
How to Get Rich Playing Video Games Online - Dowwie
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/11/20/how-to-get-rich-playing-video-games-online
======
xchaotic
This is very much like sports - very few make it to the top, and it's kind of
subsidised by the ones coming up or just idly watching. Unlike actual sport,
the disciplines here change rapidly, in spite of Blizzard's best efforts,
World of Warcraft numbers are rapidly dwindling so a WoW start will pretty
much have to start from scratch in another game or quit streaming as a career
move. Game developers or even petty missteps can have disastrous consequences
for streamers. Game developers can, for example ban streaming altogether, or
request takedown with their content selectively. This is a 'career' but with
no major prospects and if one was to put equivalnet amount of time in another
field, say learning how deep learning works, the rewards will be far greater
on average. I also think that 'pro' streamers no longer enjoy the games they
play for "18 hours a day" and can't afford casual games with the camera turned
off. It's a huge 'big brother' in their lives.

~~~
thefalcon
That's why you build a personal brand while you're riding the coattails of a
popular game. See Day9, who plays whatever game he feels like playing on his
scheduled "day off" and streams it. He definitely has fun, even if it doesn't
make him money (he recently streamed Mario, for example, which Nintendo
[probably] claimed the revenue for) he's still building his personal brand and
personal audience. His fans will follow him no matter what game he starts
playing, because they're following _him_. But you're right that it's a hit-
based system and if you don't become a hit (which requires a lot of effort and
a lot of luck) then you're going to starve trying to "play video games for a
living."

~~~
ben_jones
Yup. It's a new "field" if you will, and a lot of people are getting hurt
during the birth phase. That said I've noticed streamers focusing more on
being game agnostic, they'll demo new games and take note how much of their
fan base follows. If the new game is a success they'll keep at it, if not
they'll migrate back.

------
EA
No mention of Dr. Disrespect - a Twitch persona who recently won "Streamer of
the Year" at the Esports Industry Awards.

Just a passing mention of PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, a game which
according to some is growing faster than Minecraft did. PlayerUnknown’s
Battlegrounds (PUBG) is the most popular streamed game on Twitch right now.
The game regularly has over 2,000,000 concurrent players, has sold over
13,000,000 copies, and is still in beta with just one multiplayer map. It has
been the most popular game on Steam for a few months. Some digital items
obtained from loot crates have sold for over $1,000.

There is a whole ecosystem that has developed underneath the Twitch platform
where secondary services help gamers overlay responsive graphics over the
video stream as well as take donations. Top PUBG streamers can make well over
$1,000 per night in donations on top of their cut of the Twitch subscription
fee.

~~~
rndmwlk
I don't mean to be rude, but so what?

There's no need to specifically mention your favorite streamer, or your
favorite game. Just because PUBG is popular right now doesn't mean this is a
phenomenon centered around PUBG. There have been many streamers making A LOT
of money for years now. League of Legends, Counterstrike, and DotA 2, for
example, have always had large fan bases with "Top streamers" making similarly
ridiculous amount of money in tips.

~~~
EA
There is basically no mention of the hit game on HN. It is presently a video
game phenomenon and is inspiring video game developers to explore that video
game genre.

That particular streamer is changing the streaming game and is invested in
some third party streamer support apps. He has broad appeal as little kids
dressed up as this Twitch streamer for Halloween this year.

I think an article about the game, its streamers, the revenue sharing, and how
Twitch is evolving would make the front page of HN.

That is all. No hidden agenda.

~~~
mattmanser
PUBG inspired nothing, those kind of battle royale games have been around for
ages (ages in game terms, a year or two ago H1Z1 accidentally popularized
battle royale as an alternate mode in its zombie survival game, which was in
beta).

AFAIK PUBG was made in response to other games that used to be popular in the
genre failing after major changes, specifically H1Z1.

EDIT: Fair-cop to them though, they've obviously done a greaat job. It's just
that games like this are _already_ coming out constantly, it's the new genre
to clone. Before battle royale was that hot genre, it was MOBAs[1] + survival
games a few years ago and MMOs were a few years before that. Battle Royale is
actually a sort of spin off out of the survival genre. Another interesting
thing to note is that survival/battle royale games have a lot of indie
entrants who tend to have long alpha phases where hype makes them incredibly
popular (DayZ, 7 days to die, Rust, Ark: Survial Evolved, Unturned, Don't
Starve). Then the player base can sometimes die off as the game suffers from
poor performance and slow development.

At the moment PUBG is suffering from lots of hackers, so we'll see whether it
actually stays popular.

[1] Multiplayer online battle arena (5v5, top down, team game), spawned from a
mod made for warcraft 3, popular examples include league of legends, DOTA2,
Heroes of the Storm, etc.

