All checklists from the course, on one page
Every list printed at the end of a step is gathered here in order, plus the short list from the homepage that comes before Step 1. This page is laid out to print on paper without the header, the menu or this button.
How to use these lists
The boxes are drawn, not interactive. Nothing you do on this page is remembered, because the site stores nothing in your browser at all — no cookies, no saved progress. That is deliberate: a tick that survives a visit would need storage we have chosen not to use. Print the page, or copy the lists into whatever you already use for notes.
The lists work best in the order given, because each one assumes the written notes produced by the one before. The six facts about your computer from Step 2 are used again in Step 4 and Step 5; the spending figure from Step 1 is used again in Step 3 and Step 5. If you are only going to keep one piece of paper, keep that one.
Three of the lists are reading tasks and can be done anywhere. Two of them — Step 4 and parts of Step 5 — need the computer you intend to play on, and Step 4 needs an hour in which nobody else wants it. None of the items requires you to buy anything, install a utility or create an account anywhere other than with the game publisher you have chosen.
If a line does not apply to you, cross it out rather than puzzling over it. A household with no minors can skip the family-controls items; somebody playing on a computer nobody else touches can skip the shared-machine items; a reader who has decided to spend nothing can still read the money items, because knowing how in-game currency is priced is useful even if you never buy any.
Each heading links back to the step it came from, where the reasoning behind the list sits. The lists are the summary, not the substance.
Before you read Step 1
- Confirm your computer is a desktop or laptop running Windows, macOS or Linux. The game linked here is offered for desktop computers only, not phones or tablets.
- Check you may install software on it, or that whoever administers it agrees.
- Check you have an email address you can read today; Step 4 confirms a message sent to it.
- Decide what you are willing to spend on games over the next twelve months. Nothing is a valid answer.
- Put aside roughly an hour for Step 4, the only step with a practical task in it.
Step 1 — What a free-to-play online game actually is
- Write down, in one sentence, which of the three arrangements the game you are considering uses: free to install, bought once, or subscription.
- Find the game's own store or product page and note which of the five revenue sources it names — cosmetics, convenience, content packs, membership, advertising.
- Note whether the store page mentions purchasable randomised items, and if it does, look the title up at the Australian Classification Board before going further.
- Decide whether you are happy with a slow route that costs time, and write that decision down.
- Write down the annual amount you are prepared to spend on this game. Nothing is a valid answer.
- Check whether the game is offered for the kind of computer you own, and not only for consoles or phones.
- Bookmark the ACCC and Scamwatch pages, so that a complaint or a suspicious offer has somewhere to go later.
Step 2 — Working out whether your computer can run it
- Write down your operating system and its version number, exactly as the system reports it.
- Write down whether it is 64-bit.
- Write down the processor brand, family and model number.
- Write down installed memory in whole gigabytes.
- Write down the graphics hardware, noting whether it is integrated, discrete, or both.
- Write down free space on the drive you will install to, and clear space if the figure is below roughly twice the game's stated install size.
- Note whether your internet connection is metered, and how much allowance is left this month.
- Open the publisher's own requirements page and compare it line by line with your sheet.
- Decide which of the three positions you are in, and write the decision down.
- Install no diagnostic tool, driver updater or cleaner to complete this step. None is needed.
Step 3 — The account terms, the privacy notice and the classification
- Find the account agreement on the publisher's own site, and note the date it was last updated.
- Record what the licence grants you, and whether purchases survive an account closure.
- Record whether accounts may be shared, sold or transferred.
- Record which law the agreement nominates, and note that Australian consumer guarantees apply regardless.
- Find the privacy notice and record what is collected at sign-up and during play.
- Record who else receives the data, and in which countries it is stored.
- Record the stated way to request access to or deletion of your data.
- Look the title up in the Australian Classification Board's database and write down the classification and the consumer advice line.
- If anyone under 18 will play, set the operating system's family controls and decide the chat settings in advance.
- Decide not to store a payment method yet, and write that decision next to your spending figure from Step 1.
- Bookmark Scamwatch, and resolve now that no support request will ever get your password or a one-time code.
Step 4 — Creating the account and working through the tutorial
- Check the domain in the address bar before entering anything on a registration form.
- Choose a public display name that is not your full real name.
- Set a long password used on no other site, and record it in a password manager.
- Confirm the registration email from the message itself, then sign in once to prove it worked.
- Compare the stated install size with your free-space figure, and clear space first if they are close.
- Let the installer and the first update finish without interrupting them.
- Turn on multi-factor authentication on the game account and on the mailbox behind it.
- Set chat and voice to what you want before your first match with strangers.
- Set picture quality low to start with, then raise it only if the game stays smooth.
- Turn on a purchase confirmation prompt, and store no payment method yet.
- Finish the tutorial in one sitting, before joining any match with other people.
- Write down, in one line, whether the game ran steadily and whether you enjoyed it.
Step 5 — Settling in: time, money and the household
- Confirm no payment card is stored on the game account or the storefront.
- Write your annual cap in AUD somewhere you will see it, with a running list of purchases underneath.
- Decide the one category of purchase you will allow yourself, and write it down.
- Convert any token-currency price back into AUD before buying anything.
- Treat every countdown as a reason to wait a week.
- Check whether the game sells randomised items, and if a minor plays, set the purchase controls accordingly.
- Choose which evenings you play and a finishing hour, and set an alarm outside the game.
- Agree the computer and bandwidth arrangement with the household out loud.
- Create a separate operating system user account for each person who uses the machine.
- Set the launcher to update at a quiet hour.
- Skim the patch notes once a month, watching for changes to prices or progression.
- Recheck free disk space against your Step 2 sheet every few months.
- Find the mute and report controls before you need them.
- Note the publisher's stated route for data deletion, in case you close the account later.
- Write one line at the end of the first month about whether the game has earned its place.
How this site is paid for
Some pages in the course link to the website of War Thunder, and those links are paid affiliate links: registering through one pays Solid Facet a commission from the affiliate network that operates the link, at no additional cost to you. None of the lists above requires you to use one. The Affiliate Disclosure explains the arrangement in full.