On a beautiful day in Ponyville, the Mane Six are enjoying each others company at a lovely little picnic in the park. Before long, Rainbow Dash suggests a friendly game of Hoofball, which, through a little forceful persuation, they are all willing to take part in. But when a rather crude bet comes into play, suddenly it's no longer "just a friendly game." On top of that, everypony has something to prove:
Rainbow Dash and Applejack have their usual rivalry going.
Twilght is determined to prove that eggheads can ball too.
Rarity is hungry for revenge against a certain rainbow-maned pegasus who forced her to join the game.
Fluttershy desperately wants to help her team as best she can, despite her obvious lack of skill.
And Pinkie Pie... well, Pinkie Pie just loves having fun.
Who will come out on top? Will Spike lose his mind trying to ref the game fairly, particularly with the players harpin' on him for every call he makes? And does the entire town of Ponyville really have nothing better to do than to gather 'round and watch the meaningless game?
The point of this story: there is none. I just really wanted to see the Mane Six do this. For the love of God, do not take this seriously.
I don't own MLP: FIM. I'm not profiting from this fic in any way.
wubbed it :3
very cute and well paced!
MOAR
MOAR HOOOFBALL
wouldn't mind a sequel about the princesses bet
That was great. No detailed recounting of sweaty pony rubdowns, but I suppose we can't have everything - and ponies DO make hilarious sport fans.
...wasnt there supposed to be no flying/magic???
2049805
Where was the magic/flying part? Was it when Fluttershy scored? She technically wasn't flying, she just jumped really high.
....... oh dear, dont start it fluttershy!!
just finished fourth chapter. great story
This was absolutely the funniest thing I ever read. LOVE IT!! Great work.
All right, here goes, my first review for Authors Helping Authors.
Name of Story: Just a Friendly Game
Grammar score out of 10: 4
Pros:
- Spike's being the referee leads to some amusing situations.
- You did a good job of accentuating the Mane Six's personalities in chapter 1.
- The sudden cuts to other places in Equestria where the game is being followed are a nice touch.
Cons:
- Most of the story consists of pretty dry reporting on the game, without much comedy or tension.
- You're telling some things that would work better if you'd show them.
- There are some pretty confusing tense shifts in chapter 3.
Notes:
First of all, let me say that I'm from Europe (the Netherlands, to be specific) and thus extremely unfamiliar with Panzer-Rugby... ahem, I mean American football. But even with that "handicap", I was able to follow most of the action on the field pretty well, so you definitely did a good job of describing that! You even got me to look up some more information about the game - I now know what a "play" is and a "fumble", and that there's always one team attacking and one team defending. You learn something new every day!
But this also brings me to the story's biggest flaw. Yes, you describe the action on the field very well, but for most of chapter 2, 3 and 4, that's all you do. It feels a bit dry and boring, with very little comedy or tension. Most of the comedy comes from Spike being pressured into favouring one team or the other, but those scenes are few and far between. You're missing some great opportunities to add more colour to the whole thing, by focusing on the individual characters' actions and emotions more. There's a lot of comedic potential in there, but you'd need to focus on 'the Mane Six playing hoofball' rather than 'the Mane Six playing hoofball', if you get what I mean.
You got off to a promising start in chapter 1, when you really showed the Mane Six's personalities very clearly (RD and AJ's rivalry, Pinkie always being up for fun activities, Rarity switching from aloof and ladylike to 'It. Is. ON' when provoked enough...). But once they were actually playing, your efforts at characterisation became more vague, less consistent, and hence less effective.
Also, I hate to break out the old "show, don't tell" cliché on you - mostly because it's something people love to be stuck-up gits about - but take a look at this paragraph:
This is a prime example of telling where you could, and should, show. Instead of just informing us about how their feelings about the game have changed, you could have worked in all kinds of subtle touches - actions, lines of dialogue - to show things getting progressively nastier. This is the kind of thing I mean by 'missing some great opportunities to add more colour to the whole thing'.
As for the low grammar score, that's mostly on account of the barrage of apostrophes in really inappropriate places, and a few pretty grating "they're" / "their" / "there" errors. Also, a big part of chapter 3 is full of "time travel" between the past and the past perfect tense, making it hard to figure out whether these events are taking place now or have already happened at the point the story is being told.