~~~
yllaucaj
While you're technically correct in saying that PUBG isn't the first game of
its kind, PlayerUnknown (creative lead) is the creator of the Arma mod DayZ,
which to my knowledge is the origin of this genre.

------
petercooper
The bit I'd be interested to read about is the psychology behind the "donors."
Why would anyone throw down random $100 or $500 without a quid quo pro to
someone receiving many other such donations?

I understand streaming, generally, and have paid to subscribe to a channel
before but the random throwing around of not insignificant amounts of money
gets me scratching my head.

 _(Should make it clear I 'm not criticizing the practice. I just find it
interesting, considering how understand the psychology behind it could help
creators in other spheres, or open source developers, etc.)_

~~~
astura
People do a lot of things that baffle me.

Spending $100-500 for some entertainment is actually reasonable and not at all
baffling.

~~~
petercooper
Sure, I've spent money on a lot of weird things, giving arbitrary money to
people I think who needed it, buying coins in games I've enjoyed, etc.. but
donations with no quid pro quo to top Twitch players till do baffle me, given
people making the donations know they're well off. It feels like me sending
random checks to Larry David because I like watching his show :-D I'd just be
keen to see an article digging into that.

~~~
astura
What in Earth do you mean a "quid pro quo?" Twitch user gives entertainment
and in return the donor kicks in some cash of they want to. Just like a
busker.

If you feel they provide you with $500 in entertainment and you have a spare
$500, then it makes sense.

That's like asking "why would you go to a casino when you know casinos make
lots of money?"

If you're watching Larry David's shows the business transaction has already
taken place. Larry David doesn't stream his shows for free and give you the
opportunity to give him donations in exchange and then thank donors during the
episode.

~~~
petercooper
_Twitch user gives entertainment and in return the donor kicks in some cash of
they want to. Just like a busker._

I understand the busker metaphor, but the $100/$500 donations we hear about
most often are to _successful_ streamers, so it's more like throwing $500 at
Axel Rose. That's the bit I find interesting.

Such donations strike me as unusually altruistic for the demographic involved,
in a way that we don't see en masse in other public online venues (such as on
YouTube, donating to open source, Instagram, bloggers, etc.) I'm quite
interested in learning more about the psychology around that because I think
other arenas deserve it too.

~~~
astura
Same reason why Axel Rose being rich and successful doesn't stop fans from
buying albums, going to shows, and buying merch.

~~~
graedus
Presumably those fans are buying those things at least in part because they
_want to have the album, concert experience, or merch_. With twitch
donations/tips you get comparatively very little in return - your username
might pop up in a video overlay for a few seconds, and the streamer might be
like "hey thanks, [username]!". Those 3-4 seconds are typically the entirety
of your several-hundered-dollar experience.

~~~
thaumasiotes
Those effects can't really be considered to be "your several-hundred-dollar
experience", because you get them all, even the on-screen "thanks", for a much
lesser tip. What people are getting out of the large tips is something else.

------
olympus
What I think is crazy is that this industry exists at the scale it does. It
has replaced reality TV for a segment of the world population. There are
legions of people that watch these streams, just to watch someone doing
something that they could do themselves (but maybe not win as much). This
isn't like F1 racing where I'll never be able to afford a racecar, or football
where I don't want to exercise. Most of the kids watching these streams own a
decent computer and can play.

I suppose it's just not for me. I watch video game reviews to see if something
is worth buying, but not more than a few minutes of gameplay. Plus the other
things that streaming groups/houses do aren't appealing to me.

Have I gotten old? Is this why grey haired CEOs often miss great business
opportunities? They just don't "get it?"

~~~
flipp3r
> Most of the kids watching these streams own a decent computer and can play.

Youre making it sound not only as if only kids watch this, but also like
playing any sport at all is so much different - and then compare it to Reality
TV instead of live sports. Actual WTF? Some of the streamers (variety
streamers) do play for just entertainment value, but most stick to just one
game. A lot of it is also being able to live chat with other people watching
and interact with the person streaming.

> This isn't like F1 racing where I'll never be able to afford a racecar, or
> football where I don't want to exercise.

