30 Things of Stuff I Like: #1 - No More Heroes

I'm attempting something new here for the month of September to break up the gaps in both my sanity and lack of content on here as of late as I brainstorm my direction on where to go next with this blog's future. So, I figured the best way would be to devote the entire month to writing about and working on stuff I enjoy. Simple enough right? Some of these posts will be long, others will be quick bite-sized snacks.

Note: I originally published this on Friday, thinking that was the first of the month, then took it took that afternoon after realizing my mistake and completely forgot to republish this on Saturday. 

I don't know how many times I can slice it, no pun intended, but No More Heroes is always going to have a special place in my heart as a gamer as one of my all-time favorite franchises/series. All of the bases are covered for me - a protagonist that you can easily get behind in Travis Touchdown, a simple yet engaging plot to keep things moving, and over-the-top gameplay that's easy to pick up and get into.

HD upgrade from No More Heroes: Paradise on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. 

No More Heroes is an action-adventure hack and slash video game for the Wii. It was developed by Grasshopper Manufacture and published by Marvelous Entertainment, Ubisoft, and Rising Star Games. The game was directed, designed, and written by Goichi Suda, also known by his nickname Suda51, with the game's title coming from the album title No More Heroes, which was released by the British punk band The Stranglers. The game follows Travis Touchdown, a fan of video games and anime that wins a beam katana in an auction, from which he inadvertently becomes involved in the United Assassins Association and forced to kill assassins higher in rank to prevent other assassins from targeting him.

A port of the game, titled No More Heroes: Heroes' Paradise, was released for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 with additional content in Japan. Unlike the original, the international version of the game was published by Konami, and only the PlayStation 3 version of the game was localized in English. A sequel, No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle, was released in 2010. A second sequel, Travis Strikes Again: No More Heroes, was announced as a Nintendo Switch title for release in 2018.

To date, No More Heroes was hands-down one of my favorite streams to do for you guys. A bit mature on the content at times, but it's a fun run for me too. One of the few games where I can get animated and don't feel like sob when I'm sitting in my room gaming.

Watch No More Heroes (Wii) from xionzeros on www.twitch.tv

The original No More Heroes on the Wii is easily the best of the series to date with an unforgettable cast of characters, excellent boss fights, and one of the few games that made the Wii's motion controls feel natural instead of being slapped on as an afterthought. You ever wanted to wield a lightsaber? Well, you get that here and then some with the motion controls and you don't even have to be a Star Wars fan to enjoy that aspect of the gameplay.

Why do I like the No More Heroes series so much though? It's a story of nerd/otaku (of every sense of those words) who does a lot of stupid stuff because he's trying to impress someone special in his life. We've all been there at one point of another whether it be for someone's affection or just trying to fit in/be accepted. I see a lot of myself in Travis Touchdown - save for the whole "assassin for hire" bit, but you get what I mean. He loves anime, comics, and even professional wrestling for crying out loud. I'd be pegged to believe that he's my Earth-57 counterpart in some parallel reality (laughs).

No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle continues the story that the first game end on (kinda but not really), but I felt that game fell short with a lot of the new characters introduced were easily forgettable and while the returning characters, especially the villains, felt more like afterthoughts and filler in certain sections of the game. This is the only title where both Shinobu Jacobs and Henry are playable characters for a portion of the game, so there's at least that much to enjoy. Gameplay changes allows Travis to wield different types of beam katanas, including a longsword variation and twin blade version. Ultimately, most players are going to stick with Travis' tried and true beam katana anyway. Whereas the first game is a story just for Travis to become the #1 ranked assassin in the UAA, the second game is more a story about revenge as Travis is working to regain his #1 status and get payback on the guy who killed his friend at the video game store.

I can't trash No More Heroes 2 too much when the game starts off with a fight where you kill a Cloud Strife parody. I might get around to streaming that game in it's entirety down the road someday, but it's not high on my priorities list as I can't say I enjoyed playing that one as much as I did playing the original.

Last but not least, we have the upcoming No More Heroes: Travis Strikes Again for the Nintendo Switch. This is being marketed as a co-op title with tons of mini-games, like the training and/or odd jobs in the previous titles. I honestly haven't seen much gameplay myself, but I hope this does well to warrant a full blown sequel. Suda51 (the series creator) already stated that this is NOT No More Heroes 3 and he reportedly wants to work on that after this title releases.

