Popular children’s TV franchise My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic is to get an English language table-top roleplaying game, it has been announced. The franchise has a diverse following, and it’s a product that older fans have been requesting for a number of years. The game will be produced by Shinobi 7 and River Horse games.

The My Little Pony: Tales of Equestria Core Rulebook will be a 152-page, full colour hardcover manual. The back cover includes an introduction on how to play storytelling games and is aimed at younger gamers. RPGs for younger players is currently an under-served market, with Monte Cook’s No Thank You Evil being the only obvious competitor. Other products in the My Little Pony range include The Curse of the Statuettes Adventure Story Box Set, a boxed expansion including a 48-page full colour adventure book, a gamemaster screen, a 6 polyhedron dice set, and 40 customizable character sheets and Tokens of Friendship, 12 gemstones with a collector’s bag.

Shinobi 7 are an imprint created by Manga publisher Seven Seas Entertainment and game publisher Ninja Division, who specialise in turning cartoons into games. Previous products include Tokyo Ghoul and Space Dandy. Based in Nottingham, England, River Horse are responsible for turning movie franchise such as Terminator Genisys and Labyrinth into popular and atmospheric games.

It also goes to show how much of a difference a decade makes. Back in 2006, the official Dungeons & Dragons website ran an April 1st joke article declaring that they would be producing a My Little Pony game. This was before the equestrian franchise became a cult hit, and was more a tongue in cheek stab at the then recent news that Dungeons & Dragons owner Wizards of the Coast was now owned by Hasbro (who also own My Little Pony). It has now gone from a gag to a real product.