What's wrong with MLP today?

[Taffeta]

@Uni. Awesome recollection. Rewarding the richest kid with money seems a bit off mind you.

 Also reminded me that Hasbro UK used to be more communicative that way too. My friend's dragon got caught in a lawnmower and they sent her a replacement...I also know Mum and Dad got my Lemon Drop from Hasbro to go with my second hand stable in 1990. Of course she was the Chinese one.

I also had a lot of correspondence with them in 95.

I wonder if this change is a symptom of the digital age and the loss of the personal touch.

We don't know whether kids now are fine with 50 of the same pony. They kind of don't have an alternative. If they like mlp they are stuck with mane 6.

I don't remember exactly how many I had, I think it was around 200something maybe...meh. The thing is, here parents seemed to be collecting for her, whereas I was older, would have been 11 when I started and in 1989, I would have been around 17 years old. I did get a lot of gifted ponies don't get me wrong, but it was really the only thing I asked for as a teenager. For graduation in 1990...I fricking asked for 25 ponies I didn't have, not a car...ponies :p I also worked to get cash as a teen to buy ponies, sold other toys at yard sales to buy more ponies. So meh, I didn't have my parents randomly decide to collect for me, it was all on me.

But, in some ways Hasbro did seem to 'imply' collecting the ponies, as much as being a toy. So I sort of think they saw it as a toy but knew with things like the horseshoe points/mail order program that there were people who were actually invested in getting each and every one of them. It also seems like a reason they'd bring ponies back for mail order...have an old scan of something that shows they're bringing ponies back with a mindset of HAY you might have missed these ponies, here is your chance to buy them and this was back in 1986 mind you.

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Also note they were actually calling them 'collector ponies' back in 1986....

...I can't believe you have never shown me that. That's awesome. I love the thought that went into it. It makes me feel like there's this whole other side of the US line we don't really see because all we see is the ID site ID tag pictures rather than the whole image created for the kids at the time. You guys had a club too, right? I know you didn't have ponies released with it like we did, but all of this conversation (aside being amazing for me as a history geek of ponyness) is all about what LBS said above - creating the dream for the children.

There's that age old story that MLP came about because someone asked a child what she dreamed about at night, and she said horses. I don't know if that's true or not, but it's a long handed down story.

Generation 1 was a world, not just a toyline. But it's not that FIM isn't a world - it is. Just...that connection between manufacturer and child (or teen) collector is different. Now it's what LBS said - it's more about selling product than it is creating that 'world'.

I can pull similar UK examples to Unicorn's - one that came from Megan with Baby Lucky, for example. I remember the offer for Baby Lucky. I begged my parents for him. We didn't have a lot of money at the time but I'd diligently saved horseshoe points, so I was ultimately allowed to send for him. I remember waiting eagerly for the weeks it took. He came in a little white box with a white comb and a purple bow tie. I was about four years old, maybe almost five but I still remember it. And I didn't keep my backcards. But I kept Megan's letter about Baby Lucky, because it was his letter of introduction to my pony family.

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It was a precious thing to me because of that.

In the 1989 pony club, the whole concept of the white baby was the idea of creating her identity yourself. There's a thread atm about the all white G3s with the idea of designing your own pony. But the attitude is more like 'create something' rather than 'here's a baby pony who needs to be cared for, and adopted, and named as part of your family'. Not saying there's anything wrong with the creative idea but the fact the MLP club sold this baby on the idea that she needed adopting. You got an adoption certificate for her on which to write her name and yours. I begged parents for this year's pony club as well because of all the adverts in the comics showing an image of the baby saying 'I'd love to be yours' and then, when you got the club flier, it said, 'I'm yours'.

Spoiler

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The booklets this year involved activities you could do with your baby pony, things to make for her, poems or stories and stuff about her throughout the year. These bits of advice sometimes also came from ponies. Pony Club was also always organised by 'Majesty', and she mostly answered the letters on the letters page of the comic as well. In early comics, specific ponies would have control of a page at the end of the comic where they'd explain an activity or something they'd done or learned as a result of a story they'd been in. So the ponies were communicating with the children, albeit through these paper mediums. And while I guess most kids knew they weren't really talking to the ponies when they wrote letters, a lot of kids wrote directed to a specific pony asking them questions.

It was a world touching imagination in a way that maybe FIM doesn't do. I'm not saying that there's no imagination involved, but outside of the animated world, there's not a lot of engagement between child and franchise. There are toys without stories on the card. They have animated images drawn on them rather than specific artwork. There are rarely inserts (2nd set baby sea ponies are an exception). There's more focus on store exclusives and repetition of characters in different styles rather than new characters.

I chose my ponies as a child on two things, usually. One, if I liked their comic persona, and two, if I liked their colours. The comic persona was often more important to me than the colour scheme, although I remember making some colour-related decisions. Usually that only happened if the pony I wanted most in the set wasn't there, though. And the one I wanted most was usually dictated by their role in this 'world' that had been created. But when I had those ponies, I never played with them in terms of the comic stories about their powers. I played with them in my own way in my own games and with my sister. I just became more interested in certain ponies because of their story roles.

Basically to sum it up I'd say that the difference is imagination. G1 tried to get kids involved in a lot of imaginative and creative play, imagining a 'ponyland' and almost playing along with this idea of ponies interacting directly with children through offers like Unicorn's memo and the pony clubs, comics, etc. G4 offers the storylines of the animation, books and comics, but doesn't directly try to link the ponies to the fans in the same way. They're tangible toys or tv characters. There's no sense of creating the ponies as being 'real'.

