The video game Minecraft has been popular for nearly a decade.
The game's blocky, mosaic-ish graphics and its sandbox gameplay have given it a spot in the brief history of video gaming.
At its yearly event MINECON on Sunday, the developers announced that pandas are coming to the game.
"We recorded real pandas in China to help create these," said Jens Bergensten, the game's lead developer.
A writer for gaming blog Kotaku exclaimed "Pandas! Are! Coming! To! Minecraft!" in his?brief report?on the news.
The China-related animal, popular around the world for its cuteness, has been featured in other media like Kung Fu Panda.
Chinese reactions
Although the update is only coming in 2019, players in China are already talking about it.
"What if I accidentally killed one? Would I be an in-game criminal?" a player on Weibo said, worrying about the protected state of the pandas in China.
"I really hope the government doesn't ban the game just because it has pandas," another Weibo user expressed her concern.
Killing pandas in reality is a felony in China, as the animal is a first-class, state-level protected species in the country.
But there's no specific law or regulation addressing virtual panda kills.
Apart from these concerns, some players cared more about the changes coming to Minecraft gameplay.
"Now you NEED to tell bamboo apart from those sugar canes," another player joked about the game's graphics, which sometimes make it difficult for players to tell the two apart.
"No. There will only be people looking for pandas along the river," a reply to the above post said, referring to an in-game mechanism that sugar canes can only grow along a river.
Minecraft in China
Minecraft officially landed on the Chinese mainland in April 2017 with online gaming giant Netease. The game is said to be very popular?among teenagers?in the country.
Netease has announced that more than 60 million Minecraft accounts were registered on the Chinese mainland.
Proof of the players' passion is this video showing? a Forbidden City replica?in the game. A team of Chinese players spent two years to make this happen.