OPINION -- The Emulation Situation

A few months ago, Nintendo stated that they were going to start aggressively shutting down and punishing ROM sites and other various outlets of "unauthorized" copies of their games floating around the internet. The biggest hit came from the news this week of EmuParadise, one of the biggest and most popular ROM and emulations sites opting to shut their libraries down. This has created a sense of mass paranoia among retro gamers and gamers in general.

I wanted to offer my opinion on this matter as it's something that's going to affect ALL gamers at some point.

I'll start off with a question. What are you going to do when your favorite game is no longer available? Are you going to search countless hours on the Internet, hoping you can snag a deal on a physical copy for your console platform of choice? Or will you simply just pull up the nearest emulation website and just download the desired title at your leisure? Most people are going to go with the later in terms of simplicity and the fact that they don't have to break the bank for one of those rare most-sought-out-after titles.

I would be lying if I said that I have never emulated any video games or downloaded/made any copies of the ones that I own for my own personal enjoyment. At the same time, I'm not going to tell everyone to just scramble out while they can and just buy a Raspberry Pi to preserve the history of the video game industry by downloading every ROM file - old and new - that they can possibly get their hands on.

There's a ton of titles that have eluded me over the years, especially now in retrospect. I regret not buying .hack// Quarantine (Part 4) for PlayStation 2 when it was still at normal retail price instead of the outstanding price it goes for currently online. I can even remember seeing the PlayStation 2 copy of Marvel vs. Capcom 2 being sold at the local Gamestop Used for $300+, sitting on the shelf plain as day. There's a lot of titles that you're going to have to pay top dollar for physical copies on the second hand market, especially for titles that Sony, Sega, nor Nintendo bothered to provide digital remasters or just simply re-releases of.

A friend of mine gave me his copy of MvC2 on PS2 and I still have it to this day. That pricing is ridiculous, especially when there better ports than the PS2 version out there.

Boy, I wish I bought that back when it was $60 on PS2 originally...

Legit pricing going on Ebay right now for these games...

Here's the thing. All the time I hear gamers left and right throw out that preservation excuse to their emulation needs. Let's be real here. Most people care just as much as preserving the rocks and dirt in their backyard than they do about preserving video games. I run across so many poorly kept gaming consoles in my travels that it just flat out disgusts me. The average person isn't going to play every single console release in their lifetime so this idea of preservation eludes me, when in reality, it's just a facade to show off how big their gaming libraries are and add another feather to their caps to their make-believe digital penis that strokes their egos. At the end of the day, it's just more mental masturbation to help them sleep comfortably in their beds at night.

It's the same mindset as those PC gamers who are always talking about "the Master Race" like this is some kind of competition for superiority when gaming is supposed to ALWAYS be about the great experiences first and foremost that they provide and the platform/consoles themselves be secondary.

No, I don't care about how your keyboard projects a hologram into the air and makes more screens to work on that would make Tony Stark blush. I just want to play the damn game.

Emulation isn't even an accurate form of preservation of this medium. Unless you have the original console(s) and setup like how the developers and creator(s) intended then your argument is moot. On top of that, the majority of the ROMs available on the internet aren't "pure" copies of the original game(s) and have been modified with in some way. It's the same as preservation older films and visual media in film theory. If you're not experiencing the medium in it's classic, original - unaltered - format as how the creator of said media intended it, then it's not historically accurate.

Of course, you're going to have that argument from those people who are anal and sticklers for details who will point out that playing these older games in their original formats is next to impossible in a lot of cases, such as a lot of current generation televisions are HDTV and 4K resolutions only. In that regard, I humbly agree that emulation provides a lot of accessibility for both gamers and preservationists. Some of these platforms are unable to be experienced in their original format today. That's a problem that will continue to increase as time wears on.

Guess who's NOT buying that for a dollar? This guy right here...