 I guess that's what's missing. It's not just about tickboxes on a collector file. It's about immersing the child in the pony world (maybe in the way Megan was?). I've never put much stock in the idea of Megan as representing every little pony girl...but perhaps that intent has more weight than I realised.

[kamakazee82]

i seem to remember some kind of contest advertised in stores, like you could pull a form to take home ... but i don't know if that's the one or not.  My friend told me i should enter, but a laughed, my small herd would have been pathetic compared to that one at the time ...

[Leave a Whisper]

Yeah, I haven't seen any mention of it in any of the pamphlets I have either... I don't have my original childhood ones anymore, but I do have a big stack of them I've saved from eBay lots over the years and nada. So maybe you're right, and it was tied to the mail order program somehow. I wish I had a clearer memory of where I actually heard about the contest, but I was still just a kid so I guess it's not too surprising that I don't remember anymore.

Maybe I can try to ask my mom and see if she remembers anything else. She took the pictures of me with the ponies and she probably helped me fill out the entry form too.

Here's my picture of me and my ponies, by the way. I also have a Halloween pumpkin bucket next to me, so it must have been pretty close to Halloween.

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Aww! :3

[Leave a Whisper]

@Uni. Awesome recollection. Rewarding the richest kid with money seems a bit off mind you.

 Also reminded me that Hasbro UK used to be more communicative that way too. My friend's dragon got caught in a lawnmower and they sent her a replacement...I also know Mum and Dad got my Lemon Drop from Hasbro to go with my second hand stable in 1990. Of course she was the Chinese one.

I also had a lot of correspondence with them in 95.

I wonder if this change is a symptom of the digital age and the loss of the personal touch.

We don't know whether kids now are fine with 50 of the same pony. They kind of don't have an alternative. If they like mlp they are stuck with mane 6.

I don't remember exactly how many I had, I think it was around 200something maybe...meh. The thing is, here parents seemed to be collecting for her, whereas I was older, would have been 11 when I started and in 1989, I would have been around 17 years old. I did get a lot of gifted ponies don't get me wrong, but it was really the only thing I asked for as a teenager. For graduation in 1990...I fricking asked for 25 ponies I didn't have, not a car...ponies :p I also worked to get cash as a teen to buy ponies, sold other toys at yard sales to buy more ponies. So meh, I didn't have my parents randomly decide to collect for me, it was all on me.

But, in some ways Hasbro did seem to 'imply' collecting the ponies, as much as being a toy. So I sort of think they saw it as a toy but knew with things like the horseshoe points/mail order program that there were people who were actually invested in getting each and every one of them. It also seems like a reason they'd bring ponies back for mail order...have an old scan of something that shows they're bringing ponies back with a mindset of HAY you might have missed these ponies, here is your chance to buy them and this was back in 1986 mind you.

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Also note they were actually calling them 'collector ponies' back in 1986....

This is wonderful!

[Taffeta]

Won't be available to you again...until January 2018

[Sunset]

I do want to say between HQG1C and the new retro ponies, it bothers me a lot less that there are so few new characters in the primary line.  I now have 3 different sources of ponies to look forward to so between them my wallet will be hurting enough as it is.  I might change my tune later but for now I'm happy.

[KarentheUnicorn]

Won't be available to you again...until January 2018

LOL! I still enjoy that hasbro wrote: Love from, my little pony

like awwww...the ponies love me.

Which one of the ponies wrote this letter?

[Leave a Whisper]

Won't be available to you again...until January 2018

LOL! I still enjoy that hasbro wrote: Love from, my little pony

like awwww...the ponies love me.

Which one of the ponies wrote this letter?

Snuzzle.

[Taffeta]

Making me think of that screen grab of Gusty with the opposable thumb hooves from Revolt of PE now...

[Al-1701]

Making me think of that screen grab of Gusty with the opposable thumb hooves from Revolt of PE now...

Maybe the pennas taught them some shapeshifting tricks.  Being able to make a temporary hand is useful for dusting and writing letters to little kids.

[lovesbabysquirmy]

Star magazine is/was a HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGE tabloid magazine, so all they would have had to do was advertise in their own publication if they were the sponsors of the contest

[Ponyfan]

Here's a couple of pages of the catalogs I was talking about. The ones that showed all the ponies.
http://mylittlewiki.org/wiki/File:Y4-catalog2.jpg


http://mylittlewiki.org/wiki/File:Y4-catalog3.jpg


Ponyfan

[Juliepants]

I remember there being something in the UK comics, I don't know if there was ever a competition but I remember there being pictures of people with their collection. It certainly made me want to collect ALL the ponies, I used to study those pictures and wish for the ones I knew the names of!! Thinking about it, some of the pictures could have been of non-UK people because I definitely remember Medley and Firefly being in them, I wanted them so much!!! Little did I know why I'd never seen them in a shop...
I think this was round 1989/90 when I was 7 or 8 (I think we're the same age Taffeta). (On a side note does anyone else remember collecting Esso tokens to send off for items? We got 4 ponies that way.) Sorry for my ramblings, I just find all this stuff really interesting. I wish I'd kept those comics, I gave them away to a school friend when we moved area when I was 11. Otherwise I think I'd still have them until today, my mum kept all my pony stuff. I've often wondered if that girl kept them (slim chance probably).

Jules x

[glitterball]

(On a side note does anyone else remember collecting Esso tokens to send off for items? We got 4 ponies that way.)

Oooh! Never knew that! Which ones did you get??
My parents just got the drinks glasses 

[Taffeta]

I don't remember esso tokens...but you are right Juliepants about pictures in the comic of people's collections, I think mostly on the letters page. The one I remember was issue 200 and the girl who had a whole bunch of American ponies like colorswirls...

Pony comic also did giveaways and stuff. I always entered but never won...