Our original plan was to spend the next year or so in beta, adding new features and slowly growing the number of heroes until we reached a level of parity with Dota 1, at which point we’d release Dota 2 to the world. But the feedback we’re seeing everywhere is that people just want to play it, even though there’s still a ton of heroes yet to be implemented. We’ve also seen that the folks who are already in the beta are chomping at the bit to show everyone else some of the fun games they’ve had. So we decided our original plan was dumb.

Welcome to the new plan: We’re going to take the current version of Dota 2, which has The International set of heroes, and get it out there as fast as we can. We’ve still got some work to do in a couple of areas, so we’ll be keeping it invite-only for a (hopefully short) period of time. But there’ll be no restrictions on what players can do with it – they can release screenshots, make movies, shoutcast matches, write guides, publicly make fun of our HUD, or anything else their hearts desire. While they do that, we’ll be shipping regular updates with more heroes, new features we’ve been working on, and improvements on the existing content as we get more and more feedback.

What does this mean for you? It means it’s even more important that get on the list that we’ll be inviting from. If you’re talented, you could take a shot at winning an invite in the GosuGamers competition or the Playdota contest. Once you’ve got your hands on the game, feel free to talk about it however you’d like – we’re excited to see what you’ll produce.

Are any of you guys excited about this? If you are in, or get in the beta, please let us know what you think.

Mojang has released a preview build of the upcoming 1.9 update, the second half of the huge Adventure Update. You can download it here if you want to get in on the action and give feedback before the official release.

All of the Company of Heroes games are 80% off this weekend on Steam. You can pick up the original game for only $1.99, either of the expansion packs for only $3.99, or everything for $9.99. CoH is one of my all time favorite games, and if you for some reason missed out on it so far, it is more than worth the $1.99 to try it out. Offer ends Monday 10 AM Pacific time.

You can check out the conference live via Ustream today at 4:15pm GMT (6:15 PM CEST, 12:15 PM EDT, 9:15 AM PDT).

The two modes - "Arsenal: Arms Race" and "Arsenal: Demolition" will introduce eight new maps to Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. According to the press release Valve is actually working with the creators of the mod, so it should be a pretty authentic experience. Here's a quick word from Gun Game project lead Michael Barr:

"We are excited that Valve reached out and is working with us to ensure Arsenal Mode is the best version of Gun Game."

Valve also sent along a batch of screenshots for you guys to enjoy. Counter-Strike: Global Offensive is currently scheduled for an early 2012 release on PC/Mac, Xbox Live Arcade, and the Playstation 3 Network.

I’m rather fond of Panzer Corps. It is an excellent, if perhaps slightly overpriced, spiritual successor to Panzer General. I’d be down for a PBEM game, if any of you have it.

It's good to see that Slitherine has time to patch its games. You’d think they’d be too busy doing all those super computer calculations for that Deadliest Warrior show.

So as you might have noticed, I've been playing a little bit of the Diablo 3 beta recently, and I thought I'd give you a quick, very lose rundown of my impressions so far. First I was a huge Diablo 2 fan, I don't want to even think about how many hours I spent playing that game, so you could say I'm not exactly coming into Diablo 3 with 'fresh eyes'. Overall, I think that Diablo 3 is fantastic, and I can't wait to jump back in and keep playing. There are a few things I still have reservations about however.

From the first screenshots I was a vocal member of the audience that wasn't in favor of the new graphics style. In practice, it still feels more "WoW" than "Diablo" to me. The graphics are very atmospheric, and despite the cries calling it out as the next Saturday morning cartoon, the world is extremely detailed, impressively so. Most of all, it does exactly what it aims to; it works extremely well as a backdrop to the action, adequately highlighting enemies and items. Even though the graphics don't 'feel' like Diablo to me yet, the gameplay and the sound effects are spot on, and instantly draw you into feeling like you're still playing a Diablo game. The gameplay in particular is what has grabbed me; even when you first begin, it is like Diablo 2 on steroids. You have that feeling of power right out of the gate, something you don't gain in previous games until you've had a chance to level up a bit more.

Another one of my chief concerns from watching some of the previously released gameplay trailers was that the game was going to be too easy. I would say so far, that on normal, playing the first act, Diablo 3 is possibly even more challenging than Diablo 2 was. I am very satisfied with the feel of balance and gameplay, and I can't wait to go through the full game on Nightmare and Hell modes.

Finally, my impressions of the whole skills system. This is arguably the biggest change to the Diablo formula. Not only do you not have the option to assign attribute points, but there are no skill points either. You still have all of those stats that you can view, but the game essentially puts you on auto pilot, making all of those choices for you. The argument from Blizzard here is that it makes the game more fun because you're not stuck sinking hours into a build only to find out you did it wrong. You still have to make the choice on what unlocked skills you'll stick into your limited skill slots, but when you do that, it skill is automatically assigned to your left mouse, right mouse, or skill bar with no option to place it where you want (that I can tell yet). Overall this feels like too much hand holding for me, kind of like giving everyone a participation trophy or no longer using red ink in schools because it will hurt a kid's self esteem. Obviously with a level 7 barb and a level 5 monk I am just chipping at the tip of the iceberg at this point, but my feeling right now is that I would like the freedom to experiment and make a barbarian that wields crossbows if I want to. I haven't found any of the new skill runes yet which will give more of a chance to customize your skills, so I am willing to wait and see how it plays out over the full game experience.

Overall, I am having a great time, and I can already see this is a game I am going to be playing for years to come. I suspect that my minor gripes are mainly an adjustment period after being so engrained with Diablo 2 and its systems. I am so impressed so far that I'm willing to bet that Diablo 3 will go down as the best in the series so far.

Happy Thursday, the weekend is near! If you haven't run across this gem yet, I give you Chuck Testa: