Live Video Game Streaming

We’ve seen that the most basic way of watching video games is to watch recorded games. They’re easy to find and you won’t have to look further than the main video sites like Youtube and Vimeo.

The next step – and definitely with potential to be more fun – is to watch live streaming of video games being played. In other words watching other gamer’s perform, either by watching Esports contests or head to head competitions or watching demo’s and game-play recordings.

There are some great places to do this, some of which are free and you can subscribe for free too, some are free but you can pay a subscription to get more content, and some may involve making a regular payment just to watch at all.

So let’s take a look at a list of the options. We’ll learn some of the firms that provide services, find out  what’s free and what’s not, who is allowed or able to watch, what you’ll need, and where to find the best action.

As a starter before we get into the details – and for anyone who is considering running their own game streaming – the video below takes you through the basics of getting set up.

The game streaming industry is growing at breakneck speed, and it’s a speed that’s been exacerbated by Covid-19 lockdowns which have given all of us more time to spend online.

So watching live streaming can have a number of benefits. It may give you straightforward entertainment, you may pick up gaming tips by watching, or it may help you in deciding whether to buy or subscribe to a game or not.

Very often the actual streamers themselves are professional gamer’s. Many have huge reputations, and seeing how they perform can be entertaining and enlightening to say the least. You don’t necessarily have to be a hugely competent player though, pretty much anyone can set up a stream. Of course if you’re not skilled in a game then you’ll need to be entertaining in other ways to get others subscribing to your streams.

So there are a handful of places to either watch live streaming of games or set up streams yourself: 

 

Youtube Live

Youtube Live is essentially a channel where you can watch live games being streamed. Take a look below for the latest playlist.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLiCvVJzBupKl73xGqyIC7dNdxa5qixfaG

With fans watching games on this platform for millions of hours per year, you can be sure of a high quality and easy-to-access experience. Games to watch out for include such massive titles as Fortnite, Counter-Strike: Global-Offensive, Minecraft, Garena Free Fire and PUBG Mobile. All of these can be seen in 4K resolution and at 60fps.

There are virtually no restrictions on watching YouTube Live, although of course some games are not suitable for minors. Aside from that, the platform is accessible from almost every country. 

 

Facebook Gaming    

It’ll be no surprise that Facebook Gaming was reportedly the fastest growing game streaming over the last couple of years. The social media giant has its hands in many pies. That doesn’t mean it’s a big as Youtube or Twitch, but it’s clearly either heading in the right direction or has a somewhat captive market. Probably a combination of the two.

Facebook have a section dedicated to playing, watching, and chatting about games and gaming.

 

Twitch     

Amazon-owned Twitch is the big one of course. Based on total hours spent watching, it’s well clear of the competition. We’re talking close to 10 million hours in 2019 as an example.

Some of those hours may well be on other aspects of streaming – the platform does cover music, cooking, and travel-related subjects as examples – but still it’s an impressive figure.

At any one time you can find over a million active users connected, illustrating just how popular it is. Many of these are following top titles action from games such as Fortnite, League of Legends, and Call of Duty: Warzone.

You can subscribe to Twitch with an Amazon Prime Gaming membership which also gets you  exclusive in-game loot, free games, and everything included with Amazon Prime every month.

Caffeine

With a strap-line that states ”The best entertainers, gamers, & athletes” the streaming solution from Caffeine offers gaming mixed with music, sports and more. With ultra fast streaming you’re promised you can ”Discover shows your friends are watching. Join chat prioritized to who you already know. All in an online community where everyone is welcome”. 

Instagib.tv

Now we’re on to some alternatives to the biggest names, one of which is Instagib. One of the best features here is one that lets you stream right from the platform rather than needing any other apps or equipment.

Subscribing to Instagib may be a necessity for some, as it’s a way of avoiding a standard bandwidth limit that applies to ‘normal’ users. 

 

Smashcast  

Highly popular with experienced gamer’s, Smashcast has a drawback in that it’s resource-hungry and you’ll need a higher powered device than normal to enjoy the streamed games to the highest potential.

Still it has received critical acclaim, not least because of an easy to use and intuitive user interface.

This page on Smashcast explains all about the subscription options.

 

Afreeca.tv

Afreeca is a lesser known option that originates from Korea. It’s popular, especially with pro gamers thanks to the ease with which they can set up their streams. You’ll find some good quality streaming here. 

Other operators include:

Trovo Live

Booyah Live

Bigo.tv

DLive

China-Based Streaming –  Huya Live         DouYu          Bilibili       Kuaishou        yy.com

We’ll cover these in better depth another time, but for now you can visit any by clicking the links.