Cold Open

From EverQuest player to cosplayer, The EverQuest Show sits down with Linda Carlson.

And Brasse was a fixture at EverQuest conventions for years. We’re taking a look back at Sony FanFaires, SOE Lives and looking ahead to the 25th anniversary of EverQuest

You’re watching, The EverQuest Show.

Welcome to The EverQuest Show

Welcome to the EverQuest Show, I’m Fading here in The EverQuest Show studios. 

On this show, I try to highlight the fans of the EverQuest, just as much as the games. 

And where there are fans, there are fan conventions! A place to celebrate EverQuest with great Fan Faire

EverQuest Fan Faires and Conventions

Within the first year after EverQuest launched, fans of this new gaming sensation begin to organize and it seemed obvious that a fan convention was needed.

Sony FanFaire was born in late 2000, with the first event held in Las Vegas.

But over the next several years, the event moved all over the United States.

Alternating east and west coasts with bits of the heartland peppered in. With as many as 4 or 5 events in some of the early years.

In 2005, the event opened up to other games in the Sony Online portfolio and by 2007 Sony FanFaire had settled into an annual event, stationed in Las Vegas, mainly for financial reasons. It’s a relatively cheap destination for air travel, hotel booking, and it’s a reasonable driving distance from San Diego, where Sony Online would need to transport employees and equipment.

For the next several years the events expanded and became quite popular, Even catching the attention of the G4 show X-play.

Some of the annual favorites included the Welcome Reception, Costume Contest, The Banquet and Usually there was a Party or Pool Party of some sort. 

The fans were able to mingle with each other, purchase swag, meet the devs, ask questions…Even I asked a few questions occasionally…

There were big announcements and reveals of expansions and new games.

In 2012 Sony FanFaire was rebranded as SOE Live, to better welcome players from all of the growing number of games in SOE’s arsenal.

SOE Lives continued in Las Vegas and continued growing through the announcement and initial development of EQ Next.

In 2015 that all changed. That was a tough year. Sony sold off its PC gaming division and SOE was sold. After the sale necessary restructuring a cold hard look at the numbers led to layoffs, the cancellation of EQ Next and subsequently, the cancellation of the planned 2015 SOE Live.

Since then, the franchise has been surviving and even thriving, but there haven’t been fan events to the scale of FanFaire or SOE Live.

For the 20th anniversary of EverQuest, a small single day gathering occurred in San Diego, along with an exhibit at the Comic Con museum featuring the art of EverQuest. 

But the days of EverQuest Fan Faires are at the moment, only Fading Memories.

Interview – Linda Carlson – “Brasse the Dwarf”

If you ever attended some of the Sony FanFaires or SOE Lives, you may met a dwarf by the name of Brasse.

“Ladies and gentlemen let me welcome to SOE Live 2013 our very own dwarf, BRASSE!”

I’m Linda Carlson. I’ve gone by a couple of first names and several last names and uh I’m a gamer.

I played a dwarf because it’s typical for people to want to play something they’re not. I wanted it to be something strong. Powerful. Very resolute. All the things that I wasn’t in real life. And I liked being a dwarf.

And it was fun it was really fun to role play a dwarf because you can get away with almost anything if you’re role playing correctly.

No no wait wait wait no no no no wrong wrong here! I tell you autofollow doesn’t always work. Right there.

I actually started out because you know you also want to be something that you’re not. I wanted to be tall and svelt and attractive. And so it turns out I kind of look like a dwarf. But in the in the start I started playing female characters. I made a high elf. I made a Wood Elf. I made a human.

And the problem is back, in that day, the masses were not perhaps as well educated or diplomatic as they are now. So you can only have so many times that somebody comes running up to you, “Hey baby nice rack” or “You want to cyber?”

And I’m going “No! No!”

So I found out after trying three or four characters, that if you’re a male dwarf no one’s going to hit on you.

“Is that a flask on your arm?”

“There are at least three! You don’t want to run out of vital equipment and supplies while you’re on a campaign!”

It was a game game changer for me because I realized that those are all other real people at the same time running around in games.

Then I fairly quickly got up to level eight because I’m now on like hour nine of this game that I was so resentful of.

I caught sight of some huge massive thing and I was dead! I was devastated! All my stuff’s going to disappear! My rusty gear! People came to find me and they took me out. Somebody had found my corpse out by Corflunk!

Oh my God! It was corflunk. Cuz I was a dwarf right! Obviously a dwarf!

They killed Corflunk. I got all my stuff back. And that was it. I never looked back after that. That was it.

“Scary stuff!”

I took the blonde bearded female when I joined the EQ guide program and I wanted to have something that was sort of in your face.

So I thought “Brasse.”

So it becomes an act. It doesn’t have to be you out there. Put somebody else else out there. And with Brasse it added an extra layer of humor and fun and camaraderie that isn’t common to the human race.