Why isn't it like that? That's exactly what it is. Do you have any idea how
long professional esports players competing in tournaments have to work, to
stay at the top level? And do you think they can play at the same level on the
average person's hardware? Have a look at Starcraft 2, Counter Strike Source,
or Osu!. These are games where top players make 100+ strategic actions per
minute, need to have lightning reaction speeds and accuracy, and make bursts
of 10 actions per second for full minutes, respectively.

How can it be such a shock to non-gamers that people watch other people play a
game, rather than play it themselves? Just imagine it - people watching a
game! /s It's exactly the same as every professional sport that has ever
existed.

~~~
ansible
_Youre making it sound not only as if only kids watch this, but also like
playing any sport at all is so much different - and then compare it to Reality
TV instead of live sports._

Now I've got my next business idea.

Attach wireless streaming cameras to all the players in a sportsball game.
Each player has a HUD, and can see chat messages in real time.

Heck, for something like American Football, you could even have them vote on
what play the opposing team is likely to do next. The player can take that
under advisement, and maybe compliment a viewer when correct. To make more
money, they viewers could bid on the predictions, which might help increase
their accuracy. The player and the sport get a percentage of the bids, and the
rest forms a prize pool for the most accurate bidders.

~~~
jpgleeson
This is probably as close as you're going to get at this moment in time to
what you're saying. This was posted here a few months ago, haven't checked
back in to see how it's going for them a season later.

[http://www.slate.com/articles/sports/sports_nut/2017/02/the_...](http://www.slate.com/articles/sports/sports_nut/2017/02/the_salt_lake_screaming_eagles_a_football_team_controlled_by_fans_with_smartphones.html)

------
thisisit
> Garcia’s specialty is the multiplayer fantasy game World of Warcraft. While
> he isn’t its best player, he has a _knack for talking entertainingly over
> his play_ : he is funny, brash, and filled with stories about his delinquent
> childhood in Newark.

Most, if not all, of the live gameplay videos nowadays mostly tend to be about
screaming and raging at the screen with lesser amount of stories. And for some
reason people like that a lot.

This along with the slew of _Reaction_ videos where people watch other people
watching and _reacting_ to stuff makes me wonder - why are people really
interested in someone doing some stuff? Are they so alone that they need some
validation or is it more to do with increasing voyeurism nowadays?

~~~
seanalltogether
The only streamer that I really watch is Brian Kibler, who plays Hearthstone
and used to be a pro MTG player. I think the reason I watch him and no one
else really is because he's older, doesn't rage, includes his wife in his
stream occasionally, and provides insights into his decision making process.
He's just good natured and it's the closest thing I've found to those poker
tournaments that I used to watch on cable at midnight.

~~~
lilactown
Likewise, I watch almost exclusively Firebat (with a bit of Kibler every once
and awhile).

He does a really good job of balancing being funny and interesting (as a
person), and giving really good insights into his thought process in playing
Hearthstone, building decks, and competing.

------
dsfyu404ed
The 18-hour days and other working conditions they of the top earners
described in the article tell me that a lot of people will age out of their
ability to sustain their level of income. It will be an quick transition like
sports or porn where you hit a certain age and the dollar value of the level
at which you can perform falls off a cliff because you're limited by your
body.

I would hope that the pro streamers are planning to use the industry
connections they develop for a move into some other part of the video gaming
industry around that time.

------
dvt
I played Counter-Strike competitively (and to the extent it was possible
"professionally") about 10 years ago and made some money winning tournaments,
but nothing compared to what people are making nowadays. We got our hotel paid
for for a few tournaments and that was "making it" back then :) It's fantastic
to see the sector grow and I'd love to return to esports/gaming sometime in
the future.

Unfortunately, it's not all rainbows and roses, as I think there are some
detrimental forces at play which are trying to rip out the grassroots origins
of esports and commercialize it to the n-th degree (see Blizzard's Overwatch
League). This was attempted before in '07 (see the Championship Gaming Series)
and it failed miserably, so we'll see how it does this time around.

~~~
ben_jones
OWL is a great example because there was a $20m buy in for I believe 8 teams.
That's $160m in funding, with significant participation by organizations like
the Kraft group. Whether it'll go anywhere is like asking if a specific well
funded start-up will go anywhere, but its definitely being pushed hard.

~~~
dvt
I personally don't think Blizzard has any idea what they're doing in the
esports scene. They destroyed SC2 and fumbled HotS, I don't think Overwatch
will be any different. I was at Blizzcon last weekend and even though everyone
there seemed excited about Overwatch, the numbers just weren't there. Barely
breaking 300k viewers for a _world championship_ (when DOTA, LoL, CSGO all
break 1M+) -- the state of the game is not looking great at the moment.

