Streaming reports and market data
Documents
The Games We Watched: Lurkit’s Top 500 Global Stream Report
The global gaming industry experienced a period of significant contrast in 2023, characterized by record-breaking streaming engagement despite internal industry volatility such as widespread layoffs.
- The top 500 games generated nearly 15 billion hours of viewership on Twitch in 2023, despite broader industry volatility.
- Market engagement is highly concentrated, with just 11 titles accounting for 50% of the total viewership among the top 500 games.
- Grand Theft Auto V was the most-watched title of 2023, accumulating 1.3 billion hours of viewership.
Creative Industries in the UK Report
The United Kingdom’s entertainment market reached a historic peak of £11.1 billion in 2022, representing a 6.9% year-on-year increase and nearly doubling its total value since 2015.
- The UK entertainment market reached a record £11.1 billion in 2022, a 6.9% year-on-year increase that nearly doubles its 2015 valuation.
- Digital services now dominate the landscape with a 91% market share across video, music, and gaming sectors.
- The video games sector is the largest segment at £4.66 billion, with digital software sales—driven by mobile and console DLC—accounting for 90% of that total.
Thomas Brush Channel Update (Huge News For 2023)
The establishment of Black Window, a new film production studio, marks a strategic expansion into the horror genre for independent creator Thomas Brush.
- Thomas Brush has launched Black Window, a new film production studio dedicated to producing dark, cerebral, and dramatic short horror films.
- The studio’s debut project, 'The Unlocking,' has secured nine awards and distribution through Alter, a horror-focused platform with over one million subscribers.
- The studio is strategically separating its cinematic content from existing game development channels to maintain focused audience engagement.
Watch Extra Credits - Because Gaming Matters
The Extra Credits brand is transitioning its gaming-focused content to a dedicated, standalone channel to better serve its audience.
- Extra Credits is migrating its gaming-focused content to a new, standalone channel to separate it from the sister program, Extra History.
- The brand is centralizing its production to focus exclusively on game design, industry analysis, and the cultural significance of interactive media.
- The channel will maintain its established production schedule of releasing signature animated episodes every other Wednesday.
Esports Digital Overview: Italy 2022
The Italian esports market underwent a transformative shift in 2021, characterized by a decisive consolidation of viewership on Twitch and a notable diversification of competitive gaming titles.
- Twitch consolidated its position as the primary platform for Italian esports in 2021, recording 482 million hours watched, a 60 percent year-over-year increase.
- Viewership for national esports events surged by 92 percent, while international broadcasts experienced a 52 percent growth rate.
- The competitive landscape shifted away from the dominance of single titles like Fortnite toward a more fragmented market led by esports-focused games.
300,000 SUBSCRIBER SPECIAL (And How You Can Do It Too)
The primary thesis of this discussion is that building a dedicated audience is the most valuable asset for an independent game developer, offering long-term creative freedom and financial stability that far exceeds the volatility of individual game launches.
- Building a dedicated audience provides long-term financial stability and creative freedom, allowing developers to move away from the volatility of relying solely on individual game launches.
- A sustainable career model for independent developers involves diversifying income streams beyond game sales to include digital courses, asset packs, and sponsorships.
- YouTube serves as a critical marketing funnel for developers, even though platform ad revenue alone is typically insufficient as a primary income source.
CTV…the Next Big Thing in UA - ARTHUR QUEROU, Vibe
Connected Television (CTV) is emerging as a significant channel for user acquisition (UA), shifting the paradigm of TV advertising from a branding-only tool to a measurable, performance-driven medium.
- Connected Television (CTV) has transitioned from a branding-only tool to a measurable, performance-driven user acquisition channel by utilizing deterministic measurement and household-level targeting.
- Advertisers can link ad exposure to app installs by using static IP addresses to track users on home Wi-Fi networks, allowing for precise audience profiling and re-engagement.
- Attribution is primarily driven by organic search behavior following ad exposure, with Mobile Measurement Partners (MMPs) tracking the user journey from the initial impression to the app store install.
Audience-Driven Entertainment as the Next Frontier in Gaming
Massively Interactive Live Events represent a transformative evolution in digital entertainment, effectively bridging the divide between passive television consumption and active gaming participation.
- Massively Interactive Live Events (MILEs) bridge the gap between passive media and active gaming by using AI and physics engines to allow real-time audience influence over narrative and character development.
- The 'Rival Peak' project demonstrated the commercial viability of this model by generating over 100 million minutes of engagement through integrated viewer voting and mini-games.
- Cloud-based streaming is the essential technical enabler for these experiences, as it removes hardware barriers and local download requirements to reach users on low-end devices.
Real-time Voice & Video in Games & VR
The integration of real-time voice, video, and messaging into gaming and virtual reality environments serves as a primary driver for increased user engagement and revenue.
- Real-time communication infrastructure can support up to one million concurrent participants in a single session by utilizing a decentralized network of over 250 global data centers.
- AI-driven path optimization bypasses standard internet routing by transmitting data across multiple simultaneous paths through Tier 2 providers, effectively eliminating packet loss and achieving near-zero latency.
- Developers can integrate live voice, video, and messaging features into 2D and 3D environments using approximately 10 to 12 lines of code.
Cloud Gaming: Where Are We Now, Where Are We Going?
Cloud gaming stands at a critical juncture, projected to exceed $5 billion in revenue by 2023 while simultaneously grappling with fundamental technical and economic barriers.
- Cloud gaming faces a significant scalability challenge, as current pixel streaming infrastructure supports only thousands of concurrent users, whereas AAA game launches require capacity for millions of simultaneous players.
- Latency remains a critical barrier; because interactive gaming requires frame times of 16 milliseconds, data centers must be located in close proximity to users to avoid the performance degradation caused by multiple network hops.
- Pixel streaming is economically difficult to scale as a commodity service because it cannot utilize standard CDNs or caching, and it requires continuous, expensive GPU hardware upgrades to maintain high-fidelity experiences.
Jacob Navok: How MILEs Will Transform Entertainment
Massively Interactive Live Events, or MILEs, represent a fundamental shift in digital entertainment by merging the passive consumption of streaming media with the agency of interactive gaming.
- Massively Interactive Live Events (MILEs) merge passive streaming with interactive gaming, allowing millions of concurrent users to collectively influence narrative outcomes in real-time.
- MILEs bypass high-end hardware requirements by utilizing cloud-native technology to stream high-fidelity, persistent narratives directly to mobile devices.
- The format functions as a community-driven spectacle that leverages established intellectual properties, such as The Walking Dead, to capture non-traditional gaming audiences.
Video Game Streaming Trends: 2022 Third Quarter Report
The third quarter of 2022 reflects a period of stabilization for the live streaming industry as it transitions away from pandemic-era highs.
- Twitch maintains a dominant 72% market share of gaming hours watched, while YouTube grew its viewership by 4% and Facebook Gaming suffered a 70% decline following the discontinuation of its standalone app.
- The live streaming industry is stabilizing post-pandemic with total hours watched down 13% year-over-year, though current viewership remains nearly double 2019 levels.
- Esports viewership grew 40% year-over-year, with Twitch capturing 66% of this segment and eight of the top ten esports organizations now generating the majority of their watch time through non-competitive variety content.