I’m thinking of starting an MLP story; one that’s more part alternate universe that reboot.
Right now I’m thinking that the background would focus on the strange fact that the bad guys seem to all be returning after a thousand year absence.
I’d go with something like Celestia and Luna having brought about a thousand year ‘Calm’ of sorts, so while everythings peaceful it has resulted in Equestria going into a sort of decline, soldiers have lost their edge, advanced forms of magic haven’t been studied in a long time and forgotten, and technology hasn’t really advanced.
When Nightmare Moon returns it issues the end of the Calm, so villains and other threats are popping up more often, and because Equestria isn’t as prepared as it should be thanks to their 1000 year peace and have to spend most of their time getting their forces in order while they outsource their protection to adventurers.
With that setting, the story would mostly center around a group of ocs going around just doing adventures, building bonds and overcoming personal baggage.
In the background for the first Act, with Nightmare Moon being the initial big bad, and a morally gray Celestia would have our antisocial Twilight set out and become an adventurer to search for the Elements of Harmony which Nightmare has either taken custody of or just hidden somewhere.
Related to that, I’d most likely the Elements be unavailable for the first couple acts or so, and even if they are found they’re ‘just jewelry’ at the moment; that way there’s no instant win button for the characters. Maybe they’d even have some sort of ‘trial’ associated with them to judge if a character is worthy of being their bearer.
Act 2? I’m not sure where that would go at the moment. But this is what I’m thinking for a potential story.
On that I don’t know if it would be pony, or anthro or centered. If it’s for ponies I know I would have the cast have a spell basically grafted onto their hooves referred to as ‘Grippers’ - which would basically give them the ability to hold things with their hooves, otherwise if it uses anthro versions of the characters they would just use their hands.