Not sure who invested like $20M per team but that seems like quite the gamble.

~~~
duskwuff
OWL definitely has a weird, heavy-handed feel to it -- it's almost as though
Blizzard is trying to forcibly create a competitive 'scene' that emulates a
traditional sports league, rather than allowing the scene to evolve naturally
as it has in other games.

By far the weirdest part of OWL for me has been Blizzard's insistence on
having teams represent cities -- up to the point of _renaming existing teams_
to fit their naming scheme. (For instance, the "Dallas Fuel" team was created
out of the existing EnVyUs lineup.) This is incredibly unusual for esports;
the typical arrangement is for teams to either choose their own names, or to
play under the name of an existing cross-game esports organization (such as
Team Liquid, Evil Geniuses, or Fnatic).

~~~
dvt
> OWL definitely has a weird, heavy-handed feel to it -- it's almost as though
> Blizzard is trying to forcibly create a competitive 'scene' that emulates a
> traditional sports league, rather than allowing the scene to evolve
> naturally as it has in other games.

Bingo. Which is why so many competitive gamers are simply not interested in
it. The way esports has generally grown is "bottom-up" \-- local competitions
spring up first and then larger, more well-funded tournaments take place.
Blizzard is going for the "top-down" approach. We'll see what happens.

------
nickjj
I think it's just good timing now because we have the tech to do it. The
demand was always there.

Back in 1999 and the early 2000s you could make over $100,000 if you won a
single Quake 3 tournament.

Live streaming (with professional commentators) was available back then, but
there were no platforms for it so it never caught onto the masses. You had to
really be in the know to watch them.

But I do remember people being rabid fans and highly engaged back then. Just
as much as now, just at a smaller scale.

I made a little bit of money playing competitive Quake 3 and helped develop
and run the most popular gaming ladder for a certain mod of that game. Good
times.

~~~
c3534l
> The demand was always there.

I remember when my brother bought an NES, I wasn't good enough to really play
any of the games, but I used to love watching him play because he got so much
farther into the games for me and it was a way to spend time with him. I guess
that impulse hasn't really gone away.

------
tinbucket
Interesting read and insight into a subculture I know very little about.

Looks like only a few of them are getting rich, and it isn't without its
costs. Working seven days a week as a professional gamer is pretty brutal.

~~~
FLUX-YOU
>Working seven days a week as a professional gamer is pretty brutal.

I'm gonna throw some shade towards gameplay streamers. Streamers who do
focused content and actually produce shows as you would in a TV/Radio studio
have a real job which I've actually done, so this doesn't include them.

Playing a game and running a stream, technically, is not hard. Engaging with
viewers is not hard. There's a bunch of solutions out of the box that allow
you to manage subscription announcements, overlays, and other stuff, so that
isn't too hard either. Spending time in a chair isn't hard. 4-5 hours of
working out per week and healthy diet choices would help that, but isn't a
panacea because research shows sitting for long periods is bad anyway. I
wouldn't be surprised if there was some kind of viewer management software
akin to CRM software that make it easier to relate to a larger amount of
people. After all, people have limits on the amount of social connections they
are able to manage themselves. So remembering your viewers may not even be
hard.

The hard part comes with people being unprepared to essentially become public
figures (very much in the Hollywood or political sense) and being unable to
deal with harassment, death threats, and insults and the worst part of
internet. If you don't have enough viewers to shrug off a controversy, your
channel will get small, you'll lose revenue, and likely start stressing out
about that as well. Having a fallback career plan is essential.

But if you are mentally tough and don't repeat the mistakes of other streamers
and public figures (which is likely conveniently available for you to watch),
being a streamer is not difficult. Not like other careers. Making money is a
different story -- you can do everything right and still not be popular
because the mob is fickle. That's just career luck, which isn't specific to
streaming. You shouldn't be a public figure if you aren't prepared mentally
for it. Twitch can only ban so many people.

However, I very much support tapping this revenue stream. I truly don't care
if a loser drops $500 on a streamer who's showing cleavage as long as she's of
legal age -- more power to that streamer. And it's up to parents to police
their kids watching cleavage streamers. That's not really Twitch's job.

Just call it for what it is: easily hacking viewership for revenue. The
exception being taking care of yourself mentally first.

~~~
Jemmeh
Of course "streaming isn't hard" in the same way that playing football isn't
hard. It's when you do it at a professional level and have to put in mad hours
every week to keep up that it becomes brutal. All without guarantee that
you'll even get paid if you're just unlucky that week and don't get enough
viewers.

