I'm going to create a running list of all of the interesting leaked tidbits extracted from the latest Diablo 3 MPQ. More details here and here if you're not already aware of the latest leak.

A lot of the extracted data is development related too, so you can see a brief view of potential future projects. Most of it will show you monster and boss names, zone names, and all of the player skills and abilities. I'm more interested in neat little things (like what you'll see below).

PVP Game Types

* Cooperative
* "Diablo 3" / Normal
* DotA
* Arena
* Team Deathmatch

It's interesting that they're bringing a DotA style game into Diablo 3. You should see this hitting gaming news sites later today.

Random Features

* Looks like there's a targeting mechanism (toggle key) for selecting the more injured monsters first.
* You can drop your banner for people to see (like an emote) and show off.
* Speaking of /emotes, here's what is available so far: Help, Follow, Give, Thanks, Sorry, Bye, Die, Run, Wait, Go.
* There's a gambling Gheed-like vendor available. This was one thing a lot of people were asking about that Blizzard never confirmed (probably because of the "gambling" and real money implication). Any bets on whether this will be available in the final version?
* You carry a Bestiary and a Lore Book built from all of the random book drops that you can collect throughout the game.
* You can receive notifications when someone is inspecting you. Very useful for World of Warcraft, so don't be surprised if you see that feature added.
* Easy quest selection, just click on the NPC and you can walk away. If you chose to listen, you can stick around though. No more walls of text, and you can jump right into the action. You can also listen (yes, listen not read) to quests or lore items while you're on the go.. a nice little feature borrowed from other FPS/RPGs.
* It appears that leveling up causes a nice little "explosion" effect around you, and for added effect it also causes AOE damage to mobs around you.
* NPCs talk WAY too much when they accompany you (hirelings, quest NPCs, escorts, etc). There is probably an option to turn it off.. or at least, I hope there is.
* When you exit your Campaign Game, you can save your progress and return to it later. In D2, if you started a new game, everything was reset. Would be very cool if you could invite people to your saved game (say you came across a very rare random event.)

Items

* Item Reforging: "Transmutes all properties of a single magic, rare, set or legendary item into an entirely new set of properties. This process permanently reduces the maximum durability of the item by 10% and cannot be used on items with required level 50 or above."
* Your gear can be dyed. Very nice.
* Gear can also be "Undyed" and "Vanished" which apparently makes gear invisible.
* Players can purchase Stash Expansions for extra storage. You can purchase "Slots" and "Tabs".
* Crafting Plans are random drops for making weapons or armor, but there are also a ton that are basically Enchanting Recipes. Many of them look like they're named right out of World of Warcraft, for example "Enhance Gloves: Superior Brawn".
* There are a lot of Crafting Plans for Gemcrafting ("Design: Radiant Round Emerald") as well.
* When loot drops, you can set timers on how long you want the item text to appear. That way, you're not always alt clicking to see loot.
* Quivers can also come with special abilities for your bow (e.g. fire damage arrows, snaring effects, etc.) Will be the same for secondary weapons, like shields too.

Special Events

* There's a spiral event (which most likely takes place in the Hell Spire in Act 4) where you can keeping moving from one level to another, in either a timed event or a difficulty progression. The more you progress, the better reward you receive. Reminds me of some jRPGs.
* Each zone can have random dungeons or timed events that popup. There are randomly appearing caves, ruins, temples, towers, scavenger dens, mines, cellars within structures, puzzles, and NPC vendors. There's also the Pony Carnival event and the "Secret Bovine Wundercave".
* There's a timed "Gateway to Hell" event. Also, one where Diablo is trying to corrupt the Crystal Arch (Act 4). Speaking of which, I see a lot of references to Black Soulstones (aka Worldstone Shards) that have been cut or added to the game frequently.. maybe they have more expansion pack plans for them.

Character Naming

* 1-32 max. characters in size.
* Spaces and no special characters permitted.
* The banned character names list is a good read.