I'm not going to sugarcoat this when I say that Nintendo are scam artists. At the same time, they are smart when it comes to supply and demand. They always seem to create a shortage of supply when it's something their fan base, especially the nostalgia hungry ones, want to make it a top dollar item on the secondary market, thanks to it's "limited" release (those "rare" Amiibos say hello, especially when those were ranging as low as $1 to $5 when Toys R Us was going out of business a few months ago. Boy, I know the folks who paid the extra dough to import those things for triple or quadruple of their retail value online feel stupid now), only to go reverse the decision a few months to a year later with the same product back in circulation. It's annoying as fuck to their consumers but you can't deny that it works - hook, line, and sinker - EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.

That being said, Nintendo are the biggest culprits when it comes to being stingy about the availability of their consoles' back library. I'm not sure if the Switch has a Virtual Console like the Wii and Wii U before it and even if it did, Nintendo would probably be just as picky and selective on titles for that as they've been in years past. I can't fathom how pissed off their fan base were to find out that they were sitting on a complete working version of Star Fox 2 for the SNES for roughly three decades now, only to pull that magic trick out of their hats when the SNES Classic needed another shot of the cannon to sell more units. That goes without saying that the SNES Classic, much like the NES Classic before it, was going to be a sought after item regardless out of pure nostalgia. It holds a mere faction of the titles that a Raspberry Pi can hold (after hacking the console it can be made to hold and run more titles), but the joy of having the nostalgia of this product simply can't be matched. The feeling of holding a genuine NES/SNES controller in your hands while you fire up the SNES/NES for an afternoon of gaming delight is a welcome memory to a lot of gamers, especially those that have grown up and have children of their own that they would pass that experience down to.

Nintendo cracking down on piracy of their products and infringements of copyright on their media from streamers isn't the first case of this and it definitely won't be the last. You can't even stream nor upload video content from any Nintendo products on YouTube without it getting flagged. Evolution Championship Series, the biggest fighting game annual tournament series, almost got their ENTIRE Smash Bros. tournament shut down a few years ago from even being shown on the tournament live feed until Nintendo execs got involved and reversed the decision from the sheer backlash it was causing in the news. They've mellowed out on that front for the sake of the Smash community, but it hasn't stopped Nintendo sweeping in and laying down the law wherever they see fit. Another instance of this was the fan-made remake to Metroid II: Return of Samus, AM2R (Another Metroid II Remake), was issued a DMCA notice to the sites that were hosting that game (which was free-to-play and completely non-profit from my understanding) and immediately got it taken down a day later. Then don't get me started on how many Let's Play "YouTubers" who stream and upload exclusively Nintendo-based content got their content flagged and their channels suspended. Nintendo's been on this witch hunt for a long time and aren't showing any signs of slowing down.

What's ironic that in the wake of Nintendo cracking down on piracy, they have actually profited off of emulation in the past. Some media outlets have reported that the Wii Virtual Console version of the original Super Mario Bros. (NES) is reportedly an emulator download that Nintendo took liberty to resell for their own profit. I wouldn't be surprised if this wasn't the first time, nor will it be the last time when it comes to stuff like that from not only Nintendo but the gaming industry as a whole.

In the wake of those events, I saw what EmuParadise did as a preventative measure. They wanted to dodge the bullet before it even came out of the chamber. It's similar to what happened to both the original iterations of KickAssTorrents and Pirate Bay a few years ago. They got shut down by the feds cracking down on Internet piracy, only to pop up again stronger than ever. I mean, c'mon let's face facts here. People are ALWAYS going to find a way to get something for free over the Internet. EmuParadise may have stopped providing to the masses, but that's not going to stop anyone else from finding a healthy supply of ROMs floating around on the Internet. If you're that hard-up for emulation, I suggest keeping your eyes out for a few big torrent files that people are going to start dumping online to accommodate for EmuParadise going down to keep the emulation game going strong.

Am I saying that what Nintendo is doing okay? No, but I see the method of their madness so to speak. They want to keep control of preserving their own history instead of leaving it to independent individuals making a profit off their licensed content. Trusting that preservation entirely to Nintendo is a fool's errand though as many developers in Japan and not just former Nintendo employees and/or collaborators have spoken out in interviews over the years stating that it's difficult to preserve their own work when the physical copies just keep disappearing, never to be seen again. That's even harder for mother boards from old arcade machines or the CD-Roms from first generation disk-based games when that physical medium erodes after a few years.

