Simps, Streamers, and Swag
TwitchCon Vegas 2023 marks the end of gaming’s event dominance.
A brief word from the author:
Stroll through the Las Vegas Convention Center last weekend, and you’ll be hard pressed to find a playable demo.
Since 2015, the live streaming platform Twitch has hosted TwitchCon for its creators, game partners, and communities to celebrate whatever and whoever they identify as.
But this year marked a major shift, with one question overheard repeatedly amidst its halls:
Where are the games?
A significant Escape from Tarkov arena marked the center of the con, but few other titles dotted the showfloor. Purple LEGO buildings, VTuber meet-n-greets, and medieval style standing desks. Well, yes of course. We’re gamers, and we love these things.
But the absence of true game exhibits makes you wonder why. Could it be…
Event budgets are suppressed during a global recession
Physical events continue to see lower attendee numbers and thus ROI post-COVID
Games are moving to “micro-communities” over larger central events (RIP E3)
Or has Twitch accomplished what it hoped to achieve years ago.
Moving beyond gaming.
We say undoubtedly yes, and not in the way we’d expected.
Instead of content categories like Creative, Music, or Cooking to be the one-up champion to herald in this new age, you have… Just Chatting.
Just Chatting. With over 3 BILLION hours watched in the last year according to Sully Gnome. More than the previous two categories League of Legends (1.27B Hours Watched) and VALORANT (1.01B Hours Watched) combined.
Just Chatting is creator-to-community in its purest form, where a creator is able to talk about or watch just about anything with their audience.
The bonds between a creator and their fans are incredibly strong. Marked by lines long and short in the main hall or Dunkin Donuts cafeteria, for fans to finally meet someone they’ve listened to and interacted with online for months or years… and the dawning of simp culture.
Wait, what’s a simp? Coming to fame via TikTok memes in the last few years, simps are overly submissive or even desperate for the attention or affection of someone without receiving anything in return. Which, sometimes light-heartedly and sometimes not, can be used as a source of pride when a fan ponders their dedication to favorite creators. There’s incredible strength in the relationships within certain creator communities today, and this will likely deepen in the years to come.
And although big game publisher booths were rare this year, indie game developers still turned out en masse.
At the Conduit Creator and Game Developer Meetup (amidst piles of boba and fries), we realized something now obvious in hindsight…
Developers are creators, and creators are developers.
And although we’ve incorporated creators as part of our business at Conduit, we didn’t realize that these are often one in the same person. Fully committed to the games industry, and driving its future from the ground up.
We started our company, Conduit, to help game developers succeed in today’s market. Our first product turns gameplay footage into finished social posts that any developer can use for their TikTok’s initial audience.
As of today, we’re taking early access sign ups for our Indie Network, to help developers and creators collaborate and help drive games and communities forward.
Alongside our creators and friends, we hope to accomplish this goal every day, one game and one connection at a time.See you in the chat -
Kai Boyd
Co-Founder and CEO, Conduit.gg
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