Registering for Gamesurge and getting Pidgin
(NOTE: Click here if you're having troubles getting authed.)
Step 1) Sign up for a Gamesurge Account
Step 2) Check your e-mail for your "Account name:" and your "Password:" (save this e-mail, because you will need it to remember your username and password)

Step 3) Get Pidgin 2.3.1 and install it
Step 4) Get purple-plugin_pack-2.2.0.zip
Step 5) Extract the purple-plugin_pack-2.2.0.zip and move the files within the folder "purple-plugin_pack-2.2.0" to this directory C:\Program Files\Pidgin\plugins

Step 6) Run Pidgin and enable IRC Helper and IRC More(ctrl + u, check IRC helper and IRC More)

Step 7) Now add a new account (ctrl + a, click Add)


Step 8) Select IRC from the drop down "Protocol:" menu

Step 9) Enter a "Screen Name:" (you will be known as this name in IRC chat rooms, but it CANNOT contain a space)

Step 10) Change the "Server:" to irc.gamesurge.net

Step 11) Choose the "Advanced" tab at the top (alt + a)

Step 12) Enter your "Auth name:" and "Nick password:" which should be your "Account name:" and "Password:" you received in your e-mail

Step 13) Enter your "Username:" which is your e-mail address

Step 14) Now save your information (alt + s)
Step 15) Start adding chat rooms you would like to join (alt + b, h)


Step 16) Select your IRC account from the "Account:" drop down menu and start adding channels (a good one to add is #hl2dm)


Step 17) Now if you would like to "autojoin" these channels, just right click on that channel, once created, and select autojoin

(NOTE: Click here if you're having troubles getting authed.)