Silvershock

I wouldn't feel too bad about that. Nicole was having fun messing with people the entire convention. I watched her crash panels, randomly sit next to audience members and wait for a reaction, etc. My favourite was watching her go up to a kid, ask him about his cosplay, if he was enjoying the con and so on, and then just drop in "Oh, by the way, I'm Princess Celestia." The kid nearly exploded!

I'm not 100% on the multiquoting thing here, so bear with me... Very glad to hear that people were getting along well and meeting new folks. That's more important than anything, especially at a con like ours, and it's one of the things that I personally aim for, because it makes me happy to see. You're absolutely right. We heard that from a number of people. The simple answer to that is: we didn't expect there to be so many of you! I opened the doors early because I couldn't believe how jammed the corridor was getting. I don't know whether it was the theme we had this year, or just a side effect of having more attendees, but we had TONS of cosplayers this year. We'll make sure to have more room for you in 2015. This was an unintentional side-effect of when the guests were available to attend. As season 5 and EQG2 were both being worked on, the DHX staff and crew were especially busy this year. A number of the guests were only able to attend for a portion of the convention rather than all of it, so their events were crammed into a single day. (Incidentally, this is also why the bullying panel was unfortunately canned. We'll see if we can bring that back.) I'm gonna hold my hand up here and say that the clash with AR is entirely my fault. I checked with every convention I could possibly think of before I signed the contract, to make sure we weren't overlapping this year, and somehow missed Anime Revolution! That said, there are so many cons during the summer we're bound to conflict with something, somewhere. BUCK, for example, called their dates several months after ours, and happened to be on the same weekend for the second year running. D'oh! We'll do our best to minimise conflicts, but sometimes it's out of our hands.

Glad you all had fun at the con this year! We really wanted to try and up the ante, and I think we mostly managed that. Great to hear we had first-timers and other MLPF folks. The staff are having some downtime while the board and I finish stuff off (and the treasurer and I move house), then contract-y things will happen, and then....

Do it, filly. Seriously. The city is great, the people are great, the food is great. If you like the big outdoors then the size of this place will keep surprising you. If you like skiing, there's four ski locations within reach. Public transport is better and cheaper than back home (within the Metro area), and there's tons to do. Vancouver Island is a ferry ride away, there's seaplanes landing in the bay, an international airport a $4 Skytrain ride away, it's just great. Plus, if you want to visit the US, you're really close to the border. (Can you tell I like to travel?) The downside is that housing here is very expensive, and rents go up sharply the closer you get to downtown. If you've got a decent job and you live in somewhere like Burnaby then it's reasonable, but I highly recommend finding a roommate to split costs with. Also, the city has no well-maintained well-kitted laser tag arenas, which for an addict like me is painful. But the biggest upside has nothing to do with the location. You don't realise what an insular, paranoid, fearful person Britain can make you until you're not there, or how reactionary, traditionalist, and downright racist the place can be (though those are some of the reasons I left). Oh, and I think I have you beat on "biggest hellhole". I went to school in......Dewsbury. *Shudder*

If I'm being honest, this show changed my life, twice. Incoming ramble! Firstly, when I lived back in the UK, I didn't have the greatest social life (though I do still have a few really close friends from there). Aside from being generally viewed as a bit weird, I'm quite susceptible to paranoia, and living on my own as I did amplified its effects. I ended up quite down and quite ill, not really going out, feeling generally uneasy pretty much all of the time.The insomnia from my childhood returned, and I would stay up late at night just trying to find things to occupy my brain - coding, gaming, cartoons, etc. One night someone from America in an IRC chat sent me a link to the new MLP, and I watched half a diozen episodes straight. It's weird to describe the effect, but the show was like pure joy, all bright colours and devoid of cynical restraint. I'd come down on a morning before work and throw an episode onto my TV from my network share, and it'd fill the room with colour. It...helped. It wasn't the only factor, but it helped me get over myself, helped me realise what I was missing. I started to push myself out of the door more often, force myself to leave and not worry. I went back to hanging out with the local furries, made a ton of friends, had a ton of laughs. I realised that I'd been stagnant in my ambitions, too, so I applied for the move to Canada I always wanted, and I got it! The second time the show made my life better was once I got to Canada. You have to understand, when I walked off that plane, I had nothing. Two suitcases of clothes, my cat in a carrier, and my laptop bag. Nothing else. Not a single thing. I didn't know anyone, I didn't know where anything was, and I wasn't sure what to do next. I met some of the local furs, including my now roommate, and started looking for somewhere permanent to live. And then I figured, "there's got to be bronies in this town, right?" Holy shit...are there ever bronies in Vancouver! I've never met such a welcoming group of people. I made a whole swathe of new friends, almost instantly. We started hanging out every single week, laughing and shouting, finding fun things to do and chaos to cause. I got involved in BronyCAN, I worked for them to help make it a fun event, and it was brilliant. Before I knew what the hell was going on, they'd handed me the reins to the convention! I was blown away. I even met my girlfriend through the brony group, and we're dotty for each other. So yeah, being a brony really changed my life. I went from a fearful, upset recluse living in some hellhole town in England, to a happy and confident (if still kinda rant-y) guy living in a great city, in a better country, with great friends. When you get right down to it, those guys are why I run BronyCAN. I don't deserve to be this fortunate, so I want to throw all my friends one massive pony party, to say thank-you, for everything.

