Why Gaming YouTubers Eventually Become Irrelevant | Asmongold Reacts 

Asmongold won't fall off because he can seamlessly change his channel into a $2 steak cooking channel if needed, and that can't get stale because it's full of preservatives.

With gaming youtubers, the successful ones have fans that watch for the person/personality. While the failing ones only have fans for the games that they are playing.

It’s all about personality. The reason so many channels rise and fall is because they follow/start a trend, people are there for that trend with the personality attached to it being alright, then once the trend has dies the personality isn’t strong enough to carry the content and the trend followers move on to the next trend. Meanwhile, creators like Markiplier, Jacksepticeye, RTGame, and Alpharad gained fans through their personality first and foremost.

Watching Internet Historian, Uberdanger, Barny , Sseth etc 's videos is like going to a movie. They have good quality, a script, nice edits put on to it and the fact that they only upload once in a while knowing how good their videos are just only makes you crave for more.

Something that happened with Minecraft which led to a decline was an aging of the audience. People who played in in 2010-2012 during the first peak of the game aged out of content skewed towards a younger audience, switched to new games, or completely stopped playing games entirely. Newer and more popular games pulled would be new audience members away from these channels. A combination of the two caused sharp declines and creators left the platform. Since a lot of Minecraft creators collab with each other, one dropping out would cause a domino effect in smaller communities within the game, so if it affected one, it affected all.

Seth isn't just really weird and entertaining, he's also making videos for people that are like him and enjoy the same games he likes. So he can make videos on different games, and most of his core audience will at least have heard of each of those games, AND most of these games are so old or niche that there aren't many other good videos to find about them, which is how his videos go viral. Basically, he found the perfect niche for his channel and personality. (that's also because his audience is probably older than most gaming youtubers' audiances, and have played more games)

Reallly impresses me how long Markiplier lasted as just being a gaming channel, he really makes everything he plays fun because he's the one playing it

Soviet Womble is an example of a gaming RU-vidr who goes months without uploading and still retains his entire audience, and that's because of his personality and incredible editing skills. In fact I would say he's gone the longest without an upload recently. I think he just went 6 months between uploads.

I had a conversation with a friend who was advertising their twitch on FF14 via their player card. They told me they wanted to make a career out of streaming so I asked what is their draw that makes them stand out as a streamer? They got upset and said that "they were themselves". Its not bad being yourself if you are doing it for fun or for a side hustle, but if you want to actually get a huge pull you need something that makes you stand out amongst your peers.

The market is just oversaturated, viewers can't keep up with all of those video games which create a disconnection. The only ones that work well for content are the ones generating a ton of hype before release (Elden Ring, Hogwarts Legacy, RDR2, GTA, Call Of Duty etc...) the exact same thing is happening to movies and music, per year only 10 of them will be huge, but 10000000+ will flop. Back then you didn't have as many options, there wasn't as many games/movies/songs released on a daily basis and consumers were in synergy with the market.

You HAVE to adapt if you want to stay relevant. Goes for business and RU-vidrs alike

I think play through channels will likely never go this far down cause there will always be people who watch games for either can’t afford to buy games all the time, enjoy the personality of the youtuber, etc

Anyone that has watched Asmongold content over the last couple of months can see that he's clearly making a move to diversify his content. And to me, he seems to be doing quite well on 'non-gaming' content. Why? Because he gives such a straightforward viewpoint on a variety of topics, regardless of what the topic is. It's refreshing.

Asmon, I genuinely watch and have been watching the same chalnnels you react to for a long time, but after knowing your channel, now everytime they upload something, I just wait for you to react simply because you add so much with your commentary and truly rationalistic insight to the topics of those videos. That's why you're one of the greatest, because of your amazing personality. Love forever, Asmon

I agree its mostly because it gets stale where someone gains an audience for playing COD as an example then when it gets stale the audience finds other games and betime the streamer realises he needs to switch up the game his audience has already moved on. Similar to the problem of people who are constantly switching when people want you at points in time to settle and really push time into a game but you're trying to stay ahead of the curve so people lose interest that way. The major contributing factor I think personally is just age, the majority of people who watching gaming youtubes are kids, teens and early 20s, times when you don't have money to buy your own games, so if you garner an audience of teens and kids, after 7-10 years that audience is now mid to late 20s and buys the games they want to play so they have no need to watch you anymore.

Before you watch the video (and I haven't watched it either) It's because 'Easy of Entry' Every who can stream can use the same PC for games. Gaming, Let's Play, etc.. is the easiest start for any person to become a live streamer. It's how I did it.