Future Stuff

* Act I, II, III, and IV are mentioned. As well as Act V and Act VI. (Which we already knew they had planned to release within 3 years.)
* Player titles go up to level 100, in 10 level increments. I suppose they could be PVP titles.. but why the specific character levels? There are also "Corruption" titles for those with evil karma.
* The beta client has a Verisign expiration date of 12/05/11, identifying a retail release prior to Christmas 2011. Of course, all of this was already released by Daeity a long time ago. :)

Hirelings and Pets

* Hirelings can learn skills as they level.
* You can summon a friendly creature and roams around and collects gold for you as you travel.

Shrines

* Pretty much any kind of shrine you can imagine is there; the typical elemental resistance, health, and regeneration.
* Also a Luck Shrine, a socketing shrine, even unsocketing, item augmentation, Identify shrines, Remove Curses, +25% Magic and Gold Find, +25% experience, etc.

Blizzcon

* A lot of references to Blizzcon since this was (and will be) the build that players used during Blizzcon.
* There's a hidden "BlizzconPrize" that players can randomly loot with the message: "Congratulations! You just found something so awesome it grants you fame outside the game! Show this item to any Diablo 3 attendant to claim your prize."

Remember when Blizzard said that they were surprised players were so upset about the online only requirement for Diablo 3? The reason they were surprised is because they compared D3 to World of Warcraft and it's "roots are in Battle.net and now with Diablo 3". Diablo 3 was built just like WOW; it was stylized artistically after WOW, borrowed most of it's features and content from WOW, Stories and Quests borrowed from WOW, monster and NPC designs from WOW, boss fights from WOW, etc.

Blizzard thought that players would expect Diablo 3 to be like WOW. (Even though Diablo 1 and 2 could be played offline.)

But then, they were surprised again at the fan rage about Mods not being permitted in Diablo 3. Their reason? "Well, Diablo 2 didn't have mods."

Do you see the broken logic here?

They implement major features from WOW, stylize the game after WOW, COMPARE IT TO WOW and then, when they leave out other WOW features, they "get confused" when users are angry.

World of Warcraft has spoiled many players when it comes to end game content as well. There are just so many options available.. dozens of instances, dozens of raid content and end game bosses, metagames, professions, exploration, achievements, competition, and PVP. It's a massively awesome game with many possibilities.

When it comes to Diablo 3, though, players are in for a bit of surprise. Blizzard has changed the definition of "end game content" for Diablo 3.

When asked about End Game content, Blizzard says that Inferno difficulty is the End Game content.

Jay Wilson: "One of the things we wanted to do was really create an environment for the player at the end of the game. So, what we've decided to do is create a 4th difficulty we call Inferno." [Source]

@Diablo: “Depends on your definition of end game. Max level happens at end of Normal, so probably Hell, if that's what you mean.” [Source]

Basically, you play Normal difficulty, then Nightmare difficulty, and then Hell difficulty to be level capped. Then the "end game content" is just the next difficulty level.

So, from a World of Warcraft perspective, here's a rough example of what your gameplay experience will be like:

* Here are the different regions you can visit, at the end of each region or "instance" there's a major boss fight. (Based on current Beta Client details, I'll update Act list if there are changes in retail.)

Act 1
New Tristram
The Cathedral
Cemetery of the Forsaken
Fields of Misery
Festering Woods
The Highlands
Halls of Agony (Boss)

Act 2
Caldeum Sewers & Palace
Stinging Winds (Alcarunus, Black Canyon Mines, Khasim)
Dahlgur Oasis
Boneyards
Desolute Sands
Archives of Zoltun Kulle (Boss)

Act 3
Bastion Dungeon (Depths of the Keep)
Bastion's Keep
Fields of Slaughter
Arreat Crater (Boss)

Act 4
Gardens of Hope
Hell Portal
Silver Spire
The Crystal Arch (Diablo Boss Fight)

* From Level 1-20, you run 4 instances.
* From 20-40, you run the same 4 instances again.
* From 40-60, you run the same 4 instances all over again.
* When you level cap at 60, you can go back and run those same 4 instances again but the bosses are colored differently (originally red, then purple, then black, and now radioactive green!) and they are harder to kill..
* All of the best loot only comes from the last instance though. So, your end game is running the same boss over and over and over and over.
* You can personally run all end game yourself, a team is not needed to defeat Inferno difficulty and it's completely soloable.
* But wait, there's also another option available at the end game! It's an item selling meta game.

