Video game news oriented community. No NanoUFO is not a bot :)
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My goal is just to have a community where people can go and see what new game news is out for the day and comment on it.
Other communities:
You don't really know it until you stop watching videos for like a week. Suddenly you want to do your favorite things again; try things yourself again.
Expensive as the games are these days you gotta do copious amounts of research before plunking down those bennies
My wife likes YouTubers but isn't a gamer. If I'm doing stuff with them I'm more likely to pick a video about games than a game.
That's because I suck at the games I like and need that hit of dopamine imagining I'm actually good at something
I don't watch streams, but I do watch a lot of Let's Plays (i.e. Materwelonz, WoolieVersus). Sometimes to watch them play games that I normally wouldn't, sometimes to listen to their insights at certain hype points in games I previously played, and usually due to loneliness (i.e. parasocial relationships).
Regarding the last point, it also tends to be the reason I gravitate towards games with strong story, or MMOs. Feeling like I belong to a community keeps the loneliness at bay. Outside of games, I like to be in crowded areas, though not necessarily interacting with anyone.
Never watched a stream, never really understood the motivation. But i also don't consume social media (besides lemmy) or such and am generally anti-social, so that might be that. I would be infuriated if those people wouldn't do what I would do. Also the chat is... Annoying.
The wisdom of streams is simple.
I do shit with my life other than gaming. If I want to experience a cool game without spending the money and without investing the time to get good at the game, it's a no-brainer to watch a playthrough done by a professional gamer and a professional live commentator like the best streamers are.
That's partly because it's now more important to know what you're doing, than figuring out what you're doing, or just enjoying the fight. Unless you're willing to just tank insults while playing, and rebuild and retry with constant leavers, you have to study. Usually people try, but often they sit back and give in to "experiencing" games through video instead.
WoW for example has almost no tolerance for flawed teammates anywhere anymore, I've seen countless groups that would rather sit outside a dungeon for hours, than be inside it for 15 minutes too long.
And people no longer think "if you want good teammates, you have to build a team", they instead think that everyone who joins the random matchmaker has a responsibility to be good. It's rude to be bad at World of Warcraft.
The article didn't mention it but I'm curious what the breakdown is by age. I have to assume younger Gamers watch way more videos than older gamers.
Can confirm. This is me