14:50 That aged well.

It's so interesting how someone can just vibe with what you like in content and you stick around. I def was from the Amber/Johnny trial crowd but loved Asmon's reactions to everything cuz he came off as so bewildered and confused sometimes over how ridiculous that whole thing was. I loved his commentary and that he watched the trial in full. Before i found him, I watched lawyers react to it but Asmon was just pure gold with commentary and humor. For me at least, it was just fun hearing him speak about the people present with game terminology and shit, it was funny. And now I stick around cuz his commentary on things is just nice to listen to. I don't always agree but that's another part of it I like. He gives me stuff to think about whether I agree or not. It's a nice way of seeing it from a perspective of someone who's way more unapologetic about his opinions. I'm the type of person who has always felt easily swayed but i don't know...Asmon kinda indirectly helps me feel more confident when I DO feel some type of way on a topic C :

I think coryxkenshin is a good example of a gaming channel still having relevancy throughout the years

Watched Etho for 10 years. Until he quits I will watch every video

I love Watching You because of the way you articulate your thoughts. I like how you challenge your audience and don’t worry about people not being okay with what you believe in

7:00 Not sure how much I agree with that because how would you build your self and differentiate your self from the rest if you don't work on your skills be it speech, editing or explore new ideas in general

Gaming youtubers have an even greater need to have a personality that attracts and keeps viewers entertained in order to be successful compared to other youtubers

i don’t play wow, watch your vids for your reacts and reasonable takes. +1 vote for reacts counting as diversifying content, that chatter who said otherwise was wrong 😂

I don't watch Asmon for the gaming, I come for the commentary.

I think part of it with how often someone uploads is if they upload often/consistently then they are expected to keep doing that and will loose their audience if they don’t. If you don’t upload often/consistently, the audience won’t have that expectation of them

I used to watch SypherPK play "For Honor" back when that game dropped.. he was relatively small back then.. it was just interesting to see Sypher dip to Fortnight early and become a relatively large streamer, and every other top For Honor streamer had their channels die when they moved to other fighting games.

A channel that gets 17k views on a new video is not irrelevant, it just isn't mainstream. Only focusing on the most popular youtube channels of all time creates a very skewed perspective. Gaming trends are very volatile, and gaming channels that reach the highest of highs usually get there riding on those, but that doesn't mean the core audiences for any game are volatile. A gaming channel can be very stable as a smaller niche channel.

Mr Sark is a good example of someone that couldve blown up because he was hilarious when he did machinima inbox but just never really did much after that...

I watch the yogscast, super early and one of the first famous gamer youtubers, their still going super strong 15 years later

Poor Goldglove, he fell victim following 2 things: changing from COD/Gears and DayZ, to games he wanted to play… and having a child. Sounds unreal, but I watched his streams go from ~4K per stream before his son was born, to ~1k at best (consistently) since. His stream is ridiculously accessible, always has been, but he has grown past the “bombastic” over the top persona to just having fun with games. He refused to keep being someone he wasn’t anymore,and that hurt him. I’d love to see him get back, but I have no idea what that would take.

2 ways to stay alive in gaming content creation 1) have an amazing personality and thats what people stay for or 2)have insane skills. Number 2 is not sustainable past a certain age so personality is really it. Also gaming content creators cannot take a break from content man, you will get replaced so quick with the next one. Every gaming creator has an audience that is majority dominated by children whether that be little kids or teens, regardless both age groups, their attentions spans suck and they always need instant gratification so they'll just watch someone else. A perfect example of this is Chimneyswift, my dude was making minecraft videos and sky rocketing in subs and views then took a hiatus and dropped of the face of this earth. Still has a ton of subs but a fraction of a fraction in views

Just from the microphone quality, you can immediately tell this SunnyV2 video is at least 2 years old.

Also any type of controversies and them exposing themselves of who they truly are. Markiplier and Jackscepticeye and even pewds typically are just genuine people and it shows or they are really really good at hiding it. Even after Pewds controversy it still didnt kill his channel. I think to make it on youtube stop treating it as a business and just have fun with it and be yourself unless you are like making an obvious persona like Dr. Disrespect but being a fake person it will come up and it will hurt. RU-vid is much easier to get big on then Twitch because its all videos and more variety. People tend to like more variety then just watch a single streamer on twitch play CoD for 8 hrs a day in those 8 hrs someone could be watching like 80 interesting youtube videos while cleaning their house or whatever.

