As if we needed any more evidence of the power of Twitch, gaming, and the personalities that fuel it, popular streamerNinja has set yet another recordfor the Twitch platform. But he didn’t do it in any normal fashion, instead bringing tons of viewers to Twitch by way of popular recording artists and athletes.
Of course, this stream wasn’t just an ordinary Ninja stream, which are capable of pulling 100,000+ viewers on their own. Tonight Ninja was joined inFortniteby popular recording artists Drake and Travis Scott, as well as Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver Juju Smith Schuster, among others. Check out the stream below (Drake joins around the 3-hour mark).
Just recentlyTyler1 broke the solo streamer recordafter he returned toLeague of Legendsfollowing a lengthy ban, but there was a lot of fanfare behind that event. This stream was more of a spur of the moment thing - Drake and Ninja had discussed playing together but it was unclear if it would really happen.
If there was any question about the popularity ofFortniteand its mainstream appeal, the fact that a major celebrity like Drake and a monster Twitch personality like Ninja can connect through it is all the evidence needed. Not only that, but this single stream was trending worldwide on Twitter (for several different words) and many other celebrities and online personalities tried to get in on the action. EvenRoseanna Barr is apparently a fan ofFortnite, and has actually won a few games too.
While it will be some time until we see if this single stream has any impact on gaming, Twitch, or some combination therein, for many gamers out there this was significant. Seeing a mainstream celebrity play alongside a Twitch streamer helped bring a lot of new viewers to the platform and it didn’t treatFortniteor gaming as a gimmick. This wasn’t a stunt pulled by a marketing team (Ninja didn’t link up with Drake until around 9pm PT); it was a couple fans of the hottest game right now getting together to play.