End game content should not be compared to WOW; they're not similar at all. Since Diablo 3 is targeting spoiled (in it's most positive sense, since WOW is such an amazing game) WOW players, I'm wondering if they'll be upset when they realize the lack of options in D3 re playability.. maybe they'll find it extremely boring since there are no options available? And everything can be done solo?

Maybe D3 should have taken the WOW approach, and unlocked multiple new "instances" and "zones" when the user hits the level cap.

For Diablo players, this won't be a problem. They're already used to the Pokemon "Gotta Collect 'Em All" item game. But for WOW vets, it will be an odd gaming experience to jump back into.

Difficulty levels also should never be used to artificially increase the length of a game. It should only be reserved for more difficult and challenging adventures, with better rewards because of the risk involved, but that's it.

If Deus Ex: Human Revolution takes 30 hours for a full play through, it shouldn't be advertised as a "90 hour RPG" because there are 3 difficulty levels available.

This might be a little late with the Diablo 3 beta starting soon, but I thought it was worth mentioning.

If you're not a Blizzard Employee, a Friend & Family member, or have any inside connections, but you desperately want to increase your chances of winning a Diablo 3 Beta invite, I have couple suggestions.

Most of the guides out there suggest that you join a top end guild, have a high end gaming PC, or get in good with a Blizzard employee. If you're a past beta tester, chances are also higher for you to be invited back too.

Now, in order to opt-in to the Beta Invite, you need an active Battle.net account with any Blizzard game title attached to it. Then, "Beta testers are chosen according to their system specifications and other factors, including an element of luck."

You can't just create hundreds of B.Net accounts and create Free Starter packs to opt-in, unfortunately, it has to be a full version game attached.

Here are my suggestions;

* Use your classic games. If you're lucky and still have Diablo 2, WC3, or Starcraft CD keys (or any expansion packs) lying around that haven't been registered to your main B.Net account, simply create new B.Net account names (register them to your family members if you want) and use each of those CD-Keys individually for each B.Net account. If you have WoW, D2, D2:LOD, WC3, SC, and SC:BW you can have 6 Active B.Net accounts that are all eligible for the beta.

* If you're more desperate, and have the cash, all of the classic games can be obtained from pawnshops, EBay, Amazon, etc. for $3-10 per game.

* Check with friends or family members with old CD-Keys that they don't use anymore. All you need is the CD-Key to register it to your B.Net account. You never know who out there hasn't played the game for years, but still have the CD case or box lying around.

* Even if you only have 3 CD-Keys.. at least you're 3 times closer to win than before. :)

* Blizzard can replace a lost CD-Key, if you turn in your CD case or manual as a replacement. However, there's a fee of $10 which is typically more expensive than what you can buy it for elsewhere.

* If you don't have the money, but have the time, you could attempt random CD-Key generators. This is rather insidious, but it is possible to generate random CD-Keys that can be authenticated on B.Net. They're extremely rare and will take a lot of time, but if you don't mind the risk, it's a viable option. This link, for example, generates Starcraft CD-Keys which are the most simple to create and authenticate. I'm not sure if it's randomly generated on the backend though, or displayed from a pre-made list. I tried a couple dozen, and ended up with 3 that were legit however they were claimed and in use by other users. Diablo 2 CD-Key generators also work, but are more difficult to get a real B.Net key. Just make sure you create a new B.Net account, a new email address, and do this through an anonymous VPN service.

* You don't want a high end gaming PC, if anything, submit system specifications for an average gaming PC. Blizzard wants to reach the widest audience possible, and the most invitations will be sent for average PC builds.

* Network and make friends with players with B.Net accounts (e.g. your guild mates). Convince them to opt-in. Many beta winners won't have time to play (too busy with school) and will offer the beta key (no "keys" for D3 Beta AFAIK, instead the account is flagged) or share their B.Net account.

It's called a beta, but it isn't so much a beta as it is a demo. There will be very little change between the D3 "beta" and the retail release. Just like WOTLK and Cataclysm. It's more of a stress test on their new servers and authentication systems. The D3 beta is supposed to be much shorter than previous Blizzard betas as well.. so, just hang on there and I hope this information helps out some of you that forget about your classic games and unregistered expansion packs. :)