As more and more time goes by, I am finding that the others who are writing about Mists of Pandaria are grating my nerves some. With the announcement being so recent and so little information available, details are sketchy at best and there is bound to be a lot of duplicate information out there. This is to be expected but this is not what is bothering me.
My biggest pet peeve with all of the bloggers jumping on the Pandaren band wagon is their lack of regard for detail. The first and primary of these is the culture of the Pandaren. Even Blizzard made this mistake but quickly corrected it once a bit of noise was made. What am I talking about? The Pandaren are based on Chinese culture not Japanese!
At first glance this may not sound like a big deal but it really is. Not only are these writers completely ignoring this, they are coming off as uninformed buffoons. These are two completely different nationalities we are talking about, with two strikingly different cultures.
I read an article a few days ago where the author was adlibbing a bit to try and up the word count in his spin of Blizzards material. The whole time he was doing this he was making Japanese references while describing Pandaren. Obviously he hasn’t a clue about what he is talking about and yet there he is writing this dribble for the world to read.
Of course the Pandaren (Pandas are from China remember) will have a martial art’s background, this is a given. Let me give you a big hint about Chinese martial arts, it is not Karate they are practicing it is Kung – Fu! The Pandaren how ever are practicing something that is more akin to Tai Chi than anything else but we are splitting hairs here.
So if they are not practicing Karate, they will not train in a Dojo. Dojo is a Japanese word referencing a structure used to facilitate a Japanese art. All I can do is shake my head. Oh and another thing, Samurai are Japanese as well. And so are the Kantana swords you see in some early Blizzard art work featuring the Pandaren.
Most Americans will shrug this off because that’s how we are. We love to put a tidy label on things and then that’s what they become. We will say we are eating Chinese food and be sitting in a Japanese or Korean restaurant. We will call any box of tissue Kleenex and any cotton swab a Q-tip. Oh and we will also call anyone who doesn’t speak English selling things in the trade channel a Chinese gold farmer. It doesn’t make it right, but it is how we are.
