Re: [GRIMDARK] Fallout Equestria: Project Horizons Discussion

[Dutcher]

I like to think that Trueblood did some experimenting on his ghoulish state, making him exhale pink cloud.

Hey Somber   /
I wanted to ask if you took inspiration from Lovecraft?
The black book based upon the Necronomicon.
Amadi being the leader of the cult.
The thing under the hoof being a god.
Thanks!

[Vinylshadow]

I swear to Discord, if I see some sort of Cthulu-type monster...

[Somber]

A bit.  There was more inspiration from Final Fantasy games tho...  u.u

[Vinylshadow]

Ah, who doesn't enjoy Lovecraftian horrors though?

The things Nightmares are made of...whatever we need to keep our ponies awake at night

[Silver136]

A bit.  There was more inspiration from Final Fantasy games tho...  u.u

I've wanted to play those, but I've only seen FF VII...

[Dutcher]

A bit.  There was more inspiration from Final Fantasy games tho...  u.u

I've wanted to play those, but I've only seen FF VII...

I tried to enter the series through VII as well.
Bought it on a steam sell and everything but i kinda gave up after an hour.

[O. Hinds]

I liked IX. I seem to recall that several other people on the writing team do too.

[O. Hinds]

I liked IX.  I seem to recall that several other people on the writing team do too.

...kay.
Never played it.
I played 1 and 10. I will probably rejoin the series at 100, at this rate.

:D
I definitely recall Bronode liking IX, I think. Maybe he was it.

[SilentCarto]

Can anyone please explain what does the Star Soul bound to Tom means?
Thanks   

Well, for that, we roll way back to Chapter 34 and BJ's visit to the afterlife.

With magic and sorcery, the zebras called forth the fallen star and bade it rise.  Return to the heavens.  Thousands were offered in sacrifice, their screams rising up until the heavens could no longer bear them, and one star plunged down to silence it forever.  Like a great flame it fell and shattered the zebra city, and the broken mountains shuddered and collapsed to bury all beneath their rubble.  But the dark heart was still not destroyed; it caught the falling star and consumed the luminescent being within.  Only two specks escaped… one rising to the sun… the other to the moon.
...
Ponies built their machines and weapons and spells and slew one another in bloody combat.  The song was lost to a scream of hate and pain.  This time, however, as ponies and zebras died, not all their tiny motes returned above.  Many, a small fraction, but still so many, were snared in the spider’s web and whisked to the dark heart, there to scream the dark note.  Waiting.  Tempting another star to fall and be devoured so that the heart could be freed.

The Eater of Souls can't literally consume mortal souls; it needs to eat other celestials to regain its lost power. And Goldenblood put a star soul in the Project Horizons projectile.

[SilentCarto]

I liked IX.  I seem to recall that several other people on the writing team do too.

...kay.
Never played it.
I played 1 and 10. I will probably rejoin the series at 100, at this rate.

Well, keep in mind that it's not a "series" in the sense of the games taking place sequentially, or even in the same world. They're mostly just linked by a common vocabulary of interface, spell names, summons, and jobs. If you feel like picking one up--

Well, actually, if you feel like picking one up, reach for Chrono Trigger. But if it's gotta have "Final Fantasy" in the name, I'd advise you to start with FF6. It's really the best of the bunch. 4 is a close second, and then 7 or 9 depending on your taste.

I'm rather curious which game was most influential on PH. There's the obvious connection to 7 with Sephiroth casting Meteor, of course, but I could draw a lot more parallels to various games that may or may not be intentional.

[Somber]

Seven was most influential.  Four is most emotionally influential.  There might be some six in there as well....

Yes, I mix together anime and console games and FO:E....

Kinda like mixing barbiturates, LSD, and PCP.

[Vinylshadow]

"And off in the distance, Blackjack saw two ponies fighting with two ridiculously-oversized swords that were clearly compensating for something, or lack thereof..."

[Harmony Ltd.]

So, unrelated, but it's something I've been pondering for a while and need to get out of my system...

Somber, am I right in my feeling that Glory could have originally been conceived as a gender-swapped Arcade Gannon (from Fallout: New Vegas) in the first drafts of PH?

[Silver136]

So, unrelated, but it's something I've been pondering for a while and need to get out of my system...

Somber, am I right in my feeling that Glory could have originally been conceived as a gender-swapped Arcade Gannon (from Fallout: New Vegas) in the first drafts of PH?

I feel like P-21 is more of an Arcade Gannon. He's condescending, intelligent, and while he's not skilled in energy weapons he wears light (no) armor and helps the hero. I always viewed Glory as more of a Veronica.

[Vinylshadow]

I have read over 8500 pages of FoE fics

Why do I feel a sense of pride at that?

I barely remember the major events and names of places

[Somber]

Actually, I never played FONV till about chapter 10.  Glory was... er... 'inspired' (kof kof ripped off kof) from Velvet Remedy.   And remember, she was going to die in chapter 6 and the Dusk would have been the flyer.  But I felt I had too many bad girl characters with BJ and Rampage and so kept Glory.

[Vinylshadow]

Yeah,I've noticed the trend of female medical ponies in FoE fics...

What a shame Caddy got his head blown off

[Borsuq]

What a shame Caddy got his head blown off

You know you spend too much time reading stories when you recognize a character from a different fic than is discussed in this topic - who was in just a few chapters at that - by just his nickname...

[RoboRed]

^ This.

[Vinylshadow]

I only called him Caddy because I didn't want to go look how how to spell...Caduceus

I also snorted at the ribbing they gave 'Security' where Murk says "NOPE" to painting a target on himself

granted, he's a rather tiny target...

