Just a few years ago, few people had heard of the streaming platform Twitch, which was founded nearly ten years after Facebook and five years after video platform YouTube. Twitch’s predecessor website, justin.tv, was a platform to allow people to make live video streams, comprised of predominantly Big Brother-styled lifecasting. At the time, live streaming a video game was incredibly complex, using specialist software, webcams and microphones. Fast forward to 2018, and technology has advanced enough for it to be possible for people without complex technical knowledge to stream their gameplay. This has led to a boom in such streaming, with gaming being the most popular category on YouTube. Below is a selection of some of the best streams gaming fans will find on Twitch.
Darbian
Darbian frequently streams himself speedrunning Mario games. So experienced is he at this that he held the record for the quickest run through the original Super Mario Brothers game, clocking a time of just 4 minutes and 56 seconds.
Imaqtpie
This League of Legends player reportedly earns significant sums of money through streaming; it is speculated that he rakes in as much as $2 million per year. He was previously a professional player as part of Team Dignitas between 2011 and 2014, before he left to begin streaming full time.
PokerStars
For those interested in poker, the PokerStars Twitch channel regularly streams some of the most thrilling action from Team PokerStars players. The channel’s recent streams have included a broadcast of Felix Schneider teaching four novice poker players how to succeed at single-table tournaments and streams of games featuring poker royalty like World Series of Poker champion, Chris Moneymaker.
Shroud
Shroud is a skilled player of first and third-person shooting games, such as Counter Strike, Call of Duty and PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG). Before streaming full time on Twitch, Shroud had been member of a number of professional video game teams, including Cloud9 and Exertus.
Syndicate
Syndicate was the first Twitch streamer to achieve more than one million followers on the platform, all the way back in the summer of 2014. His audience grew rapidly as a result of his extreme skills and the crazy stunts he frequently pulled off. He plays a number of games, including Fortnite, Far Cry and PUBG.
TigerWriter
Full of energy, TigerWriter is frequently dancing or headbanging to his loud music. He streams a variety of different games and is pretty skilled at whatever he tries his hand at. TigerWriter may not be at the top of many leaderboards, but his energy and the high volumes of memes and videos within his streams make him very entertaining.
Bennyfits
With the high volumes of streamers on Twitch, and the many new ones signing up every day, it is difficult for new streamers to differentiate themselves from others. Bennyfits has set out to achieve this by using a puppet in streams. Tune in to a Bennyfits stream and you will not find a human; instead you’ll see a puppet who is most likely better at games than you are.
Johnnystonehs
A steamer of the game Hearthstone, Johnnystonehs loves discussing strategy with his viewers and explaining why he has made the decisions he has. This makes Johnnystonehs’ stream a great option for those looking to improve their playing skills. In addition to his streams, Johnnystonehs also provides paid coaching services for people looking to learn how to play Hearthstone and poker.
TheMexicanRunner
TheMexicanRunner achieved the successful completion of the “NESMania†quest, where he had to play and complete every single officially-licensed Nintendo Entertainment system game. This is no easy feat—it means completing 714 games (including all of the bad ones), which he says took him over 3,400 hours (that’s 141 straight days without any breaks). Also, like Darbian, TheMexicanRunner frequently streams speedruns, which has required a lot of practice for him to build up the skills to achieve this.
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