I confess, I play Everquest because every time I log on I look good. I mean, I just look good—long blonde hair, tall, cute perky nose, not an ounce of cellulite anywhere. Yep, I can run from Qeynos to Freeport and still look like I spent three hours getting my hair done. I can get seriously messed up fighting some evil gnoll and I still look great after losing the equivalent of three quarts of blood and having bandages all over me. And let’s face it, in real life I can’t go to the grocery store five minutes from my house without getting a stain from my coffee in the car on my white shirt and getting my hair blown from the open car window. Not Kwill….she always looks like Miss Norrath. I bet she never had a zit in her life. I like inhabiting an alternate reality where I can share a muffin with a fellow dark elf warrior and she doesn’t say, “Oh no, no more muffins…I am going to have to trade in my small bronze for medium if I put on one more pound.” There are no npc’s named Jenny Craig that I ever saw. Everyone has a great figure, no spreading bottoms or sagging arms. The only people that are fat are trolls and ogres, and they like it that way. The only plumpish women that aren’t supposed to be ugly are halflings. But they make up for it by being well-endowed. If I want a touch of realism, I go play my halfling druid and wear my Birkenstocks…it’s chilling. I should have never listened when my mother told me a hairbun was elegant.
See something ugly? Go kill it! All the ugly stuff we get to kill just for the hell of it. How many times have I stood over a dead goblin and laughed scornfully “get a belt!” Smack…another really ugly giant is gone from the world, leaving it for the beautiful people.
We never age, either. I hit 40, I am not checking all the vendors for L’Oreal Elfin Blonde. Even the evil people are good looking. Hang out in Mistmoore….the whole gang looks like a runway walk on the Victoria’s Secret fashion show on MTV when someone calls “Train!” (which we know is quite often). I think they live to all run out in their swanky undies and parade around the castle grounds, killing innocent bystanders before returning to wait for some vampire that never shows up. No one hangs out in a halter bra and leather pants and has people saying “man I wish she would put some clothes on.” Run almost naked and be proud, you will never sag or bounce in this fairy tale land.
And the guys look good too. I mean, I get to hang out with cute guys all the time. There aren’t any duds in Norrath, even ogres have charm. Elves, humans, Mel-Gibson-ish barbarians, they all look hot. Well, okay, so gnomes are a little old, but they age well. There’s a guy for every taste: short, tall, thin, facial hair, you name it. And no guys are standing around in bronze with a beer gut hanging over their sword belt. No vendors selling hairpieces, or shoe lifts, or tanning stuff. With all the liquor that is consumed, you’d think that half the guys with Ghoulbane would be asking for the tailor to punch a few more holes in their swordbelts. I haven’t seen a lazyboy chair or a remote anyplace. All guys have to do is hang around…no chores, no skipping hate plane because the lawn looks raggedy. Make some beer, maybe some nice armor out of a skin, whatever. They even get to scratch themselves in public and no one says a word. Women still talk to them, even. A guy’s paradise: go kill a bad guy with your friends, get cool stuff, sell it and then buy more cool stuff. Make rude comments about all the good looking women and they can’t hear you—and they all think you look hot, too. Nope, the vendor doesn’t need to sell Clearasil. Talk about utopia.
And it’s not just about hanging around looking like a knock-out. I kick butt looking good. My dark elf rogue wearing banded is a walking advertisement for fishnet stockings…but she still kicks orc ass with the best of them. Sure, I can fight in lingerie…want me to prove it? I carry a big stick and can whap some idiot guy with it if I want to. That’s heaven right there. Or maybe I will just sic my personal slave (read pet) on him for fun. No wonder my hair stays neat. All I do is stand back and shoot fire at stuff when I feel like it, then sit down and read my book for a while. And I am not hot and sweaty before, during or after a fight, which should be the case for my cleric who wears full armor and a robe over all of it. She always looks cool and collected, but no wonder she is thin wearing the equivalent of three layers of heavy plastic in the mid-day sun. I think it’s wonderful there aren’t any merchants that charge 1,000s of plat to get blood stains and dirt out of people’s no drop robes. And I am glad I don’t have to worry about taking a bath, or using the bathroom for that matter. I can just imagine if we had to live in a world full of realism. Can you just hear the tells from Vixxen Coldasice, level 35 warrior bitch, “excuse me, but do you know if the aviak vendor sells tampons?” It would be fun to see all the guys playing female characters blanch when their stamina bar started dropping and they got the message, “You have cramps” and they would have to sit down. Given the Norrathian time frame to time played, there would be a lot of down time if this happened once a month! Cyber at will, no consequences… Course, if the vendors sold condoms, they would do a brisk business in them, just so most of the guys could brag they carried a stack of 20 in their wrist pouch. Summoned condoms for 5pp, anyone?
But it’s not all fun and games. I die and get pissed off. But even my corpse looks good, lying there. You have to admit, the escapism is wonderful. All babes and hunks hanging out, and we don’t even have to think about who is sitting at the keyboard behind them all. We can just imagine they look as good in real life. Except when they actually open their virtual mouths. Then it becomes all too clear that it is probably your 12 year old nephew and not Mel Gibson after all.
