So with that whole Drake playing Fortnite thing going down, I was wondering, what exactly is the appeal of a service like Twitch?
Let me first talk about my standpoint: I'm 34 (I guess most around here are 30 thirtysomethings) and grew up playing video games. Now, I love video games, and I love playing them, but it bores the hell out of me to watch someone else play.
Sure, when I was young you would be staying at a friends house and he had this awesome new game and he'd show it to you and it was nice to watch him play for a few minutes, but then I had to have a go myself. The same goes for arcades. You'd admire someone who's really great at something like Street Fighter 2 but you desperatly wanted to get in there and try for yourself.
Now on to the whole Twitch thing (which for me falls in the same category as a Let's Play). I've been trying to watch some streams, but I find them mostly annoying or boring. The streamers themselves are often obnoxious or just uninteresting. But still, they're right there in the frame, sitting in their fancy chairs, playing a video game. That's alright, but I personally don't care to see the person that's playing (and no, I don't want to talk about one particular kind of female streamers).
So, person aside I have the video game. If it's something new, it might be interesting to get some impressions on how a game plays. Or if it's something difficult, it may be interesting to see how someone else may tackle it. But for stuff like that, there are previews and gameplay montages and guides and whatnot.
Or maybe to watch someone really really good play a game? Yeah, that's the point I can probably get the most. Though still, I'd watch for maybe 10 minutes and get bored.
And that's where I'm lost: I don't want to talk rudely about Twitch or the people streaming, really I don't! But I'd really like to get a better understanding on why this blew up so much. Why there are so many people watching, why they give donations to the players (which is even more baffling) and what the general appeal is. Maybe it has something to do with age? Or is it something else?
I'd love to hear some of your opinions on Twitch. What do you think about it? What do you like? What don't you like?
