Even though the title ends with a question mark, I'm not asking question here.
But, before we start, let me give brief introduction on Twitch Plays Pokemon (from here on will be written as TPP).
Twitch is an online service to stream game related video live so people can watch it. In the middle of February 2014, a streamer from Australia started a stream unlike any ordinary stream. This stream played Pokemon Red via emulator on PC and have a unique twist. It's controlled by the viewer. The game is played by typing the buttons on the chat system (ie. 'up', 'a', 'start' etc.). This is basically a lot of people playing 1 Pokemon game in one gameboy at the same time. Imagine the chaos when thousands of people suddenly interested in this thing! Yup, the chaos was really chaotic. Red, the Player Character, were walking in circle, checking pokedex again and again, searching through his bag repeatedly, all because he was controlled by thousands of player. In addition to that, each input had a 20 seconds delay by design. It was so chaotic that Red looks like played by an incompetent toddler playing with his gameboy upside down to the point the streamer added a new mode called Democracy where the game will choose most inputted input instead of pick all the input (this called as Anarchy Mode). But, amazingly enough, the people, called Hive Minds, able to do it quite well, albeit the long time they needed to do a lot of stuff. The game swayed between Anarchy and Democracy according to the command inputted. Most people agree Anarchy is better but Democracy is needed on task that need high level of precision. Many gaming websites posted articles about TPP and gave it amazing coverage. Supported by amazing fan arts and fan created lores and memes, the viewers were a whooping 90k at one point! It had a stable viewers number until Red get into the Hall of Fame and roll the credits on March 1st, 2014.
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| This is what TPP looks like. This was taken earlier today when we beat Lance of the Elite Four in Pokemon Crystal. |
My theory is this. It's not 'WTF?! We have only 10k viewers!!' but in reality it was 'WTF?! We got 100k viewers!!'. Did you said 'huh?!' ? What I want to say is that the anomaly is not we have only 10k viewers, but it is really weird (and awesome) that we have 100k viewers.
Let me explain my thought to you.
Via a lot of websites and share by their friends, a lot of people heard about TPP. Seeing the number of lore and how massive the community was, those people wanted to be a part of the community. And by my observation, there's a massive amount of people that were in TPP just to be part of the community, because it makes them different, and in reality they're not really care about the game. They heard the community looks like fun and heard amazing stories about it. And thus, they jump into the TPP, hoping they get to feel the fun and the community.
When Crystal started, there was a huge hype about it. More people come after hearing TPP will start gen II. While I know about TPP quite early, I'm not really into it until I hear amazing and stressful events on the game. I too started jump into the wagon because I want to feel the experience and the fun that I missed on Gen I. I started watch TPP on the last run on Elite Four, aka Final Battle. I was fascinated by how tense it is to have strong pokemons but have no guarantee whatsoever that you will win. And so I start following TPP Crystal because I want to feel it, I want to be part of the game and the community too, I want to have fun with all of the community, stressed together, hyped together, and touched by multiple events on the game. But, not all of those latecomer are like me.
A lot of the latecomers (and even some of those who joined half-way through gen I) are in this to have fun by them self and proud to be part of this one of a kind community. And when they don't feels the fun anymore, they leave. The latecomers are even worse.
Those people didn't have the patience to just sit back, relax, and let the game unfold. They thought that TPP will have constant stories going on, that it will entertain them constantly, that they will not have boring moments. Of course, they are wrong. With TPP as random as it is, stories and entertainment come randomly and out of nowhere.
The worst point of this come when Lazorgator, our nickname for Feraligatr, is overleveled. People get bored that we buldoze our way using only him. They said it was too easy. Then they said we need to release him aka gone for good. Which didn't make any sense at all. I and a lot of other who care about the game, not just trying to have fun for themself, understand that overleveled Gator may become problem in which none of our other pokemons are battle worthy enough. Releasing Gator in this condition will force us into a lot of grinding which will bored a lot of people. The battle between two different arguments about releasing Gator stalls the progress for 5-6 hours. By then a lot of people already leaving.
When that already become past concern, game progress steadily, but viewers number keeps dropping. Some people blame this to the democracy abuse (there's a new system implemented on Crystal on how to choose between democracy and anarchy) and saying how tpp has dead. and then more are leaving. In my opinion though, saying it is dead and leaving is what makes tpp dead in the end. If they sticks around, tpp won't be dead.
By now, everytime we reach interesting point, the view count would rise, and then down again if we managed to get passed that.
In the end, I conclude that those 90k people that are leaving are those who don't have their heart on this TPP, those who just jump into the TPP wagon because of the Hype and not genuinely want to experience it. They want to feel the experience like those in Red, and they leave in disappointment when they didn't get what they want. Others leave because at first they follow after heard it was fun and then leave when apparently didn't fun for them. Some others just simply left when the hype died off. Of course there are also those who left because they just not like it anymore or genuinely bored.
TPP started as a niche entertainment which attract several thousands of players in the beginning. Hype spread and TPP became a popular entertainment. A lot of people came to join the popular entertainment just because it is popular. The hype wore-off, TPP started losing it's popularity, people started leaving. TPP returned to be a niche entertainment again, the one who are left are those who genuinely like this niche entertainment.
The 10k people we have right now are those dedicated to the game, not the hype. What we have right now is probably the core member of TPP Crystal. 10k is the number it should be. Those who are left are those who genuinely like TPP, genuinely try the best to make TPP as fun as they can and as success (in term of gameplay) as they can for everyone else.
And in the end, those who are left are those who having the most fun of all.
This is Benz reporting, see you on the next post!!
AAAAAANNNNNNNNNDDDDDD CUT!!!!!!
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