There's a few true preservationists out there, such as Byuu, who created the SNES emulator higan, who was preserving every SNES physical release until he was slowed down by UPS mysteriously lost his package. He's got the package back since the first few reports came out, but Byuu is renown name within the retro gaming community for his efforts to preserve gaming's history and continues to contribute to the emulation end of the spectrum.

Speedrunners, such as TheMexicanRunner, have adopted the standing of being a "purist" to the medium as well. TheMexicanRunner is known for chronicling his journey to complete (or at least play until it's considered "complete" by gamers' standards for some of those titles that recycle/reuse data infinitely) EVERY original NES release by cartridges donated to him and those that he bought under his own accord. Undertaking this chore has inspired him to legitimately own all of those titles and he's almost done with that to my knowledge. That's what I regard being a "purist" to preserving the history of this medium, not downloading a stockpile of ROMs to run on emulators on your suped up PC, only to play them with an USB-powered PlayStation 2 controller or Sega Saturn/Genesis 6-button controller that isn't even native to that console generation then get the fuck outta here with that noise. That's not being a purist, that's your own personal preference to the experience - HUGE difference there.

Preservation of this medium is going to be the key for the years to come. Many are going to see Nintendo's witch hunt as an attack on gamers, but at the same time, some of the gamers up in arms are the ones to blame for the lack of care and delicacy that these consoles and games deserve to continue working for years on end. My parents bought me a NES back in roughly 1987 and it still works perfectly fine without a hitch to this day in 2018. How many of you can say that your original NES is still working and doesn't have discoloring and/or any damage at all? We as gamers are just as responsible for preserving the history of this medium as the companies that manufactured them. The blame here is a two way street and a lot of people seem to be having tunnel vision on that matter. Nintendo aren't innocent in this conversation as well, when there has been time tested proof that Nintendo has gone as far as selling ROMs to their consumers that was plucked off the Internet instead of the original medium, leaving them as guilty as gamers for this emulation crime.

A sensible solution would be some archive hosting somewhere that allows gamers and the companies tied to them to trade, exchange, catalog these snippets of gaming history for the generations of gamers to come. Even I don't want to admit this, but the physical media isn't going to last forever. Somehow, someway, the gaming industry as a whole - along with the support of the gamers that love these beloved games - past, present, and future - need to work together to ensure that these games don't disappear forever.

NXT TakeOver: Brooklyn IV (Aug. 18, 2018) -- Results & Afterthoughts

NXT TakeOver: Brooklyn 4 was a professional wrestling show and WWE Network event that took place on August 18, 2018, at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. The event was produced by WWE for the NXT brand that was streamed live on the WWE Network.

Five matches were contested at the event. In the main event, Tommaso Ciampa defeated Johnny Gargano in a Last Man Standing match to retain the NXT Championship. In the penultimate match, Kairi Sane defeated Shayna Baszler to win the NXT Women's Championship and Ricochet defeated Adam Cole to win the NXT North American Championship.

The Undisputed Era (Kyle O'Reilly & Roderick Strong) def. Mustache Mountain (Tyler Bate & Trent Seven) to retain the NXT Tag Team Championships

This was arguably the best match of the show. Even though I expressed my distaste with the finish to their match on the NXT tapings a few weeks ago, I can't take away anything against these two teams' natural chemistry to perform well with each other and bring out their best in each outing. I don't think we've had tag team matches this good on NXT since American Alpha and The Revival were still down there.

I really hope that Triple H and the rest of the higher ups in WWE realize the diamond in the rough that they have in Tyler Bate. The kid is still young and performs like the best of the best, while he looks like something out of Greek mythology. I can't wait to see him throw down against someone like Cesaro in the future. That kid is just going to be money, no matter what he does in the business in terms of match quality. I hate to say it but Trent Seven is just there to ride off his coat tails. I can't see Mustache Mountain getting the tag team titles back until the NXT UK show debuts and they went those set of tag titles anyway. I saw this match as just a means to keep those guys on the radar before that show debuts whenever. I don't know what the hold up is when they've already filmed a few episodes for that brand about a month or two ago.

