I'm the only brony in my family, so when we're forced into Equestria because of Nuclear Holocaust through a half-functioning portal, it becomes my responsibility to help my family adjust. But what do you do with 16 humans-turned-ponies in a world that has no idea of the horrors that they endured? As it turns out, you put them to work on a farm...
This was my first story here on FimFiction, and is currently in the process of being edited, so there may be some unusual continuity errors. I sort of wrote myself into a corner, and as such had stopped updating for a few years. I believe that I have found a solution to this, and will continue to write this story as I have time and inspiration to do so; This story will never die, but I can't guarantee that I will update frequently.
June 17th, 2022 Update:
Oh wow! Thanks to everyone who has shown an interest in my hokey little story over here! Don't know what caused the sudden influx of readers, but I'm thankful all the same. I am still planning to come back to this story at some point, and finish it! This I promise.
Welp, time for awkward explanations
the baby filly looks cute
This has the most wonderful concept I have ever seen you sir or madam take all of my imaginary money
You're going to need an apocalyptic amount if you are to meet with "Pinkiemena"
P.S. Pun intended by the way.
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*reluctantly takes it with a blank stare*
Lol, many thanks!
Is that Rainbow's mother in the cover art?
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The cover art is all oc's. The one you're probably looking at is Panara. She's based on the personality of my mom.
So, first chapter. Considering the concept, I was honestly a little surprised you haven't been drowned in hate yet. Don't worry, that's not why I'm here. I do have a little feedback, though.
So, to keep things simple, I think this first section where people give their last confessions is much too long. Obviously you know all these people and their last words are meaningful to you, but think of your audience for a moment here. We don't know them, and the story hasn't yet happened to make us care about their final moments.
Your first chapter is your chance to win over readers to the rest of your story, and you only get one. As a general rule, you can hope for a maximum of 10% of the views on your first chapter as the maximum for readers, and more is always better. Your prose is solid, your grammar is good, but the pacing on this is off. As a result, I worry that you're going to bore readers before they even get into the meat of your idea.
Think about it this way: We don't know these people yet, so hearing their last wishes aren't really meaningful to us at this point of the narrative. It might be if this scene came at the end of the story, but as it is it just feels like words the story doesn't need. Having the protagonist admit to being a brony serves an obvious narrative purpose, so that gets a pass, but everyone else saying they love each other is too much. I think you could've done all this in maybe a thousand words and not been any worse off for it.
But I think that's my own suggestion. It's good otherwise, way better prose than I'm used to for random stories I click on sometimes. Good work staying regular with your updates. I'll try to comment on the other chapters as I go.
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Thank you very much for the feedback! You make some good points about the dialogue at the beginning. I might go back and rewrite it again (it was somewhat rushed, after all). The point of the first chapter was to introduce the characters, and explain how they got to Equestria, but of course the only critical feedback I've gotten on this story so far has been from my family, so it's good to get a different perspective.
So, same vein as my last comment. I'm mostly here for critical type stuff, though again I will take the time to say that your prose remains much cleaner than so many others. I think you could have some real talent, but I'm also guessing you haven't written anything long-form before.
First, a quick note about presentation and professionalism. If you can, keep it to one image or less per chapter. Look at the way your pictures break the text formatting on this one. It's annoying, and it's entirely preventable. For most characters, we don't need an image to get an idea of what they look like, your carefully constructed prose is more than enough. For this chapter for instance, an image for your protagonist would be fine, but having a seperate cutie mark image and then one for his dad is probably more than we need. The cutie mark is clearly visible in the wholebody image and nothing plot-related is happening with it this chapter, so it mostly just takes up space.
You make a mistake that lots of other aspiring novelists make here with the characterization of your protagonist. Namely: he seems driven entirely by the needs of the plot rather than his own desires. We don't see nearly enough reaction from just surviving the end of the world--no relief that he might've survived, no emotional reaction to that at all.
Not only that, but his family is unconscious on the ground in front of him, their futures uncertain, and he agrees to walk out of the room with Starswirl for a Q&A. I don't know about you, but I wouldn't have left my family on the ground helpless like that to answer survey questions. There doesn't seem to be any reason that he couldn't answer the questions right there with them.
But the plot wanted him to go into another room and have a calm conversation, so that's what he did. It makes his actions feel a little inauthentic right there. Even if for some reason he's forced to do what the plot wants anyway (Twilight promises to watch his family while he accomplishes his important task with Starswirl, for instance), if he at least puts up resistance and thinks of the obvious things that we as readers are going to be wondering about, then you can get away with it.
Don't think this is a major problem, though--a little dialogue could fix it. If we're already at the point that we're talking about authentic characterization, you're already past plenty of stories here on fimfiction.
Now please in Celestia's name don't have him romance Twilight Sparkle...
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Hahaha, I have no desire to have the character romance twilight. It's been overdone. I actually haven't figured out who The main character will romance yet, but I won't be rushing it (despite the other characters' teasing) The reason I felt that my character needed to leave the room was simply because of the distraction of having an unconscious family around. I felt that removing him from the scene would help keep him focussed (remember that this character is based on my own personality) But you are right in that my character could've protested a little more and be assured by twilight. As for the photos, you're absolutely right. I'll probably be going back through this story and removing them. I have the entire family photo, now, so I can use that for reference instead. Thanks for the reviews by the way. Any critique I can get is helpful to me, so keep 'em coming!
An absolute masterpiece! Liked.
So eight and eight. I like it though i do question if the chance of an EQG crossover special was an influence somewhat. Lol
Having a section where your protagonist explains the basics of ponyworld to a family member isn't super necessary when your whole audience knows these details. Also, the way Percy is written betrays the writer knows far more about the setting than the character should. You and I understand the cutie marks are important to a pony's identity, but that seems secondary to a person whose a horse now and also probably surrounded by naked people.
