Step 4 of 5

Step 4 — Registering, installing and getting through a first session

Everything in the previous three steps was preparation. This is the step where something is actually installed on your computer, and it is written so that you can do it slowly, reading each screen, without being hurried by anything on it.

Set aside forty-five minutes. Most of that is waiting for files to arrive, and you can do something else while it happens. The parts that need your attention take perhaps ten minutes in total, and they are the parts people usually click through.

The shape of what is about to happen

In the category as a whole, the sequence is almost always the same and goes in this order: you register an account on the vendor's page, you obtain an installer, the installer puts a small program on your computer, that program fetches the game itself, and then a tutorial runs. Knowing the sequence in advance means you can tell whether something is behaving as expected.

Where a particular offer is described as being for desktop computers, that is the whole of its scope. The offer this course links to is stated by the affiliate network to be for desktop computers running Mac, Windows or Linux, and the commission it pays is described as arising when a reader registers on the landing page, installs the game and launches the tutorial. Those three actions are the three halves of this step, so to speak, and we have been told nothing further about what happens between them.

The procedure, in six parts

1. Choose the email address the account will use. Use an address you will still have in three years and can actually open. This is not a trivial point: when you lose a password, the recovery message goes to that address, and an address you no longer control is an account you no longer control. If a young person is playing, consider whether the recovery address should be an adult's.

2. Set a long, unique password and store it. Unique means used nowhere else, so that a problem at one service does not become a problem at all of them. Long beats complicated: a passphrase of several unrelated words is easier to type and harder to guess than a short string of symbols. The Australian Cyber Security Centre publishes free guidance on passphrases and on password managers, and it is the right source for the detail. Write it into a password manager, or on paper kept somewhere sensible — not in a file called passwords on the desktop.

3. Check where the installer is coming from. Before anything is saved, look at the address in the browser's address bar and satisfy yourself that it is the vendor's own site or a distribution service you recognise. The section below goes through this properly, because it is the single place in this step where a mistake is expensive.

4. Read each screen of the installer before continuing. Installers often offer extras: a browser toolbar, a second program, a changed search engine, a shortcut you did not ask for. These are usually presented as already selected. Read each screen, clear anything you did not come for, and note the install location it proposes so you can find the game later.

5. Let the launcher finish its first update. The installer is small; the game is not. The first run will fetch several gigabytes. Leave it alone until it reports it has finished, and do not put the computer to sleep halfway through. If you are on a metered connection, this is the moment the data is used.

6. Play the tutorial without entering payment details. You do not need a payment method to play a free-to-begin game, and the first session is exactly the wrong moment to add one. If an offer appears during the tutorial, the one-day wait you agreed in Step 3 applies to it like any other.

Checking where the file came from

Three checks, in ascending order of usefulness.

First, read the whole address, not the beginning of it. Look at the part immediately before the first single slash — that is the domain, and it is the part that identifies who you are dealing with. Names that are close to a familiar one, with an extra word or a different ending, are the common trick.

Second, note how you arrived. If you typed the address or followed a link from the vendor's own published material, you know where you are. If you arrived from a search result, an advertisement or a message, you know rather less, and the first check matters more.

Third, prefer the vendor's own site or a well-known distribution service over an aggregator offering the same file. Third-party mirrors of game installers are a long-standing route for unwanted software. Scamwatch publishes current information on how these approaches look in practice, and the Australian Cyber Security Centre publishes general guidance on obtaining software safely.

The link below is the paid link this course discloses throughout. Following it takes you to the vendor's landing page, where registration happens.

Visit the Raid: Shadow Legends website

Paid affiliate link: a commission is paid to this site's publisher if you register on the vendor's landing page, install the game and launch the tutorial through it. You pay no more than you otherwise would, and the whole of this step works identically with any other title in the category.

What a launcher is doing

A launcher is a small program that sits between you and the game. It has three jobs, and understanding them removes most of the confusion beginners have at this point.

It downloads and assembles the game files, which is why the first run takes much longer than any later one. It checks for updates each time you open it and applies them before letting you play, which is why the game sometimes will not start immediately. And it holds your sign-in, which is why you usually type a password into the launcher rather than into the game.

Two consequences follow. A launcher that will not let you play because it is updating is working correctly, not broken. And removing a game later means dealing with both pieces — the launcher and the game files — which Step 5 covers.

What the tutorial is for

The opening stretch of a collection RPG does three things at once, and it is worth seeing them separately.

It teaches the controls, by giving you a few fights you cannot lose and telling you which button to press. It gives you a quick sense of progress, by handing out rewards faster than the game will later. And it introduces the systems one at a time, so the dozen menus do not all arrive together.

None of this is deceptive; it is ordinary teaching design. But the accelerated rewards of a first session are not representative of the pace of the game, and it is useful to know that while you are enjoying them. Judge the game on the third or fourth session rather than the first.

You can also stop in the middle of a tutorial. Nothing is lost by closing the program and returning the next day. The account exists; the progress is saved with the vendor.

Prompts you will see, and what they mean

Three kinds of prompt commonly appear during an installation, and beginners often cannot tell them apart.

The operating system's permission prompt. Windows, macOS and Linux desktops all ask for confirmation before a program makes system-level changes. This is your own operating system asking, and it is expected during an installation you started. It is also the prompt to read carefully if it appears when you did not start anything.

The security software prompt. Your security software may ask about a newly arrived program. The sensible response is the same as the sensible response to any question: know what you are approving. If you deliberately obtained the file from the vendor, you know.

The vendor's own offers. Newsletters, linked accounts, optional extras. These are commercial requests, not technical requirements, and declining them does not stop the game working.

Only the first two come from your computer. Anything that appears inside a web page and imitates one of them is worth closing the tab over.

The household in our example

Before you move on

You should now have an account on an address you control, a unique passphrase stored somewhere you can find it, a game installed from a source you checked, nothing extra installed alongside it, no payment details entered, and a first session behind you.

Step 5 is the one people never read because it comes after the fun part, and it is where most of the long-term difference is. It covers keeping the account recoverable, handling updates, noticing how much time the game is taking, and leaving cleanly if you decide to.