Hulk Hogan was actually supposed to have the grill named after him but a little bit of drama happened and now they’re called George Foreman grills instead. I think he chose to endorse some meatball maker instead which flopped.

It is very much a case of personality and entertainment first. The absolute final proof of this is the Minecraft RU-vidr community. It has literally the very lowest barrier to entry of any king of content on the planet, and it's a game that, while being the #1 highest selling game on the planet, does still have waxing and waning cycles of popularity that have crushed several minecraft youtubers. Objectively speaking, it is the single hardest type of content to be successful with on RU-vid. But, there is one specific Minecraft group that actually has seen fairly consistent success within the community. It's called Hermitcraft. It's a Minecraft SMP in which all the members, who are called "hermits," in the SMP are genuinely friends in real life, and you are able to have fun just seeing them interact. It's not about what they're building so much as the stories they're telling, and getting to see how the hermits will interact with each other. They've made several actual storylines that are mostly ad-libbed with some of them maybe having an outline. But, most importantly of all, it gives them wiggle room to take a break. Even if one of the hermits want to take some time away from minecraft, enough of them will still be there to keep the SMP alive, and the ones who dip out for a while can come back to a warm seat. Overall, it's just a really successful group. And, most interesting of all, it's been around since almost the start of Minecraft.

4:03 Charlie n Muta are more friends than competitors

Quality takes and quality advice for every creator.

Doc isn't coming back this time around, I would say.

Told my son that drama and talking about the decline and collapse and problems of others will increase views x10 over merely playing a game. People like to see things collapse, like to see drama and it is easier to talk about and shit on others to get views than to teach guides or other how to play.

It all comes down to personality. It doesn’t matter if you have a good personality or bad personality, people will watch you. But if you have no personality, nobody will watch you.

Please never go irrelevant Asmon

ngl i learned 10x more from asmon`s commentary(tips) insight etc. on how to stream, meta etc... from most of the actualy "how to start streaming or streaming tips" videos. awesome stuff.

My own "biggest fallen RU-vidr" is Mr Fruit He was slowly rising with his personality alone. Always trying new games and small indie games especially. Dabbled periodically in Destiny Then "Among Us" popped off and so did his channel. 6.9 million views is the top; but he also chased trends He'd never done that before. His personality changed too, as he wasn't having fun, but was chasing the trend. His friends (sometimes in vids with him) also felt this and were experiencing the same thing with the same effects. Fruit went crazy-busy. He made 7 different channels total. SEVEN!!! This alienated a lot of his base and everything went downhill. from there. Currently he realizes he did it, that's why vids won't even hit 90k some days. He's rebuilding and finding the old him. Not chasing much anymore either

You are totally right. I watch mainly overwatch streamers and RU-vidrs and they suffered massively when overwatch 1 was on the decline. A lot of creators jumped ship to other games to keep their channel alive but most of the people that stayed around for overwatch 2 still have extremely low viewership.

Bro SunnyV2 is just the guy at the party who says mildly agreeable things, I've never understood why people treat him like a Messiah. Like he's not even a content creator he's literally a notch above commentary RU-vidrs, like a discount scarce IMO

The only reasons I watch some gaming youtubers are that they have good advices, or they're just fun to listen to, or to watch what they're doing, to also learn what I can do. But in the end, if it's about a game, I know that I'd prefer to just play it rather than watch it. And it was always the same with sports for me. Watching any type of play makes me want to play.

People get bored of "Hi, and welcome back to day 8409 of Bioshock 1 again." "Today we're talking about a slight damage change in the pistol that makes this game 100% unplayable. takes 4 shots instead of 3 to kill the thing now"

The redstone youtubers that still keep a good view count even on reduced interest on Minecraft: huh, that's neat... Mumbo As well as Viniccius13(from Brazil) Being great examples of this It's a pretty much ageless kind of content, if Mojang doesn't decide to destroy the farm or change quite a lot of stuff that is needed for it, the farm will still work pretty much forever

Dude. Those channels are over 10 years old. People grew up and so did the creators and people change. Also yt video lengths influence preferences. Remember the adpocalypse.

I gotta agree on the whole point of the video. Uniqueness and Personality is also one of the reason that makes a content creator more resistance to relevancy. For example, one of my topmost favorite youtuber is Sam'Onella Academy, his content is mostly related on useless but well documented knowledge mixed with the best animation and graphics(probably the best among the youtuber). The guy only uploaded only once after 2 years since the start of pandemic and his video still slapped, he will probably upload in 2025 but I will still eagerly wait for his uploads.

