• Member Since 20th Jan, 2015
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TheDriderPony


"Only the most subtle of references." -No fanfiction writer ever

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It is well known, in academic circles, that video games, as a whole, contribute nothing to society other than to lead impressionable young foals to violence. Therefore, any colt or filly who plays such games is bound to become some kind of lunatic dark sorcerer sooner or later and turn on their fellow ponies.

So in the interest of public safety, if their downfall into darkness is guaranteed, why wait? Get them off the streets now before they can commit their heinous crimes.

It's the only logical solution.


Cover art commissioned from MN27

Chapters (1)
Comments ( 46 )

"It is well known, in academic circles, that video games, as a whole, contribute nothing to society other than to lead impressionable young foals to violence. Therefore, any colt or filly who plays such games is bound to become some kind of lunatic dark sorcerer sooner or later and turn on their fellow ponies."

Ah yes. This absolute horseshit academia. It's actually been shown to be the opposite, and that kids can learn valuable skills by playing video games.

I know this isn't supposed to be taken seriously, and I do like the story. Just thought I'd point it out.

11112554
As I like to put it: we're all too addicted to our gaming consoles to go outside and therefore would never shoot anybody in real life.

11112561
It's also a fact that anyone who actually thinks that just because they're good in a shooting game makes them any good in real life is a fucking idiot.

But that's just me.

Me: I kinda like video games, especially because they have some incredible in depth lore, and the visual effects are stunning, the storyline is making me think about ethics, and-

My parents: NO.

11112563
The whole point of guns is that you don't have to be particularly good with them in order to kill a whole lot of people, though. Of course, dehumanizing someone is the quickest way for them to dehumanize you in turn, so this sort of thing all too often becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy...

Thank you for spreading awareness to the impressionable youth. As someone who did 15 in the joint for playing Donkey Kong Country, I want to make sure nobody makes the same mistake I once did.

11112780
It could've been worse... one of my friends got their hands on their brother's Terraria copy. The next day, they came into class with a musket. They weren't even using proper ranged armor to go with it.

Is it bad that i actually deal with people as dumb as these adults in rl...

He held up a graph. "Just look!" One axis read 'Amount of Evil Doers in Equestria'. The other read 'Video Game Sales'. The scales on each were printed far too small to read, but the positive trend line was heavily bolded and in red.

Interestingly, the opposite is true (at least in the United States). Rates of societal violence have been steadily falling since 1992. Furthermore, there is no direct correlation between playing violent content and commiting violence. A lot of moral guardians forget that the deadliest mass shooting before Virginia Tech (2007) occurred in 1966 (UTA shooting), long before video games were even a thing (and a school bombing in 1927 was deadlier than both).

11112554
You have no idea how often I have to debunk those claims (usually made by the same people who railed against their parents for saying the exact same things about watching TV).

11112563
Very true. I'm decent in shooters, but utterly useless on the rifle range.

The cigarette tree stopped growing as its highest leaves brushed the ceiling. White and orange flowers bloomed and burst like fireworks, raining down clusters of ripe cigarettes by the dozens in every flavor from Mild to Unfiltered.

Wait, what! And also the leaves get put into the cigarette, not the seeds, so you can't grow it.

11112960
You're always stabilized in a shooter. A hand holding a mouse usually has its wrist resting on a mouse pad, which rests on a desk, which rests on a floor.

And your sight picture is always perfectly aligned.

Dan
Dan #14 · Jan 9th, 2022 · · 3 ·

Proudly voted for Jill Stein in 2016 and would do so again.

HRC and Joe LIEberman should have been thrown out of politics on their butts. Or in jail like Yeeland.

Dan

11112561
Consoles are all shit, sirrah. Sony's backstabbing with the PS3 and PSP firmwares and Nintendo's bullshit subscription model put me off consoles entirely.

Though I'm itching for my Steam Deck.