Also, you use a ton of maid and butler dialogue. This is when two characters say something to each other that they both already know. "Whatever. A PONY with red fur and a freaking brown curly mane,"
They can both see Percy's body, they know how he looks. This dialogue is obviously meant for the audience, and it's super clumsy. I don't really think we need to know the colors and cutie marks of every one of these many OCs in detail anyway, but even if we did for some reason, you include an image not far along that does the job quicker anyway.
2. Plot convenience for characterization instead of personality. Remember what I said in the last one about your character doing what the story needed instead of what made sense? Well, turn that up to eleven for his family. At least Moto Drop knows what to expect from Equestria, and his desires there are going to be different.
But that I noticed none of his family even reacted to the fact their world had ended, or their miraculous salvation. They basically just... coast for the whole story. They totally and instantly give up their humanity with little to no resistance.
The biggest and most painful examples of this are nudity and names. A name is fundamental to someone's identity, something that probably won't ever be changed. It doesn't make sense that "this is how names work here" would make someone be willing to change their name. Towards the end Moto informs the kid that his name is just changed now--I see no reason why that child would accept that, nor would anyone else.
You could've done something like this organically, like with family members for their first several weeks in Equestria trying to use their human names and having ponies not understand them and constantly butcher them until they start doing like the brony does and introducing themselves by a recognizable pony name. OR maybe you could've introduced some compelling reason why the family needed to hide their origin from Equestria, so they used new names to stay hidden. (I would still expect them to use their human names in private with each other, particularly on their very first day)
Also, they're all naked in every meaningful way all the time, surrounded by other naked people, and never once comment on it, try to retain their own modesty, nothing. It's just instantly switched, like they're doing what the story needs.
And finally, going along with "doing what the story needs," the entire nuclear apocalypse seems to do absolutely nothing for the story except be used as an excuse to why they can't go home. It's a clumsy one at that--aside from counting down to the time the bombs would land (which was somehow known I guess). The whole family doesn't act like war survivors, they act like they just walked in off the streets of a peaceful modern day. You could've used "the portal broke" to explain why they couldn't go home and it would make much more sense.
Lastly--and more in terms of warning than complaint--one of the warning signs of mary sues is being inexplicably befriended by the main characters of a universe. The Mane Six really didn't belong in this chapter--they have lives of their own that aren't served by sitting around all day in a waiting room. If anything, Twilight Sparkle (who contributed to causing the event) would probably have been enough. Having them all there effectively doing nothing and sitting around in a waiting room (and basically not speaking in the chapter either) is not a wise literary decision.
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Ouch. That one hurt. Admittedly, this wasn't my best chapter, but rest assured that there are reasons behind why I did things the way I did in this chapter. The nuclear holocaust comes into play later on (and the portal needs to stay working for a reason... That I won't divulge here 😋) One thing I can say about my family is that we're very good at ignoring smaller issues so that we can focus on what's important, such as survival. I honestly believe that the way I wrote this chapter is more or less how my family would react to being suddenly in a different world. You're right that they don't seem to be acting like war survivors... but that's kinda how my family is. We'd bury that in order to be able to function, and it would slowly seep out later on in the form of depression. That being said... Yeah, I honestly didn't even think about the name changes (obviously I won't use real names because I want to protect my family's privacy), but in hindsight the way I could've written this story is perhaps using their made-up names as if they were their real names on earth, and simply didn't have them changed... you know what? I might just go back and do that. It'll make more sense to the readers. As for the nakedness... yeah, i have no excuse for that one. Honestly it never even occurred to me as an issue, so that was an oversight on my part. As always, thanks for the review! I appreciate your insight.
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I have no idea what you're talking about.
HOLY INFORMATION DROP!!!!! That was a plot twist and development I did not see coming!
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Bwahaha. All part of my master plan.
There is a difference between a review and a comment. Starscribe is reviewing, and I'm not good at that anyway, so I'll comment.
I enjoy reading your story. That's all I can really say- it certainly is unique, and unique in a good way. Like every story that ever was, there could be a few things done better, but I didn't really notice any problems at all. Thanks for writing.
well....shes not wrong
so unless this is the same world that Sunset went into; the names of the characters don't sound like human names. Is this the same world that Sunset went into?
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Bwahaha! All shall be reavealed in the story!
And this is where Twilight became Starswirl.
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Hey! Likewise. It was a blast standing in line... for hours on end...
Huh. Doesn't sound very fun when I put it that way...
Lol, thanks for taking the time to read my story.
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You're very welcome. It's good to be back.
First! Bahahaha!
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Hahaha, we shall see.
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Cackles evilly. All shall be revealed...
...in the next chapter.
X'D
Oh that was clever, Atlantis will always be an animated classic.
Also, Meadows as a Kirin? PLOT TWIST...
Where did he get that?
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I assumed that the EQG world would have similar society and technology to our own world. Thus, religion.
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All according to keikaku
Love it 😍
He made a new friend
Going 4 the goth style i like it
nooooooo too good must have more please
Pigs can digest almost anything, and they make good fertiliser.
By the way, nice story so far.
Chapter 5 asks if ponies are vegans in the title. I guess ponies aren't vegans since vegans do not eat any animal products (including eggs).
So far so good. Not really sure what else to comment on right now.
Instantly able to move.
Never mind. He follows her before realising he cannot stand.
Interesting, yay.
With such a big family, the main character must be Italian.
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Lol, Dutch actually.
11423315
I thought the protagonist was an immigrant from Italy.
Do the Dutch have a family tradition?
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Oh, yes. My dad has six siblings, my mom has four, and I have five siblings. Our extended family Christmas before the pandemic was well over 100 people between all the cousins and their children.