I wasn't too crazy about the War Raids laying out the Undisputed Era after the win when they are supposed to be the babyfaces. It just came off odd that they had to do something "cheap" here when Undisputed Era was already spent from wrestling Mustache Mountain. Great, they wanted to show that they are up next to get a shot for the tag titles, but there was a better way to do that instead of trying to blow their load for the Brooklyn crowd. I mean seriously, you can't get more Ring of Honor comparisons here from Undisputed Era feuding with War Raiders when this is going to be reDRagon versus War Machine all over again from about 2-3 years ago in that company.

The Velveteen Dream def. EC3

The first half of this match was a snoozefest until both men found their legs, somewhere around that first big neck bump EC3 took in this match. I can't say I was crazy about this match as much as Dream's other matches or what EC3 has been capable of prior to debuting in NXT. I busted out laughing at the "CALL ME UP VINCE" sign printed on Dream's gear as there's guys on the main roster who should be wearing "CALL ME DOWN TO NXT" on their gear. Someone needs to tell Dream that a main roster call-up isn't something he should be begging for, especially after Vince's track record with these call-ups as of late.

Ricochet def. Adam Cole (c) to win the NXT North American Championship

My best friend and I were talking about this during RAW last night and we both agreed that we could have sworn that we've seen Fenix do the same Super Kick out of the air during the Moonsault spot that everyone freaked out/marked out on during this match back in Lucha Underground. While it was VERY impressive, it irked the hell out of me that Ricochet didn't sell that a bit longer. They definitely had me fooled with the near-fall when that wasn't the finish of the match. If Ricochet could learn anything from his time in NXT at the Performance Center, he needs to learn selling and how to slow down. That's the only thing in my eyes that holds him back from being truly flawless in WWE's system and one thing that both Seth Rollins and AJ Styles - arguably WWE's two best workers in the company up on the main roster - have over him in terms of the overall in-ring package.

Kairi Sane def. Shayna Baszler (c) to win the NXT Women's Championship

Very creative finish here that allowed Kairi Sane to capture the gold. It simultaneously made it look like Kairi outwit Shayna instead of flat out beating her, while making both women look strong. I think this was arguably the best NXT women's match in quite some time from bell to bell, especially from the reversals and submission/grapple chains. I wouldn't be surprised to see them call up Shayna to the main roster before Evolution or build to another match between her and Kairi Sane at that event.

Tommaso Ciampa (c) def. Johnny Gargano in a Last Man Standing Match to retain the NXT Championship

I'll give them props on the creativity of the finish story-wise but at the same time, I thought it was stupid that Gargano beat himself in this match instead of the other way around. They left the door open for more Gargano/Ciampa matches, whereas I felt that they are beating a dead horse at this point. Move onto something else before people turn onto this feud much like the Randy Orton/John Cena feuds from days of old. As far as I'm concerned, Johnny Gargano has had MULTIPLE opportunities at the NXT Championship. While those matches have been good (or rather VERY good depending on who you ask), they have all be losing efforts for the guy. I would like to think that NXT has better booking logic than the main roster when Roman Reigns did the same thing, challenging for title despite multiple losses until he finally got lucky and sneaked out a win.

PREVIEW -- Kill la Kill the Game: IF Anime Expo 2018 Trailer

If this is as good as their track record with Guilty Gear, BlazBlue, and more recently, Dragon Ball FighterZ then Arc Systems have another hit on their hands. My primary concern as it stands is that it's going to be an arena fighter like the Naruto series of fighting games by Namco Bandai or even the upcoming Jump Force. From first glance this looks like it's going to be good though.

I managed to find some early details from Siliconera, even though more information should be available after this weekend as the game is set to be playable at Evolution Championship Series 2018.

image: http://www.siliconera.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/KLKIF2_thumb.png
Arc System Works America shared the latest on Kill la Kill the Game: IF with the official info on its gameplay systems that we previously reported, including more on its trash-talking “Ketsui Testament” system. 

Game Mechanics 

image: http://www.siliconera.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/KLKIF1_thumb.png 

Kill la Kill: IF is a 3D battle action game where players run around the field and fight against their opponent using various movements and attacks. Utilize a mix of long ranged and short ranged attacks to keep your foe off balance. Victory is achieved once you’ve depleted your opponent’s health bar to zero. 