And all the idiots trying to get in on the cryptomining racket by snapping up every GPU they can and hoping to break even are complete scum. Almost as huge bastards as the idiot game publishers slavering to get in on the NFT racket.

11113105
the funny thing is now that they make money and political contributions I've barely heard a peep from the usual aghast politicians, and the entire right doesn't really care so long as their check clears

Wydril #17 · Jan 9th, 2022 · · 12 ·

11113124
The extra funny thing is that the precept of this story is a leftist utopia; judging and sentencing ponies for thoughtcrimes, as long as they have the right demographic labels. There's no end in sight if we start going down that road though, so I'll just take the next off-ramp.

It's kind of a shame that Button didn't manage to use any actual game mechanics, and just reproduced a previously-known earth pony technique. If any pony was going to manifest game-breaking powers via magic and a cutie mark, it would be him. Quicksaves, re-rolls, and preventing over-encumbered penalties by putting all his items on a corpse he drags around.

"Anyway, that's why I became a Dark Sorcerer and took over Equestria."

Ri2

Wait, this is a co-ed prison?

.. when a foal plays a video game it fills them with violent and aggressive impulses. ... But when an adult plays a video game, it's a welcome release and an escape from the stress and tedium of their everyday lives.

So, by this reasoning, adults can't be filled with violent and aggressive tendencies by playing violent video games because they're already filled with them, and violent video games act as a pressure release so that don't act others.

By the exact same logic, any adult who doesn't play violent video games is equally as menacing to society as a foal that does, and should be locked up for the exact same reasons. So, why isn't Twilight Sparkle in jail where she can't hurt anyone?

Come to think of it, the number of Elements of Harmony in Equestria had sharply increased alongside the amount of evildoers. Better lock up anyone associated with that too, just to be safe.

Ah ha, and who could forget that as the amount of evildoers in Equestria had been rising, so has the amount of princesses! The connection between being a princess and being an evildoer is clear as day!

Oh, but then the biggest one of all. As the amount of evildoers in Equestria had increased, so has the amount... of school enrollments! Undeniable!

To ignore even one of these is to ignore them all! Wake up, sheeponies!

11113210

The extra funny thing is that the precept of this story is a leftist utopia

I knew someone who voted Republican who said the earth was flat, but would you believe a lot of Republicans don't think that?

What I really want to get at here is, let's be careful about confusing the caricatures of people by their enemies, with the real people in those groups.

(Don't you know denouncing videogames is so 1990s? Hardly anyone in the Left Vanguard does that anymore.) :twilightsmile:

I did quite enjoy the part with the game mechanics, though. :twilightsmile:

11113210
Not really, though? Not necessarily, at least. Really, it's a dig at any authoritarian regime where maintaining the existing power structure's template (not even the structure itself, just its template) is more important than anything else, so when something undesirable appears to be on the rise, the cause is blamed on something unrelated (or related only via weak correlation) in order to abrogate the political class from any responsibility, so that they can continue to exploit and systematically deny the liberties of the working and middle classes for their own material gain.

11113289
I think you make a good point about authoritarianism. I'm not like, an expert on this stuff but I feel like "Left Wing and Right Wing" are too all encompassing terms to be entirely useful? Like, I'm fairly certain Wydril's comment is implying a certain kind of person; the woke white knight who writes long callout posts for small offenses. And while that kind of person does exist, he's different from the middle aged leftist who wants to unionize for better working conditions. I guess the obvious response is to just write off people who rant about all leftists as ignorant about leftists, but I feel like the deeper problem is in the language itself. With the US's two party system most people are understandably used to thinking about politics in a binary way, but I can't help but feel there would be better discourse in general if more specific terms were employed for a broader range of political ideologies.