[Dutcher]

Is Caddy from MN7?

[Vinylshadow]

Yeah, was Glimmer's newest snuggle-buddy

Heh...can't remember if Murk walked in on them or not

Probably...just like Pip did with Velvet and Calamity

[Borsuq]

Did Murk walked in on them, hm...


Pity this hadn't actually happened, though:

[Vinylshadow]

Shhh, you'll give away my fanfic!

[Somber]

Uggggghhhhh...

I just realized where Goldenblood and Blackjack came from...

I read a lot of different stories.  Lord of the Rings, of course.  Wheel of Time (To a point).  Dresden files.  RA Salvadore's dark elf line.  But I also read a lot of non-fantasy fiction and am a big fan of Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child team ups.  I'm also a fan of Clive Cussler's work.

Mix this together and what do you get?

Ultra competence.

AKA, Mary Sue characters.  I generally don't like that term, as it is horribly sexist, but it's the one most people can relate too.  Ultra Competence.

If you're not familiar with Preston and Child, they write excellent contemporary thrillers with just enough science thrown in to keep things interesting.  They started out with Relic, and had a slew of mostly mundane characters trying to tackle a monster in their museum.  Along came a mysterious FBI agent with the guns and knowledge to give a little nudge here and there.  Aloysius Xingu Leng Pendergast.  It wasn't that notable.  In the movie, he doesn't appear at all.  And in the sequel, he makes another appearance at the middle, but it's largely left up to the less competant Officer Degusta.

Then Pendgergast took over the series.  The man can do anything.  Knows everything.  Let me acknowledge that Preston and Child have a knowledge of high culture that, if true, is staggering, and if made up, feels legitimate.  The problem is that it's everywhere.  He speaks a dozen languages, has the ability to manipulate anyone and everyone, and is always right in the end.  The later novels go from 'if' Pendergast will solve the case to 'how' and we're largely left wondering how many secondary characters will be affected.  Now he's made all of his secondary characters ultra competant too. 

I'm not exactly sure how I feel about this.

One of the staples of writing is suspense.  'If' a character will succeed or not.  GG Martin's the master of this with Game of Thrones.  We seriously and sincerely have no clue who will 'win' at the end, or if there will be a 'win' at all.  (Seriously, at this point, I think I'd enjoy it if the world was frozen solid due to all the bickering.)  It takes a very brave writer to do this, because the vast majority of our dramas end in triumph.  Imagine how we all would have felt if Voldemort had killed Harry and won?  Looking at it from the outside, it's a pretty safe bet that Harry will win.  If Harry had died by Goblet of Fire, maybe she could have started towards a downer ending, but at the end?  No.

So maybe if isn't the right thing to say.  Maybe what I take as Ultra Competance is plot armor.  After all, Blackjack screws up immensely, but I doubt that she's going to step on a landmine and die right before the last chapter.  She has to live or the story stops.  If I were to ever kill her, it'd be at 33.  And I didn't.  Ce la vie.  I often wonder what if I had killed her, and took out the Ultra Competant Goldenblood too.  Made Horizon's Trottenheimer's mad invention.  Introduced Dr. Strangepony.  Something like that.  Maybe it would have made the story better... I don't know.  At this point, I'm just crawling towards the end and fighting towards the original vision.

So if the if really isn't in question for most of our fiction, then what causes suspense?  Maybe it's the price.  There's always a price to be paid.  I have to wonder what would have happened if killing Harry had been the key to finally killing Voldemort, and the price had been Harry's life.  We all have to pay prices in our lives.  What Price will Blackjack have to play?

Also... I realized I screwed up.  I should have had BJ's friends find her in the Core.  This is one happens when characters are ultra competant, but secondary characters aren't.  Since Maripony, the story's been largely keeping BJ away from her friends.  It seemed like the only thing I could do because I don't want them to die.  They didn't have BJ's victory talent protecting them. 

Sigh... I dunno.

[Vinylshadow]

I find the contrast between MN7 and PH interesting

Murk needs his friends to protect him, whereas it seems Blackjack's the one that needs to protect her friends, and LittlePip seemed to be a balance between the two

I think Blackjack's going to pay quite the heavy price to keep her friends safe from Cogjack, or maybe even to leave the Shadowlands or whatever they're called

Maybe become a creature of shadow that wouldn't be able to live in a world of Sunshine and Rainbows

[Harmony Ltd.]

Well, the good thing is

as I sincerely hope PH isn't the last thing you'll write as an author, now you'll know what errors not to commit again.

Right?

[Silver136]

To be fair, I saw Goldenblood as ultra competent up until we learned more about the Eater. He seemed to know all the answers, god knows he was manipulative as all hell, and for a while I thought something he'd done would bring the story to a close. Then came the new chapter sets, and the info therein. Now I see Golden as someone who seemed to know all the answers, believed he did, but was really just manipulated by a greater power. I would say that makes him a well developed character, not a "Mary Sue."

[Vinylshadow]

That's usually how it works, especially if you keep a log of any writing mistakes you find or plot contrivances that don't work in a certain setting

My computer isn't used to finding words that use "S" instead of "Z"

Agonising, cosy, that kind of thing

My spell-check took one look at MN7's word doc and said "Screw that, too many spelling errors, you're on your own"

Sad thing was I was going through it and correcting them as I found 'em, but now that I'm reading the (up-to-date) PDF, I can't fix any mistakes I find, nor do I take the time to open up a word doc to list the errors

And don't even get me started on Horizons' (few, but still there) mistakes, I've seen a few missing quotation marks, some names weren't capitalized and a few words missing here and there

[Borsuq]

Considering how much Blackjack had paid already, I would say she should get a refund rather than pay more.

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