No More Complicated Commands! Simple Inputs Allow for a Variety of Attacks! 

image: http://www.siliconera.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/KLKIF3_thumb.jpg 

While there is only one button assigned for close ranged attacks, combining the button with a directional input (up, down, left, or right), or pressing it during jumps or dashes will allow you to perform a wide variety of attacks that vary in range and direction. 

A Game of Reads that Fighting Games Fans Would Love! 

image: http://www.siliconera.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/KLKIF4_thumb.jpg 

In addition to the basic rock paper scissor elements that fighting games employ (in Kill la Kill: IF’s case – consisting of Attack, Guard, and Break Attack), the game also incorporates two additional elements: Evasion and Evasion Catch Attack. Players can expect to experience a simple yet engaging gameplay loop that encourages deep and intricate interactions in the midst of combat.

The Mechanic That Will Bring Back The Spirit of the Animated Series!! Introducing the “Ketsui Testament.” 

The “Ketsui Testament” recreates iconic scenes from the original animated series, where characters engage in a heated exchange of words during battle. By pressing L1+R1 during battle and hitting the opponent with the “Ketsui Burst”, you enter into the “Ketsui Testament”. Once activated, each player will choose one from the three rock paper scissors choice of phrases to use as their testament. If the activator results in a win or a draw in this engagement, the winnner’s “Ketsui Level”increases. When the “Ketsui Level” increases, that character receives massive power-ups such as enhanced normal attacks and special moves. At max level, you gain access to the instant kill skill, “Fiber Lost: Secret Arts” (Sen’i Soshitsu Ougi). Ketsui Levels do not decrease during battle.
Kill la Kill: The Game IF releases in 2019 for PlayStation 4 and PC. You can check out its latest trailer and screenshots in our previous report. 

Read more stories about Kill la Kill the Game & PC & PlayStation 4 on Siliconera.

Read more at http://www.siliconera.com/2018/08/01/kill-la-kill-if-details-game-mechanics-and-trash-talking-ketsui-testament-system/

PREVIEW -- SHAZAM! - Official Teaser Trailer [HD]

I gasped like everyone else when this trailer dropped from San Diego Comic Con a few weeks ago. A light-hearted DC Movie? The hell you say! This can totally work, even though it comes off REALLY corny and cheesy at times, but when I think about Shazam, I can't help but associate those words to describe his brand of heroics. He only got "serious" when he had the other members of the Justice League to learn from and act as his mentors to look from as an example. We saw that both in Justice League: WAR and Justice League Unlimited.

In all seriousness, this is the type of light-hearted movie that DC's cinematic universe (whatever the fuck they are calling it...) needs in the wake of Justice League, Suicide Squad, and Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice all flopping in the eyes of many people.

PREVIEW -- Aquaman - Official Trailer 1

I'm pleasantly surprised on how good this looks so far. Hell, I would have been the LAST person to be caught dead interested in anything relating to Aquaman about two decades ago. The character lost that Superfriends association as being DC's resident loser and actually transformed into a bad ass in recent years. This trailer easily represents a lot of that bad-assery.

The thing that impresses me the most from first glance is how well the costumes look in this trailer. From Mera (who is sporting some distractingly bright red hair in this film in comparison to the dull shade it was in Justice League last year) to Ocean Master (Orm Curry) and even fucking Black Manta looks damn awesome in this. I'll admit that the creatures of the deep blue sea are looking as fake as those rhinos and other various animals that joined in the fight during the final of Black Panther, but I'm willing to give that a pass if the rest of the film turns out good.

PREVIEW -- VENOM - Official Trailer 2 (HD)

Still not crazy about how Venom looks in this. I guess it could be worse, but can't say I'm a fan of what I'm seeing here to say that the film releases in less than three months. Don't get me wrong, this is looking like a much more true to fashion nod to the character than whatever that was we got in Spider-Man 3.

Twitch's Not-So Hidden Gems: Volume One

Twitch is a live streaming video platform owned by Twitch Interactive, a subsidiary of Amazon. Introduced in June 2011 as a spin-off of the general-interest streaming platform, Justin.tv, the site primarily focuses on video game live streaming, including broadcasts of eSports competitions, in addition to creative content, "in real life" streams, and more recently, music broadcasts. Content on the site can either be viewed live or via video on demand.