If I don't go, I'll be in a lot of trouble, so you'll see me there.

CANterlot has unfortunately been cancelled for 2014, may return in 2015 depending on whether funding can be raised. There's TROTtawa that may be coming back for a second year, which is attached to G-Anime. Only other confirmed Canadian cons for 2014 I'm aware of are BronyExpo and - naturally - BronyCAN.

I think season 3 is fine to be honest. The opener was great, and there were some really solid episodes in there. My problem with the finale was always down to it being rushed rather than the events that occur in it. I just wish they hadn't cut it short to spend time making that...other thing. I bloody hate that film. Best Pony just spent her time stealing everyone else's episodes, like teaching Applejack how to act hysterical.

Apologies for the thread resurrection, but I like to keep my promises. So I'm at CANterlot. Not running any panels here, but we do have a booth... Wait, what's that in our "Highlights from 2013" slideshow... Oh no, did some of the gifs from this thread find their way in there? That's terrible! I did warn you, dude. Just be glad that there aren't any projection screens at this con.

For me it's easily e-books. There's several reasons for that: 1) E-books don't tend to have the same draconian DRM as other forms of media, so I feel much happier buying them online. 2) E-books are now starting to actually be much cheaper than their paper counterparts on many storefronts. 3) I'm a programmer. Just one of my reference books might weigh several kilos. Having all of them available in the same place and being able to fast-search them is just the best thing ever. 4) E-book readers are inexpensive and have insane battery life, which makes them ludicrously handy. I bought a Sony PRS-T1, which is extremely light and comfortable to use, plus I jailbroke the custom Android install and put Kindle on the device alongside Sony's own store. ;-)

Hola chums. Looks like I'll be over in Toronto in a few weeks. Anyone else attending CANterlot this November that fancies a beer/meetup? Been ten years since I was last in Toronto, so it would be fun to meet up with some new folk out east.

You didn't hear any "fun" crowds? I couldn't get away from them!

How can this thread possibly be missing the cheesy, over-the-top sheer bloody awesomeness of Meat Loaf? Please, allow me to illustrate:

And this! I think we have a booth this year at V-con. It's also highly likely that I'm manning it. Trollface?

This is the greatest thing! Next event Feld0 and I are both at, I'm getting that on a screen somewhere.

Hi all! It's highly likely that the rest of the staff are currently asleep, so I'll come on and express a sentiment I know they all share. Thank you for making BronyCAN 2013 awesome! There are so many people we need to thank, but the attendees are top of the list. We budgeted for around 450-500 people, and around 820 walked through the door. For a first year con in Vancouver, that's incredible. The con wouldn't have been successful without your support, so you get first praise. The attendees started the con by invading the stage and dancing, and ended the con by cheering the roof off. Personally, I thought you lot looked like you were on the world's biggest sugar high. A big thank-you also to our special guests, who were fantastic. They were enthusiastic, a ton of fun, and patient when things were sometimes late or didn't go quite to plan (that's live events for you!). A personal shout-out from me to Lee Tockar, who was everywhere helping us out, whether on the main stage, hanging out in con ops, or stepping up to do media interviews for us. Thanks also to the various show staff who slid into the con incognito. (I think everyone knows Sibsy was around, but did you happen to spot any others? I can think of another name you would definitely recognise. ) Huge, huge, unrelenting thank-you to the Vancouver furry community, who stepped up when our at-con reg system was delivered to us non-functioning and helped us out with tech and hardware support. Special thanks to Aphinity (who is on both BronyCAN and Vancoufur staff, and basically engineered the whole thing), Jason (one of the Vancoufur techies) and Poniverse's very own Feld0, who also saved our asses multiple times when the new server started misbehaving at the con. Numerous other staff members were from the local furry community, and they did a great job helping us get started. Special mention to Trapa Civet, the unsung background hero of many a con, for all his advice and support. Trapa's been founding, running or otherwise supporting conventions for a long time, and his involvement was invaluable. The radio kit we were using is his, the reg system software we use is his, some of the hardware our reg team used is his, so big thanks to him also. He unfortunately came back from a trip to Europe the day after the con, so we couldn't drag him on stage and thank him in person. And everyone should thank our small army of volunteers for their dedication and hard work. The local (and less local) bronies that came to the con as redshirts were essential in keeping the con running. They were professional, cheerful, and worked their butts off. I'll see if I can get something nice for you guys for the Saturday meetup. Finally, a thank-you to our community artists for all their really great work, as well as an apology to those few whose contributions never made the charity auction. There was a small mix-up and a few pieces got left behind. We're hoping to do something with those after the con. That said, the auction was still a success, and with the help of our contributors, we made over $7000 for the local children's hospital, which is something to be proud of. And on a personal note, thank you to everyone who turned up for my panel. I was a bit worried about how it would go, given the complete failure of my embedded video content, but the turnout was better than I could have expected, and we all had a ton of fun. The feedback we've had from attendees has blown us away. We're really glad that you all enjoyed the con, and we were amazed by its popularity. We had both pony and non-pony news networks attend the con, and I think we're up to 4 TV stations that have featured us as an item. It's really encouraging to see just how enthusiastic people were for the convention, and we promise to put all our effort into making our next endeavour bigger, better and brighter. I hope I haven't missed anyone. We really do appreciate everything you guys did for us, and we hope you all had a blast at BronyCAN '13. We'll be back very soon, hopefully with info on BronyCAN '14, but for now I'm sure you'll understand if we all take a little time off. I'm behind on my writing, and that backlog of video games aren't going to play themselves. We love you guys. See you soon! Silvershock

