Step 3 of 7 The seven-step path · Crest Space
Making an account and confirming your email
Registration is the step where most people stall, usually for an ordinary reason: a confirmation message that has not arrived yet. It is also the step that attracts the most attention from people running scams, so it is worth doing deliberately.
The sequence, in order
For the title covered on this site, getting from nothing to a playable account follows four stages, and they happen in this order for a reason.
- Register on the publisher’s page. You provide an email address and choose credentials. Nothing else is required at this stage.
- Confirm your email address. A message is sent to the address you gave; following the link in it activates the account. Until this is done, the account exists but is not usable.
- Install the game client. The download comes from the publisher. This is the large step, and it is the reason the previous page dealt with disk space and connection type first.
- Launch the tutorial. The client’s own introduction runs on first launch. Step four of this guide explains why it is worth finishing rather than skipping.
Doing the registration and confirmation before starting the download is a small piece of sequencing that saves genuine annoyance. If a confirmation message has a problem, you would rather discover it in the first two minutes than after a multi-gigabyte download has finished and you are ready to play.
Paid link. Crest Space is paid a commission by the advertising network behind this link if you register an account through it. Nothing is added to what you pay the game publisher, and the link goes to the publisher’s own registration page in a new tab.
When the confirmation email does not arrive
This is common, and it is nearly always one of a handful of causes. Work through them in this order before contacting anyone for support.
- Check the spam or junk folder. Automated confirmation mail from a game publisher is filtered often enough that this should be the first place you look, not the last.
- Check for a typo in the address you entered. A single wrong character sends the message somewhere that will never reach you. Most registration pages will let you correct the address and resend.
- Wait several minutes before resending. Mail delivery is not instant, and requesting three more copies usually slows things down rather than speeding them up.
- Check for filtering upstream of your inbox. Some workplace, school and ISP mail systems quarantine automated mail before it reaches you. A personal address on a large provider is the path of least resistance for a game registration.
- Check whether the address is an alias that forwards. Forwarding chains sometimes break confirmation links or delay them substantially.
If none of that resolves it, the publisher’s own support channel is the correct destination. It is worth saying plainly that Crest Space cannot help with an account problem — this site has no relationship with any game publisher, no access to any account system, and no ability to look anything up on your behalf.
Setting the account up so it stays yours
An account in a long-running online game accumulates value: hundreds of hours of progression, and often money spent along the way. Accounts like that are traded, which is precisely why they are targeted. The protections are the ordinary ones, and they are worth applying at the moment you create the account rather than after something has gone wrong.
- A unique password
- A password used only for this account. The failure mode being guarded against is not somebody guessing it, but the same password being exposed in a breach of an unrelated service and then tried here. The Australian Cyber Security Centre publishes current guidance on choosing and managing passwords for individuals.
- Multi-factor authentication
- A second factor, usually a code from an authenticator application, so that a password alone is not enough to sign in. Most game publishers offer it; many players never switch it on. It is the single most effective step available here.
- A recovery address you still control
- Account recovery runs through the email address on file. An address you have abandoned is a gap, and it tends to be discovered at the worst possible moment.
- Knowing the real domain
- Note the publisher’s actual web address when you register, and treat anything that resembles it but differs as suspect. Nearly every credential scam in this space depends on the target not looking closely at the address bar.
The scams that circulate around popular game accounts
These are described here as patterns, not as warnings about anything happening to you. They are well documented, they are reported in volume to the Australian authorities, and recognising the shape of one is generally enough to defuse it.
The account-status message. An email or in-game message says an account has been reported, suspended or flagged, and provides a link to resolve it. The link leads to a sign-in page that is not the publisher’s. The tell is the link itself; the remedy is to reach the account page by typing the publisher’s address yourself.
The trading or skin site. A site offering item trades, rare vehicles or discounted currency asks you to sign in with your game credentials to “verify” ownership. Legitimate third-party services do not need your game password.
The giveaway. A code, a free premium vehicle or a beta invitation, distributed through a chat platform, requiring you to sign in or to install something. Publishers run genuine promotions, and they run them on their own site.
The friend with a link. A message from somebody on your friends list, whose account has itself been taken over, sending a link to a vote, a portfolio or a game. This one works because the sender is real.
Scams of every kind can be reported to Scamwatch, which is run by the National Anti-Scam Centre and also publishes descriptions of what is currently in circulation. Reporting is worth the few minutes it takes even when you have lost nothing, because the reports are what makes the pattern visible.
What to watch out for
Never reuse your email password as your game password. If the two match, one exposure gives up both the account and its recovery route.
Treat urgency as the signal. Messages engineered to make you act before you think are the common thread across all of the patterns above. A genuine account notice will still be there in ten minutes when you have reached the site by typing its address yourself.
Do not buy or sell accounts. Beyond breaching most publishers’ terms, a purchased account can be recovered by its original owner at any time, and you have no recourse.
Harassment and conduct in multiplayer games
Team-based online games involve voice and text contact with strangers, and a share of that contact is unpleasant. In-game reporting and muting tools are the first response and they are more effective than they are given credit for. Where behaviour goes further — serious harassment, threats, image-based abuse, or contact directed at a child — the eSafety Commissioner is the Australian body that handles complaints of that kind and explains what can be done in each case. If you are setting a game up for a younger player, its guidance on online gaming is worth reading before rather than after.
Next
With an active account and an installed client, the next question is what to do in the first session — and specifically, why the tutorial deserves more patience than it usually gets.