Coronavirus: Home-bored fans stream to share sites

Online live-streaming site Twitch recorded a huge increase in viewership over the past six weeks.

Amber Wadham has seen more viewers to her streams. Picture: Roy Van Der Vegt

With more time on the hands, many bored Australians turned to gaming in the past six weeks as a way to escape the monotony of staying indoors.

Game and console sales spiked through March and April, with strong demand for devices such as the Nintendo Switch causing stock to sell out just hours after restocking.

Online live-streaming site Twitch, long a haven for gamers and fans alike, recorded a huge increase in viewership over the past six weeks. Averaging 17.5 million viewers daily worldwide before the pandemic, the site allows creators to share what they are playing in real time with fans, who can comment and support creators through subscriptions and tips.

In the past month, the site set records for new viewership and daily visitor numbers, with the numbers of hours viewed on the site up by 50 per cent.

Twitch’s Australian and New Zealand partnership lead Lewis Mitchell said similar increases had been reflected in local trends.

“It’s a live-streaming platform but at the heart it really is an ­engagement platform and it’s about building communities. The average user is on Twitch for 106 minutes a day, which is longer than a football game,” Mr Mitchell said. “So there’s something that’s keeping people there and interacting, and especially while people have been here isolated and COVID meant we were all at home, it turned into a place where you could engage with familiar voices that you’ve heard before.”

Online game streaming is Amber Wadham’s full-time job. Better known as PaladinAmber, the 23-year-old streamer from Ade­laide has seen an increase in viewers to her hours-long gaming streams several times a week, where she plays popular games including Call of Duty and Apex Legends alongside chats with fans.

“The amount of people I’ve had come into one of my streams and say it’s their first time has definitely increased, but those who are regularly tuning in can hang out for longer and even play games with me,” she said.

“I think it’s really changed the way people interact online; we’ve almost become more connected as a community, even though there’s a physical distance ­between us all.”

March marked the release of highly anticipated games Doom Eternal and Animal Crossing: New Horizon. The latter, a cartoon simulation where users farm and sell goods to other users in order to build an island, even had celebrities including Lord of the Rings actor Elijah Wood reaching out to fans on Twitter to get virtual produce at competitive prices.

Isolation also started to see the type of content on offer diversify: musicians and fitness trainers used the platform to teach and entertain, while the mukbang, a Korean trend of people eating and talking to camera, gained traction.

“One of my favourite people who gained popularity is a Maori wood carver,” Mr Mitchell said. “At one stage, 7000 people at once watched him carve wood and talk about his culture. It was a really lovely moment.”

Other video platforms had their turns in the sun. Stocks in online meeting site Zoom soared in the early stages of isolation as people used it to connect with friends, work and continue schooling, with Facebook and Google quickly adapting to offer a similar service. Youth app TikTok also found a new demographic as adults joined teens to take part in dance and fitness challenges.