Blizzard: Pandaren are as ‘serious as a heart attack’

While many initially thought World of Warcraft’s upcoming panda-centric expansion Mists of Pandaria was a joke, Blizzard’s Chris Metzen states the studio is very serious about the new race.

“These guys are not a joke,” said Metzen during the World of Warcraft Story and Lore panel during BlizzCon, Gamefront reports.

“This is not a throw-away silly-silly ha ha funny expansion set; it is absolutely the next vital chapter and as things ratchet up, they’re gonna get really gnarly.”

He went on to say that it is simply lighter fare for the MMO, not an April Fools Joke.

“There’s no way we’re gonna build an expansion set based on an April Fools Joke. What you guys may not know is, our senior art director, Sam Didier, started drawing these guys years ago. It was just a passion project for him, and he painted all sorts of pictures of these guys and nobody really thought we would really include them in Warcraft – it was just what he loved drawing. And so he had crazy panda shamans and his artwork was off the hook.

“And I remember, was it in Warcraft III, we included Chen Stormstout in Frozen Throne, maybe, in the Orc campaign? Was it after that? I can’t remember anymore. But these guys are not a joke. This is an idea that we’ve been thinking about for years. It’s one of our favourite flavours of Warcraft. It’s not ultimately really silly, it’s just a little lighter.

“But the context of what’s going on where they live, the context of what’s happening in the history of the world at this time: serious as a heart attack. They’re just really chill about it. This is no joke.”

World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria was confirmed at Friday’s sold-out BlizzCon reveal.