Popular Twitch streamer Michael “Shroud” Grzesiek confirms thatWorld of Warcraftis “killing” his Twitch channel, but he doesn’t seem to mind. Activision Blizzard recently released the latestWorld of Warcraftexpansion, and from that point, its Twitch views have spiked and fallen dramatically for channels that only dabble in the game like Shroud.
During a December 20 Twitch stream, Shroud stated thatWorld of Warcraftis his favorite game to play, but he can’t play it as much as he’d like because viewership drops when he does. WhileDragonflightwas released at the end of November,World of Warcraftalso releasedWrath of the Lich King: Classicin September, which resulted in two popular months for the MMO at the tail end of the year. Shroud has particularly taken toWrath of the Lich King: Classic, butthe expansionWorld of Warcraft: Dragonflightis considered to be a step aboveBattle for AzerothandShadowlandsin quality despite also struggling to maintain Twitch viewership.
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Shroud was in the middle of aWrath of the Lich King: Classicraid on the December 20 Twitch stream in which he sang about “getting loot in a game” that he loves in justifying his continued streaming of the game. Although Shroud stated thatWorld of Warcrafthas been killing his channel, it continues to maintain a strong following as thepopular Twitch streamerhas over 10 million followers that may simply not show up for the MMO content. According to his official statistics, Shroud is down to an average of 8,000 viewers forWorld of Warcraftcompared to 14,000 which he could reach by playing FPS games likeOverwatch 2orValorant.
Another Twitch stream saw Shroud complimentingValorantas “not bad” while stating that it and other games don’t quite stack up to the quality ofWorld of Warcraft. Given that hisOverwatch 2content is also widely praised despite being what Shroud may consider as not bad, the millions of viewers that could be showing up may be tuning into other successfulTwitch streamers like Asmongold, xQc, or Summit1g. Twitch Just Chatting is often among the top viewed categories of the Amazon platform for popular livestreamers, while some of the other current relevant games areLeague of Legends,Call of Duty: Warzone 2,Fortnite, andMinecraft.
Because Asmongold has been known to surpass 20,000 views forWorld of Warcraftstreams in recent months, the Activision Blizzard MMO may have an audience that sticks to established names in the community rather than players that merely dabble. Given the success of eSports organizations like Team Liquid, Method, and Echo Esports inWorld of Warcraft, the race to world first andother timelyDragonflighteventsmay continue to draw in views.
World of Warcraftis available now for Mac and PC.
