#steamquestria

that’s adorable!! I love it when things work out serendipitously like that. :D

...and that’s a wrap! Part Five and Part Six are up, finishing us off. Or maybe you’d like to start at the beginning (now with a handy index)?

I’d hoped to get this up before school started again, but didn’t make it. :/ but I did get it up in time for Valentine’s, because I love you all! there were supposed to be more drawings, but alas, time once again makes a fool of me.

before I forget, the obligatory “thank you for your patience” cat picture:

an anon asked for steam!Tempest -- sorry for not responding directly to your ask, but it had a spoiler for my favorite line in the entire movie and it would be a shame to ruin that for people who haven’t seen it yet!

the steam!Tempest design? hmm, my thought was that she’s a robot who was in some kind of accident that resulted in a big ol’ Elementy crater on her face. I didn’t think too much about the details or how the movie’s story might be interpreted in steam-verse, but I wanted to keep it as a more fantasy-style injury without giving her a literal horn. (Candy’s the only one with a horn and that’s...probably still pushing it. but I liked the L.O.V.E. antenna too much.)

watsonian answer: Celestia’s actually pretty light in comparison to them both! she’s just down an arm and a couple of legs, while Luna and Sombra both had almost their entire bodies replaced. the main difference between those two is that Sombra’s augmentation was done gradually, so he was able to chop bits off and replace them as it spread. whereas Luna’s had to be done all at once, not to mention after a couple decades of her being science-frozen and also covered in evil gak. I think one thing that got a bit lost in the drafts vs in practice was that I meant for Luna’s situation to be totally unprecedented -- no one had ever been successful with someone in such bad shape, and they were basically winging it as they went. if it’d been anyone other than Celestia and Twilight working together, they wouldn’t have been able to pull it off. so...maybe it’s not as elegantly-done as it could’ve been if they’d had the luxury of more time and a better idea of what they were doing.

some of it can probably also be chalked up to the difference between the Nightmare and Sombra’s goop, that it just had different effects on their bodies and/or required different things to fix. had it continued, I had some ideas about how she still had some of the Nightmare in her system, and they were trying to make more Magic (Twilight still has not approved that name) in order to flush that out. maybe there might’ve been something involving Tantabus? 🤔

I did want to have her be a bit of a work in progress for a while, as they figured out more about Magic and how to improve her augments. ultimately she may have stopped needing the batteries, or at least nothing quite so dramatic (but Luna does love her theatrics, so maybe not).

This sounds like a reference to Gabe Newell of the company Steam, infamous for never releasing the third episode of the popular Half Life series. This person’s comment sounds like an attempt at a pun expressing their ire rather than any obscure insult towards you

I accept this explanation because it sort of answers it, while still leaving just a enough mystery to keep me happy! thank you. :D

ALSO I remembered I’d sent a screenshot to some people after getting it, so here it is in its original glory:

nope, I use Photoshop CS6! the brushes I use for steam are Kyle’s animator pencil and #1 and #2 from kecky’s magical brush set. both are pay-what-you-want so you can get them for free, or toss a few dollars their way as a thanks. c:

and as long as I’m here, happy new year everybody!!