Ah, so that's where our Apricity is. Well, I'm glad she went to a good home. We raised a ton of money for the local kids' hospital, which is great. I did manage to get some swag myself, but being staff I didn't get near the vendor's hall much. I picked up another alt comic cover, one of our prints, a Princess Poutine shirt, and some artwork from the always awesome Temrin. Not nearly as much as the horde I brought back from EFNW, but then I wasn't being pulled around by the radio all con long. ;-)

Really glad that you had fun with us, and thanks for coming along. The staff are all taking some time to recover, but we'll be back very soon with plans. BronyCan 2014 is, I would say, almost a certainty at this point. I'm glad you got a shot of that Sibsy image too. It...may have somehow, kinda, sorta made its way to my living room. But it got damaged in transit, so I'm glad you got a shot of the original. Actually, your image reminded me. I had our reg team knock this little beauty up for me. And on the back... Not that I think Button's mum is super-yummy or anything. *Cough*

Charity pieces are still welcome, but you'll have to be quick! Let me know what you need - shipping address, e-mail details, etc - and I'll get them over to you. And thanks for the donation!

We could only fit one piece in the conbook, I'm afraid, and that has been decided upon. Could any of the artists who were doing signage/donation work for me that I haven't been able to check in with yet please PM me? I haven't heard back from a few of you, and my Skype contact list is kind of insane these days.

Many apologies to anyone who's been waiting on replies from me. As Firestorm said, I've been travelling, and I haven't been as able as I'd like to respond to the dozens of messages I've been receiving. BroWhovian - PM me with your Skype ID and I'll check to see if I accidentally blocked or missed it. I've been getting tens of contact requests recently, so unless you change the request message from the default, it's often hard to match people up. I'll be checking in with all the artists I've previously spoken to this weekend, to see how things are going. There's a little time left yet before we need everything mailing/e-mailing over for the auction, so no panic yet. Panic slightly more if you're going for a conbook slot. Again, apologies. I'm currently travelling the motherland, but I'll be back somewhere better next week.

I'm currently attempting it in Okami I've done it in various games over the years. The Sucker Punch games spring to mind - I have 100% trophies on all 3 inFamous games, as well as the Sly Coopers I've played and (weirdly enough) Linger in Shadows. That's just my PS3 stuff, though. I came close in Psychonauts, and my friend actually did it. There are games like Deus Ex where I managed to max out every level, etc, though without a percentage counter it's harder to tell if I missed anything. I also did it on the Time Crisis 2 PS2 disc, I think, but TC and I....we get along. I've probably done it in tons of games that I just can't recall.

Not a bad idea, especially if we could get Trapa on the panel. Dude has literally founded at least a half dozen long running cons.

This is something I really want to get into. I have Blender, a good amount of technical know-how, and the right number of ideas to get started. It's just finding the time and talent to do it.

Neon, Mare - I'll contact you as soon as I can and sort something out. We're still gathering submissions for the con space itself at present, though we've had a few vacancies on the staff art team become available, if anyone here is nuts enough? ;-) Writers - I'll get an e-mail address from Andrew to use for submissions. Actually, he posted one a few posts back, so send them along to there. :-)