~~~
bllguo
Streaming requires little commitment to try out. You can easily have a normal
job and stream at night to ease into it. The skills required are to just be
entertaining. You can quit immediately if you want or need to, without
dropping a beat. The commitment required is orders of magnitude less than
something like playing sports professionally.

The actual comparison to football is "esports," where people play games
competitively. There, you actually do have to put in large amounts of hours to
compete at the highest level, without being guaranteed prize money or
competitive wins.

~~~
nightski
If you don't want any viewers. You vastly underestimate how hard it is to
build a stream that attracts a healthy audience.

------
beobab
Hmmm... I read this, got distracted, followed links, and bought a game in a
Steam sale (Avadon 2 - £2.99).

I think I'm doing it wrong.

------
glenneroo
Slightly off-topic but now even New Yorker is inserting autoplay videos about
completely unrelated topics in the middle of long articles (in my case
"Anthony Bourdain on Going from Obama to Trump"). Why would they do such a
thing? Are they hoping everyone suddenly develops ADHD?

~~~
stochastic_monk
I now browse with 4 extensions to handle issues like this. The autoplaying is
everywhere and absurd. (NYTimes even has autoplaying animations you can't turn
off. I sent them an email asking to have the option to turn it off as a paying
subscriber and they didn't even respond.)

It's a mix of reasons, but it's usually ultimately about turning you into a
product. I think it's disgusting.

To make the internet bearable, I use the following extensions: Ad Block Plus
HTTPS Everywhere Privacy Badger And, the newest in the bunch, Ghostery.

I do have to twiddle some things on and off now and then, but on the whole it
works and my online experience is a lot less jarring.

------
spullara
Primarily you are entertaining, secondarily you are good at video games. There
is a narrative pattern that you must be a master of to get any kind of
interest on Twitch. It is a unique artform in and of itself.

------
forkLding
From reading the article it sounds like it could be retitled to almost "How to
get rich playing video games or die trying" but another aspect is the global
scale of this thing, you can also look to see China's obsession with video-
streaming to see that this isn't really a one-time trend but rather an
enduring thing that will likely keep evolving into more physical interactions
where streamers do more and more celebrity on-site activities rather than
purely virtual.

------
arkis22
My favorite streamer for Overwatch, aimbotCalvin has 300,000 subscribers. This
puts into perspective how much he makes. Wow.

~~~
ptomato
He has 340000 _followers_, not subscribers. Subscriber counts aren't public
but if his follower/subscriber ratio is similar to some of the top streamers
he'd probably have around 5-6000 subscribers.

~~~
arkis22
Aw thanks for pointing that out, my mistake

------
jonheller
Tell that to the tens of thousands of streamers on Twitch who have 10 or less
viewers, who absolutely are not getting rich.

Like others have mentioned it's a combination of luck to get the initial
attention, and skill to maintain that following (either actual video game
skill, entertainment skill, or a combination of both).

------
SurrealSoul
Pretty click baity, "How entertainers make money by playing video games" is
still click bait, but at least gives you an idea of what this is about.

I feel like there is a lot to discuss about this topic (donations, reliable
income, future plans ect...) from twitch streaming that doesn't get touched
on. But it boils down to the audience wants to interact with you, and will pay
you to interact with them.

I'm curious how reliable this income really is, asking for money to give to a
celebrity playing a game vs asking for money to play a game seems like a weird
event

------
yters
Soon there will be Video Game U, where you can get a college diploma by
playing video games all day.

------
mitchtbaum
oooOOH!! I like rich playing video games! Where do I get them online?!..

------
brndnmtthws
The same applies to pretty much any skill: to be successful, work hard and be
very good at what you do. That's the entire article in a nutshell.

~~~
sandworm101
And be attractive. The top youtube/twitch people either look or sound like
celebs. They are either cute or have the voice, the pipes, of a radio star.

~~~
maccard
Lots of people are saying that, but it's clearly not true. I don't think
imaqtpie [0] fits that description. Skimming through the top twitch streams
right now, plenty of them don't fit that description.

[0]
[https://go.twitch.tv/videos/200675143](https://go.twitch.tv/videos/200675143)

~~~
gozur88
I haven't looked in awhile, but when I used to watch dota streams the top four
or five (by viewer count) were always extremely attractive Eastern European
and Russian women. They were better than average players, but not good enough
to command that kind of attention.