Conclusion: decent effort, but I think you let your love of the game get in the way of your desire to tell an interesting story. Not that the two can't coexist - if you'd paid a little more attention to the latter, this could have been one of the better comedies on Fimfiction. The premise certainly has that kind of potential. But I'm afraid you didn't quite tap that potential. Sorry for being so harsh, but hey, you put it up for review and I gave my honest opinion.
Besides,realfootball is obviously superior.Enjoy your review! Please help me out by looking at my story: Arsenal of Harmony
2543114
Hey, just wanted to let you know I'll get around to reviewing your story soon. I've got most of it read now, and I'm just trying to figure out how I'm gonna go about reviewing it. Just thought I'd let you know in case you were wondering what was taking me so long.
Thanks for your review of mine, also. It was very helpful and I learned a lot from it.
2569736 Oh, take it easy, there's no rush. I definitely appreciate that you're taking your time to think about how to review it.
The NFL's rule about a simultaneous catch:
Rule 8 - Section 3 - Article 1 - Item 5: Simultaneous Catch. If a pass is caught simultaneously by two eligible opponents, and both players retain it, the ball belongs to the passers. It is not a simultaneous catch if a player gains control first and an opponent subsequently gains joint control.
since pinkie and fluttershy caught the ball at the same time, and in hoofball you only need to grab onto the ball with your teeth and come down with it to be a catch/interception (not necessarily grab onto a certain amount of the ball) , fluttershy would win the simultaneous possession and the touchdown would go to applejack's team
also, even if pinkie did intercept it, she pushed off of rarity while jumping to catch the ball, so the pick would've been called back giving applejack's team an extra try at the end zone.
there, i just saved a ton of bronies from an argument. you're welcome :)
2871181
Thanks! Was hoping for someone to give their interpretation of what they think happened. I wrote it to be kind of open-ended, though what you said sounds about right. I actually based this on the final play of the Seahawks-Packers game from week three of last year's season that you may have heard of (I'm actually a Seahawk fan, but I can't in all honesty defend the ruling that was made), and I imagine Spike would have the same knowledge of the rules as those replacement refs. Kind of an odd thing to reference for a fandom that doesn't seem all that in to Football, but I hoped I could at least get through to a few people. Looks like I was right.
2871383 1)i was actually gonna mention that game in my comment but i didnt want to be too much of a football fanboy lol
2) thanks for actually responding so soon! (im new to fimfiction so this is kind of a huge accomplishment for me 
)
also, this is one of the only stories on fimfiction that i've found so far that has to do with hoofball, albeit a good one as well!
2871383 we should also talk football sometime. maybe about how the falcons are gonna whoop the seahawks in week 10 this year? hint, hint? (if you don't get the hint, im a fan of the falcons. mostly because i live in atlanta
)
2871845
Sounds sweet!
Urhhg! That play-off game last year had me pulling my hair out!
That was the second time that Seattle's D screwed up big time in the final minute of the game (first time was against Chicago, though we ended up winning that one in overtime). Still 11-5 was a big improvement over going 7-9 two years in a row (and somehow still making to the play-offs one of those years. The NFC west was freakin' joke at that time.
), plus our boy Wilson got Rookie of the Year, even after being pretty much ignored by the media, so that pretty much gave me more than enough to be happy about.
Seriously though, I'm definitely up for talking football anytime!
One more thing: as upset as I was about that play-off game, I would've much rather seen the Falcons go to the Super Bowl instead of the Forty-Whiners. Seriously, the whining their fans were doing after we destroyed them in week 15 (I think it was?) would put Rarity to shame.
2872479 hey, after the nfc championship, im up for any team whooping the niners (as much as i hate to admit it, i would love to see the saints beat them -_-) so go ahead and beat them! you get to do it 2 times a season!
Rarity grabed Spike in a hug , Counting one, two, She then Held him out at hooves length ,three,
"PUNT" Spike sailed through the goal posts "SCORE!"
Spike bounced and rolled to a stop.
Rarity ran up picking him up over her head, "STOP" yelled twilight.,
Rariry lowers Spike down to eye level & gives him a smooch, "Can't Spike my Spikey poo?" Spike cooed "With you Rarity I'll always have a ball"
5004840
Always useful, that Spike.