11113351
Maybe. Maybe not.

All I can say is what I feel we all already know: Politics ruin everything. Accordingly, it's probably best if we keep politics as far as possible from any story that isn't overtly political. We'll all be happier, if only because we'll have at least one place we can go where we can get away from politics.

wow WTF, I know I’ve heard of countries around the world where a person can be arrested and locked away for something so minor and be locked away for life, but over video games? I’ve never heard of that, and I live in California, USA

11113279

I knew someone who voted Republican who said the earth was flat, but would you believe a lot of Republicans don't think that?

What I really want to get at here is, let's be careful about confusing the caricatures of people by their enemies, with the real people in those groups.

That's a different animal entirely, though. You're introducing "Republicans" as a term and conflating it with beliefs, when neither the comment I was trying to head off nor my own comment mentioned specific political groups. Leftism by definition wants a strong and invasive authoritarian power structure that can and will prosecute anyone for anything they say, do, or think, anywhere and everywhere; Button Mash playing video games in his home, as it were. Nowhere in there did "Democrats" come up, which makes you using "Republicans" inapplicable and "caricatures of people by their enemies" bias projection at best, as it was intentionally not about either and was specifically to prevent what is now happening.

So what I really want to get at here is, let's be careful about confusing the words of people by how we want to see them and projecting our own biases, and avoid starting pointless political arguments and posturing in the comments of stories like the comment I initially responded to and 11113289 this one. It doesn't go anywhere and accomplishes nothing, so like I said at the start, "There's no end in sight if we start going down that road though, so I'll just take the next off-ramp," but I'm happy to discuss the story itself.

11113105
Now become an insufferable commie like me!

11113558

Leftism by definition wants a strong and invasive authoritarian power structure that can and will prosecute anyone for anything they say, do, or think, anywhere and everywhere

I'll be sure to go tell the leftists what they want! After all, who can argue with a definition? :rainbowwild:

Do they get to define you now, and do you agree to conform to however they define you, too? :twilightsmile:

11113754

I'll be sure to go tell the leftists what they want! After all, who can argue with a definition? :rainbowwild:

Do they get to define you now, and do you agree to conform to however they define you, too? :twilightsmile:

You seem to have missed the point, and missed it badly. :derpytongue2: Have I labeled anyone as "leftist" here, either individually or as a group? :twilightsmile: Why are you so intent on labeling and attacking me, when I haven't done the same to you or anyone at all? :rainbowlaugh: Look to your own biases for the answer, and use self-reflection to improve. :moustache: Getting upset about a definition in a book, my goodness, this is a site for writing! :rainbowwild: And over a post that wanted to avoid pointless political arguing, how ridiculous. :ajsleepy:

I've tried to reach you through your chosen writing style, but I'll repeat this one more time for you:

It doesn't go anywhere and accomplishes nothing, so like I said at the start, "There's no end in sight if we start going down that road though, so I'll just take the next off-ramp," but I'm happy to discuss the story itself.

Playing D&D is or was also supposed to give magic powers.
So many people have been jipped

11113274
gotta remember power corrupts and knowledge is power so that means school is evil.

11113210
not really, thoughtcrime has always been the purview of the overly religous, from blue chip laws, to temperance, to misogyny laws, and same sex intercourse bans. they can hold double standards as perfectly reasonable parts of some ineffable working because faith can when misused can be the antithesis of knowledge. Liberalism itself was the opposing ideology to authoritarianism and feudalism, the idea that our society should be maliable, have meaningful laws, and be run by the people in it, and not a bunch of psychopaths who's family trees resemble corn stalks and claim divine rule, so its silly people keep tossing that word around like it just was invented in california a couple decades ago, especially when the other side insists that they can't be fascist on account of some technicality or other.

great story though, this is exactly what fiction can do because if you use real names and settings, people freak out saying its unrealistic.

