Nick “Nickmercs” Kolcheff, one of the most popular Fortnite streamers and a member of FaZe Clan, has signed a multi-year exclusivity agreement with Twitch. Currently, Nickmercs has over three million subscribers and is often among the top viewed content creators on the platform.
The deal should come as no surprise following the acquisition of Tyler “Ninja” Blevins by Microsoft to their streaming platform, Mixer. Last month, Ninja left Twitch and signed on to stream exclusively on Mixer, taking his millions of viewers away from Twitch. Since then he has accumulated a large following there and has also streamed Microsoft’s recent title Gears 5. The implications of having high-profile streamers exclusive to certain platforms becomes important not only to attract viewers, but to push sponsored content, such as the release of new games.
Nickmercs made the following statement in celebration of the announcement and his time with the organization over the passed eight years:
“I’ve been streaming on Twitch since 2011, when it was called Justin.TV. It is very special for me to see the service expand and evolve into what it is now, while I’ve grown my community as well. I’m passionate about competing in traditional sports and gaming, so working directly with Twitch has been amazing. I’m thankful to have the opportunity to watch games with my followers and play alongside professional athletes at various events.”
Nickmercs is well known in the Fortnite community, not only for his popularity, but for being skilled with a game controller, using it exclusively over a mouse and keyboard. Many players consider the mouse and keyboard to be the superior method for playing games like Fortnite, but Nickmercs proves many wrong with his skills and consistent performance.
The move is not only a strategic one for Twitch, it is all but necessary in the evolving market of streaming platforms. This is especially true thanks to the recent problems that Twitch has had with moderation of the content produced by its streamers. Twitch has been in hot water lately over how it disciplines streamers with what appears to be a lack of consistency. Some players have streams filled with hate speech and receive no sanctions, while female streamers dress in casual sports wear and receive bans for showing skin.
If Twitch continues to sign streamers to exclusive content, will they be held to a lower standard than other streamers? It may sound ridiculous, but the manner through which disciplinary action is handled now indicate that this may be the case.
For now, the exclusivity deal with Nickmercs is the first major move by Twitch in response to Ninja leaving for Mixer, and we are bound to see future dealings for other streamers. While Mixer is relatively unknown compared to Twitch, the right group of streamers could certainly boost its viewership and market share, and Twitch would be wise to snatch up its best and brightest as soon as possible.
Source: Gamingstreet.com