Setting up beta keys for your game

Hey guys,

Have anyone came across this problem? What is the best way to set up beta keys for a game? Currently i'm using a simple login system from the asset store which saves the user info on a database (encrypts password and all)

I was wondering what would be the best way to implement beta keys and such? My current thought process is to auto generate a list of keys using excel. import them to a database. The database entry will have 2 columns. the key itself and a boolean for used or not. and when someone wants to create an account they type in the key first and it will take them to account creation scene if key is not used and exists in the database.

any thoughts? is there a better way to do this? and how would i distribute these quickly?

I think i know how i could get this done but the issue i'm having is just i cant tell if the way i want to do it actually effective.

are there any tools i can use to help me?

Thanks all

 

I did it once.

Created a program in C# which could generate X amount of keys and put them into a database.
If i gave it a mail list separated with commas, it would find unused keys and send in a mail with a standard message.

Each key was connected to the mail and a bool (as you describe). So when they had to activate it they wrote mail, key and the login info they wanted. If the key wasn't used and the key was connected to the mail, the user would have an account successfully created, and the key would be set to used in the database.

 

i'm focused on how to make a beta key for my game but never made it yet i'm planning on learning how to make a beta key first so i can allow players to use them during the beta or Alpha phase of the game i can't find any one who did make one online it just brings up random stuff about game devs giving them away and how youtubers/twitch streamers get beta keys/codes i'm unsure if it's something the gamedevs code or if it's something completely different i would like to have a response to this question

 

Do mean the generation of the actual key itself?

There are a ton of solutions, like:
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/10368768/generating-nice-looking-beta-keys

As example

 

i came across that link but i was uncertain if it was used for game dev and if it is used on multi-platform e.g. xbox pc playstation switch