The rise of video games as competitive sports, the increasing adoption rate of broadband internet, and the growing popularity of livestreams have created a huge community of video game voyeurs that didn't exist just a few years ago.
It's a community that many developers are finding increasingly difficult to ignore.
Twitch, the San Francisco-based video platform built specifically to help people easily broadcast and watch gameplay, has played a crucial role in building that community, fostering an audience of more than 23 million monthly viewers -- nearly triple its numbers a year ago, and growing by 10 to 15 percent per month.
Huge player hubs have emerged around Twitch's livestreams for popular eSports titles like League of Legends and StarCraft II. A number of game companies have noticed the potential of engaging fans in a novel way -- and of reaching a new audience -- if only they could figure out how to tap into the service's momentum.
Twitch began providing that sought-after opportunity to developers recently with a free software development kit that enables in-client streaming through its service. Supported titles can allow players to quickly set up a stream of their gameplay, broadcasting live on Twitch's site without even leaving the game.
Companies have lined up to offer the feature in their titles: Paradox Interactive was the first to announce its implementation in The Showdown Effect, Red 5 is adding it to Firefall, Sony Online Entertainment has already rolled it out in PlanetSide 2, and Electronic Arts is integrating Twitch across its entire Origin digital distribution service.
With these notable developers and publishers eager to hitch their wagons to Twitch's star, and many other partnerships still unannounced, it's not difficult to imagine built-in livestreaming becoming a standard feature for many online multiplayer games soon.
PlanetSide 2's Twitch streaming menu
"I think one of our rules is to go where players are. If players already exist in a big community some place, it's easier for us to go to them than force them to come into our ecosystem to play with us," explains Higby.
But why bother building it into a game when there are already external solutions (e.g. X-Split Broadcaster) allowing players to set up Twitch streaming themselves? After all, that's what has worked with the 200,000 broadcasters who have livestreamed on Twitch so far.
Twitch's marketing VP Matthew DiPietro argues that there are too many barriers for everyday players to overcome when using external tools: "If you're on a PC, you have to download third-party software and you have to have some technical know-how. It's not really an easy thing to do. You have to know how to optimize the video, your PC, etc.
"If you're trying to do it with consoles, it's even harder, since you have to get a capture card and do all this other kind of stuff. You have to be pretty technically savvy in order to do it. We want to remove those barriers entirely and make it a one-click process with every game, wherever you're playing it."
Remove those barriers, and more players can start streaming -- and act as evangelists for developers' titles. DiPietro continues, "The idea is that you want to make your title a platform for community creation. With streaming, your community can become something that's about much more than just gameplay. ... It creates a sense of engagement and spectator excitement that never existed around the game before."
The Showdown Effect
Jorjani continues, "Finally, making sure your game has variation is really important -- gamers don't want to see the same match over and over. We've solved this by adding customization options for the characters."
Why developers are integrating Twitch
Still, some might seem surprised that companies with a huge amount of resources like SOE and EA haven't decided to roll their own proprietary solution to offer in-game streaming to suit their needs, and to separate their broadcasts from the dozens of other competing games on Twitch. Twitch's reach and demographic, though, are exactly what many developers are looking for. "Twitch is an established service that already has a lot of name recognition, especially among the audience that we're really targeting, the competitive gaming audience, so that made sense," SOE's creative director Matthew Higby tells us. He points out that many of Twitch's viewers don't necessarily have a game in mind that they want to watch when they visit the site. They might not be PlanetSide fans, but if those visitors see a stream for the game that's popular there, they might watch it and decide it's something they're interested in playing."
Which games should include in-client streaming
Higby notes that there's definitely a specific game scene that's thrived on Twitch: "[The service] really become a hub for the competitive gaming scene across the board, from fighting games to first-person shooters to real-time strategy games and MOBAs [multiplayer online battle arena titles like League of Legends]. "Basically anything that could be considered a competitive video game experience is being broadcasted and being watched on Twitch," he says. In-game streaming is particularly beneficial for broadcasters mindful of their system's performance while playing, as it's designed to not be as CPU-intensive as external methods. PlanetSide 2 is an MMO first-person shooter with a competitive emphasis, so adding built-in Twitch streaming a few months ago was an easy decision for Higby and his team. The creative director says these types of titles also tend to attract plenty of viewers who like to watch expert players, either to pick up some tips or just admire their execution. Paradox's business development VP Shams Jorjani says that while The Showdown Effect isn't an eSports title, "it shares a lot in common with eSport games and makes it a great fit for streaming -- it looks good, it's fast paced, it has a high skill component, and it has tons of explosions." Developer Arrowhead Game Studios and Paradox specifically built The Showdown Effect to be a spectator game. "We knew that the game would be filled with 'Oh shit, did you see that?!'-moments," says Jorjani. "Going for those kind of moments was actually a core design goal. So when we heard about the Twitch SDK, it was a no-brainer for us." He compares the 2.5D multiplayer action title to ancient gladiator games, bloody experiences sure to attract an audience. So the team designed the title with livestreaming in mind: "Game rounds are generally short and sweet -- you can watch for three to five minutes and still have an enjoyable experience. In other games that have 45-60 minute rounds, a three-minute viewing session isn't exactly rewarding. "Additionally we've built a spectator mode that allows you to freely move about and zoom in on the action. Spectators love statistics and data, and that's something we're gearing to add and allow players to get more info on the combat."