Categories: Tips & Tutorials

YouTube Gaming: Find a New Way to Play

If you’ve ever been on YouTube, there’s a good chance you’ve noticed the impact video games have on the site’s success. While some of us can recall growing up in a time when gaming meant firing up “Mario Kart 64” at a buddy’s house, or wasting a few hours on “Halo 2” multiplayer, the gaming world today has evolved into an incredibly diverse, and community-driven social phenomenon, and sites like YouTube are a big reason why.

Gaming culture has spawned entirely new genres of content, from walkthroughs and speedruns to “let’s plays” and music videos. It’s rare to find a popular channel these days that doesn’t post gaming content. Even the site’s most famous personalities, most subscribed channels, and most viewed videos (excluding the VEVO-branded channels) owe their success to gaming.

Welcome to YouTube Gaming
The developer team at Google, responsible for YouTube, isn’t lost on gaming’s popularity, and in June of 2016, launched YouTube Gaming. Developed as a likely response to other dedicated gaming platforms, like Twitch, YouTube Gaming is an all new app, and website designed to be a central hub for all things gaming. Using a slightly tweaked version of YouTube’s classic user interface, YouTube Gaming is awash in gaming media. Over 25,000 popular titles, ranging from “Asteroids” to “Zelda,” have dedicated pages, each linking to all the most popular videos, and streams involving that game. You can even customize your feed to show the games, personalities, and content you love most.

At the center of YouTube’s new platform is a focus on live streaming. Live streaming is an integral element of casual, and competitive gaming culture that has skyrocketed in popularity in recent years. With the popularity of eSports growing across the globe, and receiving major television coverage on US networks like ESPN, there’s never been a greater time for media companies to offer platforms supporting this service. To reflect its growing importance, live streaming videos are displayed prominently at the top of each user’s homepage.

Get in the Game
If you’re genuinely interested in gaming culture, or just want to see what all the fuss is about, YouTube Gaming is currently live, and available for anyone to use. If you want to get in on the action yourself, and share moments from your favorite video games, simply create a new account on the site directly, or log in with one of your existing YouTube or Google accounts. Once you’re in, sit back, grab a controller (or some popcorn), and prepare to be entertained.

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