I agree with Octavia. I mean, I don't know... I guess the stories of the Mane Six and their friends have gone so far since S1 that episodes which
don't involve them moving forward in their lives are seeming stale to some people? Or something? Whatever it is, I don't see a problem with that. I think it's fine to have a variety like this, like to have Spike majorly advocating for racial tolerance one week and playing pony D&D the next. At the very least, I'm enjoying the direction S6 has gone.
I particularly appreciated the design of the game itself, as Aramek and HH pointed out. I'd predicted that it was just going to be ponies playing kickball, which would not have been terribly original but still something solid around which to build a story, but instead we got something cool and new.
Wayoshi wrote:Anyone else think these few seconds in particular was a bit too exaggerated? Like the animators are trying a bit too hard to have unique faces in each new key moment, and it comes off as not entirely organic.
Don't have a copy of the ep to get pix right now, but yeah.

Like, this face is just... not uncanny, but very unpony IMO
It's definitely different, but I think the animators have been doing a great job this season, with things like this as well as all the action that Applejack and Rainbow Dash put on in the practice montage (and how Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy subsequently ate it). Like, in seasons 1-4 the artists and animators figured out what
worked, so in S5 they started pushing the backgrounds and environments into overdrive and the same with the characters this season. I think the best way to describe it is that it's less restrained than early seasons were.