Only 1 Person on Twitch is streaming Dark Void. Are we streaming and watching for the wrong reason?

Shout out to twitch.tv/blueyedwarrior3 but the games with Gold Title 'Dark Void,' was released for free on Xbox's Games with Gold on April 1st. I went on Twitch to see gameplay since I can't stand Youtube for stuff like that. Only 1 person on planet earth is streaming the game. Games with Gold is like a book club so tons of people will theoretically be playing it for the first time. Yet nobody is streaming it. When did streaming stop being about game appreciation?

It didn't, but the audience that watches popular streamers and popular games far outgrew the audience that cares about gaming history or variety.
A lot of streamers who are active daily are making it their job, or their second job, and to succeed at that you either need to have a great personality which lets you play whatever you want, or you need to play the most popular games (the former is harder than the latter), there are still plenty that do it for a hobby but the audience looking for that is really small.
It's not like there isn't an audience however, i watch Maximilian who plays fighting games but often plays retro games and new releases in other genres, Avoiding the Puddle does whatever the hell he wants, and i've become a huge fan of Hololive which has loads of variety, but vtuber appreciation is a discussion for another day :P.

Some real assumptions taken as fact in this post.

what i've learned about streaming is that there are basically two types, the ones who are "pros" and stream only competitive games, your league, dota, apex, etc. then the variety streamers, and by variety i mean the newest games. right now it's valheim, monster hunter, and outriders. sure there are streamers who play other games, but only popular games like minecraft or binding of isaac. non competitve, unpopular games are so niche it's offensive.

A streamer also has to be interested in it to want to stream it. Especially variety streamers who have a big enough audience they don't necessarily need to be playing the newest thing.

If you feel your needs aren’t being catered for, be proactive and create your own channel.

There could be thousands just like you.

You could become a pioneer and generate an audience that tunes in for the right reasons.

Luckily there are multiple Stubbs the Zombie streams. Maybe Dark Void just isn't all that interesting in 2021.

Games with Gold also isn't what was say 5 years ago, and especially since Game Pass came out.

There are dozens of us!!

DOZENS!!!!!!

@shrinerr: I think that are definitely way more then two types of streamers. Limiting to only those two definitions cuts out quite a bit.

Also, was this just a clever way to promote his stream? The line about streaming being about game appreciation is so out of left field it crossed my mind lol. If so, kudos!

Dark Void has a Metascore of 59, and that was 11 years ago, I doubt it has gotten any better with time. Is this some sort of a Giant Bomb meme that I'm missing, or why should anyone be excited about this thing being on Games with Gold (which has been garbage for a long time so I wouldn't be surprised if most people don't even bother checking it each month).

@shrinerr: I mean I can see how one could get that impression since those types are going to be playing more popular things and thus inherently have more visibility.

But like... nah Twitch is full of obscure games being played constantly. It just has to be on you to find it.

I just played through Dark Void for the first time. It's not great. Nor do I think it'd be an interesting game to stream. It's a lot of shooting at the same bullet sponge-y enemies, inconstant checkpoints, and imprecise aerial combat. There's some goofiness in there around the premise of secret lizard men trying to take over the world, but there's also, what felt to me like, a 20 minute, slow moving, turret escort mission that's probably longer than all combined story content in the game.

I played Dark Void when it was new and I can confidently state that you're doing more for the cause of game appreciation by not streaming it in 2021.

@brian_: The Dark Void defender has logged on, and it is ME!

Is Dark Void "great"? Definitely not. It was clearly rushed, both from how janky it is and from the out of left field way that it ends. It's sort of going along like a normal game and then bam it just ends with a boss fight from nowhere and leaves you scratching your head. There's obviously a big hunk of cut content in there.

Would it make an interesting game to stream in 2021? I don't think so. The plot is kind of amusing, but it's thin, and the gameplay is kind of sluggish and repetitive. It's not bad enough to be a so bad its good game for streaming and not dynamic enough to be a "holy moly" game.

BUT!

I think it was pretty ambitious and innovative, and if you played it during the 7th gen there was a lot to appreciate. The story was pretty good for the time. The vertical cover combat was interesting and a nice twist on something every other game was doing then. The free flight and ability to hijack UFOs added a very different twist and was really cool.

Did it come together in the end? It didn't. Things felt awkward, the level design wasn't that interesting, the enemies were kind of dumb, it had all the problems that games that don't have the time or budget to realize their ambitions have. But it wasn't the burning car wreck disaster it was made out to be by some people. I honestly think a Dark Void sequel that ironed out the kinks would have been really cool, but that 59 Metacritic killed it, and I think was unwarranted.

The game isn't great but it's better than its reputation.

Flipping this on its head, I think it’s interesting that just because a game is released/ shows up on a service that it’s assumed that someone HAS to stream it