie bitch

[Erik the Enigma]

What happened to cutie mark crusaders forever?

[Bashfluff]

A few things:

First, and I know this is a minor point, but do not type words in all caps. It looks sloppy. You can adequately display emotion through description of the character's actions combined with a few descriptors for the tone of voice you want to convey--as long as you don't abuse them. If you feel that you absolutely have to capitalize certain words or sentences, try to do it sparingly and only when you feel that you have no other choice. Most authors go with caps for the, "CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS ______! lines. It's okay if you only use it for certain moments. Peppering your writing with them looks unprofessional, and using them excessively, like you do here, is murder on the eyes.

Second, I want to see these scenes have more going on. Certain areas feel like cliff note versions of events rather than fleshed out scenes, like they were imagined to work better in a visual more than a written story. Let's take advantage of the medium! Don't be afraid to show more of what Button's thinking and what he's doing. I felt like the ending suffered from this most, but also the scene where he was testing games. You more or less just tell us he's testing games and that he does a good job. We need to see more than that. The bit after that was my favorite part of the tale because you did do that. It's cute and it's funny and it works. It shows off his kiddish imagination perfectly. But we needed to see more of what came before, and that ending part needed more dedicated to it.

All of these scenes are almost identical in length, but I don't know how appropriate that is. The beginning scene seems to serve as a short introduction to the meat of the chapter, but it's a quarter of the entire thing without doing much to justify its existence. What do we see in that introduction that shows us about the relationship between Sweetie and Button? Button talks a lot, and while the lines could be better, they're only a little rough around the edges and they feel like lines that maybe could come out of his mouth. What does Sweetie say?

"Is it any good?"

"I gotta go. Rarity got me a new game and banned me from playing this after she saw how much blood was in it."

I like the line, Button exited to the main menu. There wasn't much to do in Equestria of the Ancients without Sweetie Belle.

But it feels hollow when you see how little the two interact. This is the real problem with the story. You need to establish the relationship between these two characters. The story is about this relationship ending. There's no sense of scope or context for how we're intended to feel about it because we don't get to see how strong the relationship is and what chemistry the characters have. And there's plenty to show just in the situation! A gamer letting his non-gamer love interest in on his hobby is ripe for a ton of interaction. You could even have some foreshadowing of the coming conflict with cutie mark related talk. Button doesn't care about his cutie mark, but Sweetie is a mare obsessed.

I like the ideas and the small touches here and there, but you need to fill the story with more. You've shown that you can do it and that you're good at it, and I'm eager to see more. But always keep in mind to make every word tell and to use every scene to do something special in the narrative.

...and as a personal note, I'd love to see more about Button Mash testing. He's growing up. That's what a Cutie Mark represents. I want to see that develop maybe as something on the side. <3

Thanks for reading, if you did, and happy writing!

[Luna1337]

3865900

uh.

I don't really know how to respond to walls of text. Just that I read it and I'll hopefully make next chapters better I guess??

Have a Trollestia.

[Bashfluff]

3866431

Hey, no problem. This isn't for me. It's for you. If you read it and got something out of it, I'm happy. Good luck, and I look forward to reading more.

[Meow Mix]

Love this! Nice work

[They]

my only issue is that there is no way one can make a living off of beta testing, let alone become a billionaire
I have a feeling it is a freelance thing rather than a full time job.
those who do do it professionally still make little and need a college degree.

[Reluctant Brony]

Great start, I'm not worried about Sweetie dumping Button just because he got his cutie mark
No, when Sweetie gets hers and has a completely different vision of their lives together that that's when they'll break up.

[Tessa]

Hmm... I can see it as Sweetie thinks that now that Button has his cutie mark that he will not want to be her coltfriend. But there are many ways this could go. Anywho... I like this story so far!

[Mister L]

Can't wait for the next chapter

[Awesomo3000]

Aww, poor Sweetie. Update soon!

[ButtonMash]

Aww, canceled? As long as they got back together in the end, I wouldn't snap necks...

[ShadowblazeCR]

Um why is this cancelled I think you have a great story line and potential to make this a good story,so what happened?

[Luna1337]

4628148

It was canceled in honor of the JanAnimations cease and desist. I felt it wasn't really right to keep writing until the work it is based on can continue.

[Button Mash The Great]

I was just gonna go to the next chapter, then I saw the words " Cancelled ".

The Cease & Desist curse that the dreaded Hasbro has put over us all... We're d-d-doomed....

WE'RE DOOMED HASBRO! WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!!?!?!?!?!

-A panicking Button

[PhoenixBlaz3]

Cancelled? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!