11114093

Liberalism itself was ... so its silly people keep tossing that word around like it just was invented in california a couple decades ago

It's even more silly when you realize you were the one who started tossing it around, which rather neuters your whole post. Since you clearly didn't want to leave pointless posturing and grandstanding behind, as I suggested at the start of your comments on this story, and since you clearly didn't want to accept that arguments for any of it can go both ways ad infinitum making the process itself rather pointless and tiresome on a fanfiction site, and that "one side" isn't standing clean and spotless, as I also suggested at the start, you can go ahead and play in a cesspool of your hatred and demagoguery and I'll simply enjoy reading and discussing more stories. Try not to let your blood pressure spike too high, it's unhealthy. :derpytongue2:

11113998
That is actually something that people get wrong a lot, the idea that power corrupts.

Power does not corrupt; it reveals. Politicians do not become corrupt; they are revealed as corrupt. Bureaucrats are not corrupted by the power entrusted to them; they are simply shown to be corrupt when put into an environment where they can flourish.

It's the same as any other parasite.

11114177
i know but i just like using that joke

11113919
That one was settled by the company pointing out that killing its own customer base is bad for business.

Well, that escalated quickly.

11114126
I was making a comment on how politicians of any stripe will freak out over something they don't understand until they get paid to not care about it, you went to bleeding heart goose-stomping liberals, I rebutted saying liberalism is an abused term that actually means the opposition to authoritarianism, and its more that the overly religious, regardless of their political leanings, are the ones patrolling for thought crimes. after all its surely the authoritarian liberals passing book bans across the country now because their children might read about the time the US did something evil, even though their children already have phones with wikipedia. I'd rather live in california where the legislature is trying to address the crisises facing the working class than my current state where the only things that have passed the legislature in the last 10 years are corporate handouts, abortion bans, defunding of the public schools and gun-freedom laws. The house speaker's contempt for the masses was completely evident recently when he said the anti-gerrymandering amendment passed was just a suggestion he didn't need to follow

Moral of the story: The generation gap is no excuse for dragging kids into the abyss.
Moral of the comments: The other side wants to make this ludicrous scenario into a reality. (Which one's the other side? Never you mind.)

In all (well, slightly more) seriousness, lovely bit of madness. Thank you for it. :twilightsmile:

11114482

you went to bleeding heart goose-stomping liberals,

Gotta stop you right there because you're simply wrong, and everything you said afterward was based on that faulty comprehension. Here's what you said first:

and the entire right doesn't really care so long as their check clears

So I responded:

The extra funny thing is that the precept of this story is a leftist utopia ... There's no end in sight if we start going down that road though, so I'll just take the next off-ramp.

Left this, right that, blah blah blah, my point was once it starts it never stops and you have swimmingly demonstrated that to be true, especially when you try to lie and say things like "I rebutted saying liberalism is an abused term" when you are the only one who used the term. So as I said, you can go ahead and play in a cesspool of your hatred and demagoguery demonizing "the other side" and I'll simply enjoy reading and discussing more stories along with most everyone else. Later hater :twilightsmile:

Decent enough. I think it would have been better without so many overt references. Super Mareio / Maretroid are quite on the nose, don't you think? Then I saw the [Abilities]. Ehhh I've read worse.

I can imagine Buttons Mom thinking “This is somehow Twilights fault”

He held up a graph. "Just look!" One axis read 'Amount of Evil Doers in Equestria'. The other read 'Video Game Sales'. The scales on each were printed far too small to read, but the positive trend line was heavily bolded and in red.

I've got a feeling those scales are actually important.
Also, back when the Wendigos appeared there were no video games.
And now we have video games, but no Wendigos. Can you explain that?!

While Button did know strategies for taking down larger opponents, most of them relied on access to diamond swords, buffing potions, and at the very least the promise of a respawn.

They should implement those in Real Life ASAP!

Just like that, Button Mash was once again alone. That had been... successful? Maybe?

*Ding!* Speech Check Passed!

It was a bare as they came. Solid stone walls, packed dirt floor, and a slab of wood bolted to the wall for a bed. His first home in Ponycraft had been nicer.

The last part really hurts.


Good story!
I enjoyed reading it.

11112804
so he's in prehardmode so it's not that scary

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