I grew up watching a lot of creators that aren't around anymore sadly. Specifically, Seananners and old AH come to mind. Especially old Roosterteeth, I found them back in 2006 I think. I remember my older brother showing me Red vs Blue on their website when it had the blue side borders, before I even found youtube with the old yellow subscribe button. Times change man.

Josh from 'Let's Game it out' is an example of a gamer who only uploads periodically and yet always gets views. His style of gaming is unique and funny as fuck

I haven't played WoW in over a decade, but Asmon is probably one of my most viewed channels.

The way I've always seen it: Personality, sense of humor, and video presentation reign supreme. Game Grumps, are they amazing at games, no. but people love Erin and Danny and want to see what kind of wacky adventures they get into and see how they react and respond to the situations they get in. Pyrocynical and Moist Critical may make a video talking about the exact same situation but I watch both videos because I love hearing how both of them present and talk about the situation, their presentation is unique from one another and makes the videos so different despite being the same thing.

I actually really enjoyed the last bit of the video with asmon talking about what works in RU-vid and streaming

"If people aren't playing your game" Me stubbornly still making RU-vid Roller Coaster videos for Planet Coaster.

the idea that a gamer channel on youtube usually needs to stick with one game and take that game with them to their graves would definitely get boring. can't really play different games, (if you're monetized) because your fandom isn't going to like the same things you do. and every time you play a different game, you may as well play russian roulette. particularly with a 6 shot barrel with 5 rounds in it.

Most content doesn't get popular not because it's bad but because there's too much content and it won't ever get seen. Marketing.

"When people have enough money they dont try as hard" Asmongold says as he reacts to a video he didn't make. When was the last time Asmongold made a gold or mount farming video?

theRadBrad is still going strong

Content gets stale Game youtubers refuse to move on and adapt and/or They find out they don't have an interesting personality they thought they did, and people were mainly there for the skill at the game.

Personality and content... I have been watching Vanoss and the guys for nearly 10 years now. Why? because i enjoy their personalities, their humor, their dynamic and their content. Content is King and when you understand how to obtain that content and pair it up with a personality that is able to hook people, you will never die off.

basically personality over skill

Skill definitely makes you an outlier. Dream, Technoblade, and Shroud I would say are huge testaments to this

The Lets-Play genre was great for 5 years. After the Saturation, it dies out. It stagnates, its boring. Shoot a guy, build something, try to look awesome. People want Emotions, not "I'm the best!" most of the time. They want the 80% failures, the 15% draws, and the 5% success. Once people follow that formula, your not in here to win. You in here to play. It's why certain channels thrive, and most fall.

I feel like one of the best examples of a straight up gamer RU-vid that stays relevant without changing to much is Jev.

That random mention of how everybody loves dr disrespect had me checking out the upload date lmao

Most gaming RU-vidrs just aren't that interesting. They might blow up by riding the wave of a big game, but once that interest dies out they are left with the people who actually like their personality, which is a much smaller pool. The natural size/interest around these channels is probably about 100k subs, with the 10k views per video that we see today. Those extra million subs are just people who were interested in a game around the release date.

Only gaming creators that I will always go back to are like Dashie, Cory, Markiplier, Jacksepticeye, Ceeday, Fearless (maybe one day...). They all are some of the best

12:50 good advice

33:00 I don't completely agree with you on the points you make in this time stamp. Yes we have a say on what type of environment we create. I can't directly comment on streaming, but from my experience if we take a general workplace scenario when someone reaches a comparatively higher level(streamers like you with a broad appeal) they should put some effort on making the path more forward and smooth, educating others on how to skip/avoid road bumps and help them grow bigger. (I'm not saying to hand hold forever but until they reach a certain sustainability).

There's 2 reasons that youtubers and twitch streamers take off is their either one of the best in the game, or they can edit it in a way that is super entertaining. Those who are good at x game die off as soon as x game falls off or shortly after.

Demo disc by funhaus had a finite amount of content, sh*tstorm of scariness by the switcher had a finite amount of content. Any channel featuring the works of HP Lovecraft or channels based on TV shows like GOT or The Walking Dead, basically have a self imposed expiry date. The longevities of the most enduring channels is 8 to 10 years with a few outliers, eventually you age out of you're audience, run out of content or live long enough to see yourself become the villain.

i mean i watch the barney videos every year again and again on my birthday, it never get boring, because its good content, its not gettin easier than that.

