On pandas.

I like to join in that party a week late and after everyone has gone home.... I'm like that, less people and all and me being so shy.

I like pandas. I have a plush panda I think they are cute and cool. To me it's a great addition to the game. I love the Asian flavour of the expansion and think it will fit in just fine. WoW has always been a weird mix of odd elements, the tram, I was so confused fantasy, trams technology?, trams fantasy? my brain! umm I never "oooh, I'll collect rats for you .... WHAT ! you plant to eat them? !!!" gnomes are weird , cute but weird. Also the giant Silithus bugs, now that garnered two weeks of crazy rants about giant bugs ( oooh, pretty robes loove Kurinnaxx, well killing him ...) belong in science fiction , I have seen those movies, radiation giant bugs horror, destruction , oh wait the radiation is with the gnomes, anyhow.... WoW has always been a little odd it is it's own world a unique place. So pandas nifty.

The first MMO I played had pandas it was a Chinese really obscure game, you raised pets became devils or gods could fly around on a cloud ( yay! flying although not much exploring, it was isometric) craft ( making good armour took months if you didn't use a bot) and disguise yourself as a pet, one of the first pets I was gifted randomly by someone was a humanoid panda I ran around disguised as that pet (or an anthropomorphic voodoo pineapple) much of the time a lot so MMOs and pandas go together in my mind , also the Asian theme is what I started with, WoW actually seemed very odd to me , and night elves were just creepy looking as heck (that coming from a voodoo pineapple demon), I'm used to them now though*. So yes I am excited.

One of the things I did see and was dissapointed by on the official forums was the amount of racism and xenophobia against the Chinese. I suspect this may fuel some of the anti panda feelings. This made me sad. This is a game and we should be having fun and enjoying it,after all anyone you may play with may be different from you and still you will often have fun think they are great but may not know how they look or believe or where they are from. I am glad moderators cleaned up much of this as it was going on. I worry more about inapropriate cultural appropriation on blizzards part that may happen then that an American game is some how pandering to another culture, it is a big world after all and so far we can't get off of it yet so we have to live together.

* I am logged in on my night elf druid right now trick or treating, and typing while flying.... ahhhh! tree! I should watch where I'm going.