The popularity of Twitch eclipsed that of its general-interest counterpart. In October 2013, the website had 45 million unique viewers, 38 and by February 2014, it was considered the fourth largest source of peak Internet traffic in the United States. At the same time, Justin.tv's parent company was re-branded as Twitch Interactive to represent the shift in focus – Justin.tv was shut down in August 2014. That month, the service was acquired by Amazon for US $970 million, which later led to the introduction of synergies with the company's subscription service Amazon Prime. Twitch later acquired Curse, an operator of online video gaming communities and introduced means to purchase games through links on streams along with a program allowing streamers to receive commissions on the sales of games that they play.

By 2015, Twitch had more than 1.5 million broadcasters and 100 million viewers per month. As of Q3 2017, Twitch still remains the leading live streaming video service for video games in the US, and has an advantage over YouTube Gaming. As of May 2018, it now has 2.2 million broadcasters monthly and 15 million daily active users.

I've wanted to do an article like this for quite some time actually, covering some of my personal favorite channels and streamers that I take pleasure in watching. Twitch is the thing that most people are familiar with when it comes to broadcasting, so I wanted to take the opportunity to share some of my favorites.

When I say Volume One that's because I'm sure that I'm going to have to update this list in the future, so yeah.

Speedrunners

Calebhart42 - My personal favorite Mega Man streamer/speedrunner. He's usually doing runs of Mega Man X (original on Japanese cart at any percent completion for personal best times) or X2 (100% completion). When he's not streaming those games, he's doing runs of Final Fantasy VII. He's also started doing some runs with Maximillian from what I've heard.

TheMexicanRunner - He's known for completing and streaming complete playthroughs of EVERY NES console NTSC release of 800+ titles. He's been mostly running Cuphead recently, but most of the time he's speedrunning Battletoads or any other retro classic titles from that console era. He's been slowly collecting every NES console release too.

LackAttack24 - He streams mostly speedruns of The Legend of Zelda (NES original) and occasionally Mega Man 2.


GamesDoneQuick - Speedrunners come together from around the globe and host a week full of non-stop speedruns, breaking games old and new - all while donating all profits from this event to noteworthy charity organizations, notably for cancer research or doctors without borders.


Speedgaming1 - Daily competitive speedruns, mostly in Super Metroid or The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past with randomizer rules.


Speedgaming2 - A companion channel to the above with extra competitors competing in the same bracket.

Entertainment

ShoutFactory - Occasionally streams random episodes of the original run of GLOW (Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling), Classic Old School Wrestling (that WWE surprisingly hasn't bought the rights to for the WWE Network). Their archives include the full complete series marathon of Reboot, Ultraman Leo, Denji Sentai Megaranger (Japanese original series where Power Rangers: In Space's archive footage was pulled from), Street Hawk: The Man... The Machine... and even Mystery Science Theater 3000. Their streams are mostly derived from whatever they are about to release on DVD that they currently hold the license rights to.

Twitch Presents - Currently streaming EVERY episode and every season of Doctor Who to date. I don't know how far they are in this daunting task, but bravo. Last year they streamed every season of Power Rangers to date, followed by complete series runs of Yu-Gi-OH! and Digimon.

Twitch Presents 2 - Weekly Marathons of He-Man, She-Ra, and Voltron (GoLion and Vehicle Voltron original English dubs), roughly five episodes of each a piece before repeating the marathon all day/night on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays.

For anyone looking to relive their childhood Saturday mornings as kids of the 80's like myself, this is a pleasant treat to put on as you're going to be to wake up for your pre-work routine and still watch some of these classic toons on your way out of the door. Sure, a lot of this stuff hasn't aged well - i.e. Like Prince Adam can't do anything, not even open a jar of pickles without having to resort turning into He-Man. Allura has a similar issue but it comes off as she goes through puberty after turning into She-Ra, despite the voice acting credits cite that roughly the same two women voices every other character in that show.

As for Voltron, it's nice to reflect on that original series and see where it came from but some of the voices were fucking horrible. Looking right at you Sven... I love Michael Bell's voice acting work, but that role had to be his fucking worst one, especially to say that he plays a character in Vehicle Voltron who sounds identical to Sven! Okay, okay, rant over...

