YouTube Gaming launches today, with website and mobile apps
Twitch got you down? Looking to explore a bit with another partner? Then how about some YouTube Gaming in your diet? Does this new platform appeal to any of you who do some streaming? Why or why not?
Google will launch YouTube Gaming, the streaming video site’s gaming-focused service, Aug. 26 on the web and in dedicated Android and iOS apps, Google announced today.
YouTube Gaming, which YouTube and parent company Google announced in June, is meant to be a one-stop shop for people looking for gaming video content. The service automatically collects all gaming-related videos as well as livestreams on individual pages for more than 25,000 different games. It will also provide users with personalized recommendations based on the pages and channels they follow.
In addition, Google wants to make it easier for people to livestream games on YouTube. A new page at youtube.com/stream, which is currently in beta, provides a streamlined process to start streaming at a personal URL.
“Together, we all make gaming better,” said Frank Petterson, engineering manager for YouTube Gaming, in a prepared statement. “Our peers make us better gamers, and games are made better by the communities that surround them.”YouTube Gaming is Google’s effort to focus more on gamers and gaming video, with the company’s main competitor, Amazon-owned Twitch, being the leader in livestreaming gaming content. Amazon announced exactly one year ago that it was buying Twitch, following initial reports saying that Google was interested in acquiring Twitch; it was later reported that Google backed down over the potential antitrust concerns that the deal would have raised.