I appreciate that asmongolds deliberation on what he's going to put on his RU-vid channel and twitch channel is literally just. "I want to watch this" and 0 other give a fucks are given.

It’s simple supply and demand. There’s way too much supply and the best channels get the vast majority of the views. You have to be entertaining and bring something unique to stand out.

kinda funny how when sunny actually puts work into his videos they become semi good

The answer is really simple honestly. The gaming channels that usually stay popular are the ones that only play 1 or 2 games. Variety youtube gamers lose peoples interest if the game they are currently playing isnt fun for enough people to watch. Minecraft streamers get quadrillions of views because they ONLY play minecraft and its one of the biggest games in the world. But if you play dead by daylight on monday, league on tuesday, slime rancher on weds and crazy taxi on thursday, every new game is a coin flip that some of your viewers wont be interested anymore. Its very simple to understand but people WANT to play games that they like instead of dedicating their life and soul to 1 game for 10 years. So either find a niche game for yourself. Or prepare to sell your soul networking endlessly to try to keep your name relevant.

Danny glover is the guy in lethal weapon. Lol

Recent Example: Alex Webb. He uses much older games or content in general with a personalized way of editing that's wild and keeps your attention.

I myself never watch Asmongold streams. I don’t care about what he’s playing, I like the commentary and insight he provides on multiple topics.

Same reason why McD's doesn't just sell a hamburger. You have to diversify, have more baskets.

The first Asmon video I watched while being aware of Asmon as a content creator was his reaction to the Endwalker trailer. His neutral stance and reaction to the trailer was a gateway for me into his content in general. His takes on stuff from games to drama, personality and overall vibe as an individual makes him interesting to watch. Another example is Pewdiepie and Charlie aka Critical

Man I get burnt out recording and playing warthunder for a couple weeks straight during events I can’t imagine playing the same game every single day for 5-10 years

I'm only 7 mins in but in regards to not uploading if you don't get views, I will say that some people want to upload just for the "fun" of going through the process or to archive their own experiences for later or some other non money related reason.

its usually that they play only the same game and make the same kind of video every time, the good gaming youtubers do great

typing before watching, imo its cause a lot of them adopted a family friendly form of content but never changed the content as their majority community aged, like thats one of the many reasons i stopped watching rooster teeth, they were funny when i was like 9-14 but as i got older all their content felt so forced cause they couldn't be themselves in order to be family friendly.. but then there's also the gaming youtubers who got popular off 1 game and will only play that game for forever which will eventually bore the viewer ( but tbh, will say i had the opposite feeling with asmongold, stopped watching when he started branching out to different games lol )

this video got me thinking about Tobuscus and the Yogscast

Seeing Pamaj in the clips for cod really hurt man, he was the goat

"well they didn't fall off, they got off" -Asmongold 2023 (colorized)

maxor is one of those that peaks out of nowhere because he is completely different than anyone else.

I can speak on what you said around @26:02 Nothing but facts! I went from being monetized, Had more subs and nearly 1mill video views and loads of likes to nothing all because I grew tired of showing off the early days of SpinTires before it was that, When it was only Havoc engine. Then I did spintire videos on launch and stopped a while to try new games. I lost EVERYTHING. Deleted tons of videos, Kept just one original up to date now from 2010 or so, i forget. But, Yeah.. RUINED anything I had going and I'm just now trying to pick up my channel again and do things better and stick to a variety, At least sort of.

Aww he's so young he didn’t know G Foreman was a boxer.

diversifying is an issue ive been trying to solve, but my channel got to the meager 1k subscribers i have now almost exclusively from the age of empires community, and doing ANYTHING other than that gets zero views, and i have no idea how to fix this...

Casey is such an awesome person. He’s so passionate and driven, but also has a great personality and attitude, which make him so likable.

Everything falls off with time Death comes for us all at one point

Channels or RU-vidrs that focus on gaming "only" should realise one thing. Gaming-Content is not even in Top Ten of most watched categories, thats why youtube doesnt give a shit if u dont like their new policies ;) and with this new policies the views go down as well due to age-restricted and so on

ssohpkc was thinking ahead. cant become irrelevant if you leave youtube before it happens

Lowkey think it’s just fps games are dying each new fps game that comes out is just a carbon copy of the last game. No one cares about kill streaks because most fps players nowadays are skill af at the game. While fighting game clips is huge I’m there community’s because half of the stuff these high lvl players do, the average fighting game player can’t do.