It's no secret that China is basically enjoying the same viral chaos of pony that we enjoyed back in the early to middle 2010's right now. Cartoon horses are all the rage, with armadas of artists, plushie makes, animators, and more all producing piles of pony for a ravenous fandom.
They ran a convention called China Southern Brony Carnival back in July, and have sent a full writeup over if you want to take a look at how their events look! Go check it out below if you are curious.
Submitted by Chinese Community:
Recap Of China Southern Brony Carnival 2024
China Southern Brony Carnival, aka CSBC, has happened recently from 19th to 21st July, at Guangzhou China, which is the 4th time of CSBC since it was founded in 2022. CSBC 2024 gained a well reputation right after it finished 2 months ago.
As a new convention, CSBC brought something new for Chinese bronies.
Prance the Night
Programs like concert or music live are rare in Chinese brony conventions, but CSBC managed to make Prance the Night, an activity with band live show and EDM party, happened as the first try. This event received a good reputation, rated by attendees as the best one of all.
Watch it here
Band Live
A fresh band showed up on Prance the Night, it was teamed up by group of friends who doesn’t had any experience on stage. With little time to practice since they are students, they still made it happened with incredible atmosphere. The band performed several famous fandom songs by 4everfreebrony, Forest Rain, etc.
EDM Party
3 electronic musicians, Rainko, Starry Xplosion and Mutou led the audience into a further hyper night after the band live. They are from Ponies at Dawn and Eastquestria, and the latter is a domestic fandom music brand in China.
Brony Bus
CSBC made an innovation by having a Brony Bus as a convenient transport between the nearest metro station and the venue. It made traveling to other place (go dine together, sightseeing, etc.) much easier from the venue especially with a group of friends. The Brony Bus was equipped with special designed LED signs and pony related decorations. There were several times that bronies spontaneously singing Legend of Everfree (aka the bus song) together during the trip. Although it’s not far between metro and the venue, the brony bus still won the love of many people, undoubtedly be way ahead of the others!
Guest
Sweetie Bot Project joined CSBC 2024. After sightseeing around the city with some local bronies, they attended convention with two Sweetie Bots. For bronies that stay in the fandom for years and are interested in fan made project, it was a dream-come-true moment to meet Sweetie Bot in person. They shocked the people who were new to the fandom, showing what bronies can do. The booth of SBP was full of people, and the team got along well with attendees. It seems that the Sweetie Bot ended up having a great time.
Interactive Activities
Unlike other brony conventions in China, CSBC focus on interactions between friends and strangers. Not only do they hosted many interactive team/solo games such as Trivia Trot, Draw & Guess, they also dug into details to make people both on and off stage to feel involved. In solo games, everyone can compete with their knowledge and learn new things. Both canon and fan made production were blended in to let people return their focus on official episode and appreciate brilliant creations by bronies. While team games can make someone who has stage fright easier to take part in and make new friends. They designed various group games that don’t require any skills to play but always make plenty of funny moments for participants and audience to enjoy.
Excellent fandom project display
CSBC is always concerned about the development of MLP fan made project, they set a panel to give creators a change to show everypony what they made. This can boost the confidence of creators with positive feedback to keep creating and maybe let someone to join in, making more wonderful works in the future.
Cosers
Even though CSBS doesn’t has the most amount of cosers, we can still find plenty of them from the very basic dressing to full pony suit.
Booths
There were 18 booths attended in 2024 CSBC, which was a huge number compared with it’s scale. There was a wide variety of merchandises sold on the con, plushies, painting, badges, handworks, etc. It also had artists taking commissions during the event.
Bronies sing-along
An indispensable event in Chinese brony convention culture, was commonly held by the end of the con before the closing ceremony. CSBC worked on the playlist to make it meaningful and added subtitles at the top to ensure even at the back of the room can see.
CSBC will happen again in Guangzhou, July 20th ~ 21st, 2025. We’ll see you there.
Official website: https://csbronycarnival.com/index-eng.html
X: https://x.com/csbronycarnival