CONtv - The best way I can describe this channel as pot luck. They seem to have just about anything for all different tastes. Some days have Zatch Bell marathons or an occasional marathon of Yu-Gi-OH! (mainly the original series, 5D's, or GX - the Bonds Beyond Time movie was actually shown this past weekend), Deltora Quest, or even Saint Seiya (original run). On weekends they seem to show whatever they fancy in terms of classic anime or cartoons, as one weekend I was treated to the full King of Fighters: Destiny anime in its entirety of it's first season. FYI that series has been greenlit for another season, so that was a pleasant surprise to see it on this channel. Another rare treat was the Heavenly Sword CGI movie that was released straight-to-DVD a few years ago. Ninja Theory's criminally underrated PlayStation 3 exclusive that I had my fingers crossed of possibly getting a sequel when Hellblade was first announced. With that studio under Microsoft's umbrella we can pretty much rule that out as a possibility. Still, it was awesome to get to see the events of the game retold in this cinematic format. I'm definitely going to pick that up on DVD when I get a chance. I've reviewed the console release of that game ages ago though.

Fighting Game Community (FGC)

Team Spooky - Home of the weekly Next Level Battle Circuit streams over on the East Coast, while covering FGC events around the globe whenever possible. He hosts local and international FGC streams on his channel as well, so that fans of Mortal Kombat XL, Guilty Gear Xrd, Street Fighter V, Tekken 7, and Dragon Ball FighterZ won't miss out on the action.

LevelUpLive - Home of Wednesday Night Fights and The Runback, along with most FGC events being held on the West Coast of the United States, ran by Alex "Calipower" Valle himself.


CapcomFighters - Home of the Capcom Pro Tour event streams, specifically for Street Fighter V currently.


TEKKEN - Home of the Tekken World Tour events held around the world. Seems like the Tekken scene always has something going on, either stateside or internationally. If there's a Tekken World Tour event going on, then nine times out of ten, this channel is covering it.

UltraChenTV - Hosted by James Chen and UltraDavid, two renown commentators for the FGC, they offer weekly news on what's going on in terms of the current state of the FGC and itsand FGC tutorial streams in various fighting games.

AvoidingThePuddle - Aris, a prolific, yet controversial figure in the Tekken community, provides commentary on the ins and outs of what's going on in the Tekken community, while occasionally dabbling in other games, such as Dark Souls, Resident Evil series, or whatever tickles his fancy that given night. Definitely one of my favorite pros to watch since he mains one of my favorite Tekken characters, Sergei Dragunov.


Maximillian_DOOD - Popular from his YouTube series, Assist Me!, featuring a comedic live-action approach to fighting game tutorials for Marvel vs. Capcom 3 and it's sequel Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3. Max is a popular streamer and reviewer of fighting games and some other genres as well. He mainly streams longplay sessions throughout the weekdays of various titles, but joins up with his friends for "Yo! Video Games!" (obvious spoof on Yo! MTV Videos from back in the day) where they play multiplayer games while chatting together on the couch.


mvcclockwork - Mostly streaming from built-in PlayStation 4 streaming app, Marvel vs. Capcom series veteran Clockwork (known mostly for his Strider/Dr. Doom teams in the series) mostly streams his online sessions of Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite against randoms as he trains for majors or simply against his roommate for fun. If you don't care about the lack of fancy borders/overlays and just want to watch two guys hanging out playing video games, you can't go wrong here.

Professional Wrestling

House of Hardcore (HoH) - They offer a free alternative to WWE programming almost every week on Thursdays after Impact Wrestling, then on Sundays as well with a rerun stream.


LuchaLibreAAA - Offering mostly old and new matches of their lucha libre product. Unfortunately (or rather fortunately if you speak the language...) ENTIRELY in Spanish. The feed is a bit disorganized too as it's like playing the lottery on whether or not in terms what you're going to get since the content is so damn random. On the plus side, AAA has been offering their biggest PPV of the year, TripleMania, free on this platform live and free to watch, so there's something to be thankful for.


Impact Wrestling - 24/7 offerings of Impact Wrestling's events. Mostly reruns of previous episodes of Impact Wrestling from this past month or highlight compilations featuring former stars that went to WWE or blocks devoted to the heights of the Knockouts division. Occasional live interviews and panels weekly too. You can't beat this content for free. You don't even have to pay for the Global Wrestling Network for this.