When Jack Morrison logs on to stream, he doesn’t boot up Twitch, Streamlabs OBS, or speak into a fancy microphone. Instead, he grabs a basic circular mirror and sets it in front of his desktop monitor, facing the screen. Then he sits in front of his monitor, as usual, and plays the game, propping up his cell phone to face him and setting his camera live. When he boots up Apex Legends, viewers see the gameplay reflected in the mirror as they watch him play.
This makeshift setup might have been surprising just a year ago, in an industry that seems to be more and more concerned with having the latest streaming technology. But it’s become a rather common practice on TikTok, where video game streaming has picked up in the past few months. In September, the company said that one billion people in total use the app each month, and jokes and sounds riffing on video games have long proliferated widely across TikTok. Now, Morrison (JackMorrisonTV on TikTok) and other streamers with similarly crude setups have taken over the app’s “LIVE” section, capturing as many as 2,400 viewers at a time.
TikTok isn’t really known as a live media streaming platform. It’s a short-form video app, where people post all sorts of footage — from participating in viral memes to developing independent platforms for original content. But TikTok’s suite of features for live streaming has quietly been growing, with additions like event scheduling and comment filtering options. While these “LIVE” features were designed for influencers to talk to their followers and host question-and-answer sessions, crafty streamers have taken to the platform and the giant audience it has to offer.
These streamers are using low-key setups, in comparison to the complex (and expensive) setups that dominate Twitch, where a DSLR camera and the capture card to use it can cost over $800. The exact build of each TikToker’s setup varies, but nearly all of them capture video via an external camera that’s focused on a screen, or in Morrison’s case, a reflection of a screen. A brief scroll through the gaming section of TikTok’s live content shows these streamers’ ingenuity; some will stream videos of tablets or phones as they play mobile games, while others will just put the camera in front of a screen. The games also vary widely, with people playing games like Snake, Minecraft, and Wordscapes in addition to shooters like Valorant.
Spenser, who runs a TikTok account by the handle Brick_ser, is primarily dedicated to building Legos and built his setup using a phone stand his mom ordered on Amazon. He streams a variety of games, but more recently, he’s been streaming minigames from Super Mario 64 DS on the Wii U virtual console. When he plays, he puts his phone on a stand and wraps his arms around his phone while playing the Wii U controller in front of the camera. Prior to going on TikTok, he had tried going on YouTube, but he didn’t understand it so he quit. He also occasionally streams on Twitch.
“I do Twitch every now and then, but mainly just to talk, because Twitch takes a lot longer for me to set up,” he said. Now, when he goes live, he streams to as many as 380 viewers at a time.
TikTok streams capture large but brief …….
Source: https://www.polygon.com/22761680/tiktok-streamers-twitch-livestreaming