BCG is considered by many as the holy grail among games torrent trackers. This veteran private torrent site (which by the way is over 7 years old) has a lot of PC, console and mobile video games along with a large, dedicated user base who keep these torrents alive. However, BCG is not the easiest tracker to get into, especially if you are a newcomer to the BitTorrent scene. Open signups almost never happen on this tracker and you can only become a member either through a referral from an existing member (referrals are BCG’s alternative to the invites system commonly found on private trackers) or via an official recruitment thread on select BitTorrent forums. If you still aren’t a member of this tracker, good news is that thanks to stoi (BCG SysOP) we now have at our disposal 500 referral codes to be given away to FILEnetworks Blog readers.
UPDATE: We have received well over 500 requests. As we commented earlier, please do not send any more emails – this giveaway has now concluded. Referrals will be sent to selected emails in the coming days.
BCG crew seem to be in a mode of expansion right now and they’ve just given 10 referrals each to most of their existing members. According to stoi there are now 187,225 free referrals ‘out there’ in the system. If you are an existing BCG user, now would be a good time to check your account – you may have received them as well. Although BCG isn’t really short of members, new blood is always welcome in a private tracker. Their user base currently hovers somewhere around the 27000 - 30000 mark and the plan is to recruit several thousand new members within the next month.
When it comes to content, BCG has games for almost every platform there is on the planet. From the popular DOS/Windows PC section to PS3, XBOX360, Wii console games sections, BCG tracks over 12000 active torrents which include latest titles (scene and non scene releases), retro games and exclusive BCG member creations. Recently they have expanded to cover mobile platforms and now games for Android, iPhone etc are also available on this tracker. In addition to individual releases, lots of games packs & collections have been uploaded – some of these can be seen in the screenshot below:
One thing you should know about BCG is that it’s functionality in some areas is drastically different from the average private tracker. For example on BCG there are no invites – these have been replaced by referrals. Same goes for the Seed Points mod – it’s an advanced system that essentially replaces the seed bonus system on most private trackers. We strongly recommend everyone to check the site’s Rules and FAQ pages first thing you login – without reading these your stay on BCG will be short lived. You can also find many helpful tutorials on this forum section of the site. Anyways it’s time to get back to the invite giveaway :)
How to send the referral request
Referrals can be requested / sent back via E-mail. Before you send in the request, please do some background reading and get a basic understanding of how the Seed Points system and Hit and Run warning system functions on BCG. To prove that you at least tried, please answer the two questions below and send the answers with your referral request email. Answers to both questions are available in this forum post stoi made on FileSharingTalk (FST) forums.
- To receive Seed Points for a particular torrent, what is the minimum active time requirement you need to have on that torrent?
- What is the minimum individual ratio a torrent needs to have for you to safely stop seeding it (without getting it counted as a hit and run)?
Here’s how you need to send the referral request E-mail
- Address the E-mail to invites[dot]filenetworks[at]gmail[dot]com
- Set the subject to BCG 01 . Please don’t get this wrong as we use the subject to filter invite requests.
- In the message body, specify clearly your answers to both the questions mentioned above.
- In message body, insert the link to your profile page of any private tracker you are currently a member of – for example http://sitename.com/user.php?id=12345 . You do not need to have a massive buffer or an unbelievable ratio – not being a Hit and Runner and not being a collector would be suffice.
- Send the mail. If you are successful, a response with a referral code will be sent back.
Use your referral before it expires
In the next few days, we will be sending out referrals in batches of 125. Please allow us one week to send out all the referral codes. This is not an automated process and we will have to manually verify the request, generate the referral and then send it to the requester via email. Needless to say it’s a time consuming process.
Note that a referral code expires after 6 hours. That means, you have to use the code within 6 hours since we generate it or the code would become invalid. Make sure to use an email you check frequently when sending the request. Since there can be various obstacles such as time zone differences, etc, we have taken the following steps to make this process more convenient for our readers :
After each batch of codes is sent, we will immediately notify you via E-mail, Twitter and Facebook. You can use any one or all of these mediums to stay up to date.
- E-mail – An email with the code will be sent back to the E-mail account you used to send the referral request.
- Twitter – Follow us on Twitter and we will Tweet whenever we send out a new batch of referral codes. http://twitter.com/filenetworks
- Facebook page - ‘Like’ our Facebook page to become a fan of it. Then you will get an update on your FaceBook wall immediately after we send out referrals: http://www.facebook.com/filenetworks
If you didn’t receive a code after a certain batch of codes were sent out, don’t lose hope as you might get it in the next round. However do keep in mind that we only have 500 codes (at this point) at our disposal and these will be served on a first come, first served basis. We may be able to do additional giveaways in future but this is not confirmed as of yet.
What to do after you receive the referral code
Like many other areas of the site, BCG’s referral/signup/login system is very unique. Follow the steps below to use your referral code to create a new account:
- Visit http://www.blackcats-games.net
- TYPE the word referal into the search box (don’t change the spelling), without hitting submit or enter. Once you do, Email and referral code (aka referral link) text boxes will appear at the foot of the page
- Enter a valid email address (NO HOTMAIL) and code in the boxes given. Then submit.
- Check mail for link and proceed to signup page
- Fill in your details and submit. this will then send you a completion email and more importantly, the keyword.
- Back at http://www.blackcats-games.net you must type in the keyword in the search box. Username pass fields will appear at the foot of the page.
- Enter your credentials at the username, password fields and hit submit. Enjoy BCG
Special thanks to stoi for hooking us up with referrals.
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