Good morning! You're about to call in sick. It's really happening. An open beta for Blizzard's highly anticipated Diablo 3 will kick off at noon. That's right, a public beta open to anyone with a valid Battle.net account will begin today, April 20th, at 12:01 p.m. PST. The beta will run through Monday, April 23rd, 10:00 a.m. PST. You should be able to begin downloading the client now. Blizzard needs your help assaulting their servers in this three day stress test. Here's a link to the Diablo 3 website with instructions on how to enter the beta and other FAQs.
Grab three friends and dive in immediately:
From Friday, April 20 at 12:01 p.m. PDT (noon), until Monday, April 23 at 10:00 a.m. PDT you'll be able to log in, team up with friends, and play each of the five heroic classes to level 13 as you fight to save the world from the impending demonic invasion.
What are you going to do while you're waiting for the game to download? Why don't you check out our Diablo 3 beta impressions as well as our Co-Op Character Focus articles which cover the skills and cooperative potential of each class:
Diablo 3 supports four player online co-op. The full game will launch for PCs everywhere on May 15th. I have a feeling that a lot of people will be taking half-days today.