If you’re roleplaying a character like that then everything becomes easier. You can just mess around and have a great time because none of it’s going to reflect on yourself personally.

“You’re going to come up here. You’re going to do a spin. “Hopefully you haven’t as had as much to drink as I have and you won’t fall down!”

Costuming I did specifically for the first EverQuest Fanfare that I attended because again I was still such a horrible introvert. But I was in the guide program.

I wanted to participate in the live quests but I didn’t want to be seen in person. So I thought that’s it I’m going to dress up as Brasse.

I would always sort of plan out a color. I’d pick a color and that’s what I’d go with. So when I decided one year to do green, I did a very leafy green costume. I used to enter the costume contests and I loved role playing, so I was always Brasse the dwarf every day all day at the Fan Faires.

And I loved that! So it seemed natural to the powers that be that maybe I should host this.

I’ve always loved stage work. You can be an introvert and do stage work because it’s just you talking to an imaginary set of people.

It was so much fun. To be part of a large group of people getting together for the same reason.”

“And just in case you’re wondering no they’re out of your league”

It’s a very different thing to perform in front of a large audience. It still terrifies me to this day to go to a party where I don’t know people. And have to make small talk!

“Always remember the Golden Rule : Whatever happens in Vegas … who am I kidding!? It’s going to be on the internet in two minutes! Prepare accordingly! See you there!!”

It is no lie to say that the game saved my life. The game also led to to my present career.

I owe everything to a game. So when people say it’s just a game? It’s never just a game. It became a social experiment for me where I blossomed as an individual.

I met my future husband in EverQuest. That was where I learned that online worlds can help you learn a person from the inside out. I learned so much from all of the people that I played with and later with all of the people that I worked with at Sony Online.

I just cannot minimize that!

I owe everything to this game

Linda Carlson – Brasse The Dwarf

I’ve been lucky enough to become friends with Brasse and see her at many of those conventions. 

Looking back on those conventions makes me realize how much I miss Fan Faires as we approach the milestone year ahead.

Now, I try not to get into too much speculation, and report only official facts that have been released or confirmed. I think of this show as kind of a news magazine.

But I wanted to take a moment to give my own editorial on the upcoming 25th anniversary of EverQuest.

My opinion, it needs to be BIG!

Fading’s Moment of Clarity

On March 16th 2024 EverQuest will celebrate 25 years since launch. 

And to mark the silver jubilee of the World of Norrath, we NEED a fan event. A big fan event. Bring back the FanFaire and SOE Live formula from the past. Improve upon and keep this franchise going for 25 more years.

Ji Ham himself, the CEO of EG7 and Daybreak recently talked about EG7s commitment to build franchises.

We have a number of first party owned IPs which believe are highly highly valuable, and can be utilized further for future titles, with EverQuest being at the top of the list.

Ji Ham – CEO of EG7 and Acting CEO of DayBreak Games Company

And how EverQuest fits into that…

Existing live games will be maintained with investments as necessary. We’re not pulling money out. We’re going to invest as necessary to continue to prolong. Like EverQuest will be here a decade later. And I would not be surprised if it was still where it is today.

Ji Ham – CEO of EG7 and Acting CEO of Daybreak Games Company

And THIS is how you can do it. The community is HUNGRY for information. About the games, a peak behind the development curtain. Even if it’s just a morsel. Hungry For Celebration. For FanFare. 

Celebrate the past present and more hopefully and importantly the FUTURE fans who hold this brand dear. The current players who spend hours and dollars playing, raiding and sustaining the game. 

Embrace those who love nostalgia of the old days. Take a key from your own playbook and tap into the nostalgia. It’s worked for all the recent expansions, let THAT (Nostalgia) work to usher in a new renaissance of EQ fans and expansion of the brand. 

Build the hype!

25 years is the Nostalgia sweet spot. Think about other major IPs that reinvented themselves. Transformers, Batman, or any Nintendo IP.

And while I’d love to keep this type of event to the EverQuest Franchise, you can significantly increase the attendance, and lower the cost somewhat by making  a games festival for the impressive portfolio of games under the EG7 umbrella…Like Sony did with SOE Live.

EQ, EQ2, DCUO, H1Z1, Planetside, DDO, Lord of the Rings Online. We EverQuest fans are loyal, but I’m sure fans of those games are just as dedicated to their favorite IP and would love to attend this type of event.

Now, I know that *something* is being planned. 

In case where we need to invest in the existing business of certain games. We wanna do that. Like the EverQuest 25th anniversary. Yeah, we’re going to invest in that.

Ji Ham – CEO of EG7 and Acting CEO of Daybreak Games Company

I don’t know what that is, but I’ve laid out my biggest hopes for an announcement very soon. 

Thanks for Watching!

That’s all for this episode. But I want to hear your thoughts on the 25th anniversary and fan conventions. Please comment on this video and as always, subscribe, like and share this video to support the channel and to get notified of new episodes, and our news updates.

Thanks for Watching.