Over the weekend, Blizzard Entertainment revealed details about the next major installment of its long-running World of Warcraft game – Mists of Pandaria. No release date was offered (standard operating procedure for Blizzard, which won’t ship a product before it’s ready to go).

The Pandaren – a race of bipedal panda-like creatures – have been peripheral to Blizzard Entertainment’s Warcraft series since Warcraft III, the final installment of the original real-time strategy game series.

Pandaren society is modeled after Asian cultures, and the early screenshots (and a promo movie) showing Pandaria reveal a heretofore unseen portion of the game world of Azeroth that looks like China and southeast Asia. The Pandaren themselves will be the first “neutral” race in the game – aligned with neither the Alliance nor the Horde. The expansion will also introduce a new playable class, the Monk.

Other enhancements coming in Mists of Pandaria include a higher level cap, 90; new zones to explore; the addition of “Scenarios,” a flexible new type of Player vs. Everything (PvE) challenge that lets friends join up to achieve a common goal; Five-player time trial “challenge” modes in dungeons; a new “Pet Battles” mini game; and a new talent system.

In related news, Blizzard, which held its annual BlizzCon event over the weekend, announced a deal for gamers interested in pre-ordering its forthcoming dungeon crawl action adventure game Diablo III: players who sign up for an “Annual Pass” – a 12-month pass for World of Warcraft – will be able to download Diablo III for free.

Other announcements include a teaser cinematic for the forthcoming StarCraft II expansion pack Heart of the Swarm and the first official trailer for Blizzard DOTA, a custom game for StarCraft II inspired by the Defense of the Ancients (DOTA) custom map for Warcraft III.