In January 2020, YouTube poached streamer Rachell “Valkyrae” Hofstetter from Twitch and gave her an exclusive contract. In October 2020, she was crowned “the biggest gaming streamer in the world”. After a drought, Valkyrae’s star rose with “Among Us”. The streamer chit-chats and lies her way to the top of the streaming world.
This is how it went for Valkyrae on Twitch: The streamer had been on Twitch since 2016 and was part of the esports organization “100 Thieves”.
On Twitch, she eventually reached 945,218 followers, making her one of the largest female streamers on the platform. She primarily played Fortnite, LoL, and Teamfight Tactics.
In Fortnite, she won a match unfairly, which made her feel embarrassed.
On Instagram, the American was already successful in January 2020 with 1.7 million followers. By now, she has 2 million followers there.
This was the switch: YouTube went on a shopping spree at the turn of 2020 and secured 3 streamers exclusively to build its own streaming program “YouTube Gaming”. Valkyrae had already been active on YouTube prior, and with the exclusive contract, YouTube became her only platform.
This corresponds to YouTube’s tactic: They acquire streamers who already have a strong presence on YouTube and are considered “family-friendly and nice”, often with a Fortnite background. The perfect example is Jack “CouRage” Dunlop.
This is how they want to strengthen streaming with people who feel connected to the platform.
As a leaker reported before the deal became official, Valkyrae signed a contract for “several years”. YouTube allegedly paid a decent sum for this, but less than the millions of US dollars that Mixer supposedly paid for shroud and Ninja (via twitter), it was said back then.
After the switch came the crisis
This is how it went for Valkyrae on YouTube: The streamer experienced only a small upswing after her exclusive switch to YouTube. In the first months of her exclusive contract, she even generated fewer YouTube views than in 2019, as she transitioned to live streaming (via socialblade).
As a reason, she stated that the transition from Twitch to YouTube was “difficult”.
Apart from the platform switch, she also went through a tough phase personally. She had moved in real life with her partner: But in the new house, the neighbors disturbed her and kept her awake at night.
The stress in the new house led to a relationship crisis; her partner moved out, and they separated. All the beautiful plans lay in ruins. In March, shortly after the switch, Valkyrae seemed to be in a pretty bad mood (via dexerto).
Viewer numbers explode for Valkyrae thanks to Among Us
This is how it’s going for Valkyrae now: In September 2020, everything turned around completely. The streamer proudly shows her YouTube statistics for live streaming:
- From January to February, she had an average of 1,100 viewers, who watched her live for a total of 40,120 hours.
- From September to October, she averaged 31,059 viewers. Valkyrae was watched for 3.4 million hours.
Wyatt says he always believed in Valkyrae’s success. She has “clearly recognizable superstar potential”: As long as the output is there, others will notice it too.
Valkyrae’s success is certainly due to the hit potential of Among Us and her charisma and energy, but the fact that she is the biggest gaming streamer in the world is also because the biggest streamer on Twitch, Pokimane, now prefers chatting over gaming.
But when Pokimane streams games again, she is happy to do so with Among Us, together with her roommate Valkyrae. Pokimane also took a longer break:
Big Twitch streamer receives a lot of hate, now taking a break
She owes this mainly to the Steam hit “Among Us”, which has received outstanding reviews on YouTube and Twitch.
Among Us works like a classic party game: Some of the players are murderers and commit murders covertly while maintaining a spaceship. The “Impostor” must be unveiled. This leads to wild discussions, blatant lies, manipulation, and intrigue.
The Steam hit Among Us is said to have destroyed more friendships than UNO, they say.
It’s about discrediting the credibility of others and sowing doubt while being completely innocent oneself, with the accusations of others serving primarily to distract from one’s own guilt.
Many streamers play this together with other streamers and engage in wild verbal battles. Valkyrae manages to appear wonderfully innocent and confused in some clips. She always has an alibi; she just was “afk” or “deep into her sandwich” while she cold-bloodedly murders and stirs the other streamers against each other.
Valkyrae has also solved her housing problem by now. She has moved in with Twitch streamer Pokimane and some other female streamers (via twitter).
“Biggest Gaming Streamer in the World”
This is what YouTube says: The head of YouTube Gaming, Ryan Wyatt, is promoting her. According to him, Valkyrae is now the fastest-growing live streamer overall and the biggest gaming streamer in the world.
They seem to be really satisfied with how everything went. YouTube Gaming seems to have a knack for talent. Although they had to wait a while for success.
Wyatt says he always believed in Valkyrae’s success. She has “clearly recognizable superstar potential”: As long as the output is there, others will notice it too.
Valkyrae’s success is certainly due to the hit potential of Among Us and her charisma and energy, but the fact that she is the biggest gaming streamer in the world is also because the biggest streamer on Twitch, Pokimane, now prefers chatting over gaming.
But when Pokimane streams games again, she is happy to do so with Among Us, together with her roommate Valkyrae. Pokimane also took a longer break:
Big Twitch streamer receives a lot of hate, now taking a break
