Matthew Mendez, Author at XSplit Blog

Everything You Need For A Good Game Streaming Setup

Gaming is more than just pressing buttons on a controller in order for you to get to the next level. For any gaming content creator who wants to be able to make a name for themselves; as a gaming influencer, you’re going to need a lot more than just a console in order to do it. Being a gaming influencer requires you to have the right personality and the right setup to make it happen. For the setup, there are a few things that you definitely need to have for good player experience.

A Private Room

The first thing that you’ll need is a private space to play in and record the content for your channel. The size of this room can vary between the size of a standard single-person bedroom, or something twice that size. You can also do game streaming in your living room, where there is more space for guests on your stream. Or enough space to allow you to experiment with streaming VR games.

What’s important in choosing your space is – if it has enough legroom needed to create content for your channel. It doesn’t mean you have to keep filming in the same place every time. There will be occasions that will require you to move locations if you plan on streaming for mobile broadcasts.

Strong Internet Connection

This is essential for every online gamer who wants to frequently do live broadcasting, a strong net connection will help allow you to keep streaming on your channel for as long as you want to, especially if you plan on streaming for hours on end more than once a day. A weak wifi connection can have serious effects on your video and quality, and more often than not, result in your stream getting spontaneously cut-off prematurely after less than five minutes.

A strong internet connection with XSplit’s Broadcaster, you can maintain a seamless combination that will allow you to be able to stream for as many hours as you want, without interruptions.

Two Monitors

For people who plan to do a lot of serious game streaming, it’s important for you to have two monitors for your gaming setup, one for you to use for gameplay, and another for you to monitor your social feed. Some people might think of it as a bit of a hassle, but any professional streamer will tell you that it’s better for you to have two monitors, so that you won’t get distracted by message alerts, or chat flow popping up on the same screen.

Two monitors can be optimal to get a better view of your game and stream without switching tabs all the time. While one screen’s used for gameplay, you can also use the other monitor to upload your content; while chatting with your followers or other streamers or schedule your next session.

Gaming Console And PC

This is obviously important for anyone who wants to do gameplay streaming online. You might want to use the same online console you’ve been using to play games in your living room. We recommend getting one that is specifically used for streaming, to avoid running out of memory in between sessions.

You have the option of using a wide variety of consoles for your streaming channel – like a Playstation, an X-Box, a Nintendo Switch, or the main PC you plan on using for your setup altogether. This depends on what your console of choice is, but that doesn’t mean you have to limit your gaming setup to just one. A lot of well-known content creators are known to use more than one console for their playthrough videos.

High Def Web-Camera

In order for a streamer to be more recognized among his followers, and have a more noticeable brand campaign, an HD camera can help with his promotion, and serve as a good mirroring device for practicing his facial expressions when he’s recording.

Game streamers can get more than one use from having a high functioning camera for their streaming setup, one of which is that it serves as a great device to use for promoting their own personal branded merchandise, like their t-shirts, or hats, or sweatbands. A lot of streamers would connect a green-screen with their camera set up so that they can remove the surrounding box of their chat window in order to make more room for their gameplay screen.

Gaming Headset With Microphone

Along with being able to make visual presence with your online audience, it’s also important that you be able to have a verbal connection with them as well, which is why when you’re online, it’s recommended for you to have a gaming headset with a built-in microphone so that you can have better sound quality to project to your listeners.

Having a headset with a microphone attached will allow you to have a more personal impression with your gameplay, while also giving you the opportunity to work on the kind of vocabulary you want to use when you’re streaming. Gaming headsets are also important for when you plan on doing a multiplayer live stream with two or more other gamers, in order for you to be able to have proper communication with the other players on your team.

Gaming Chair

While having a well functioning gaming console and communications equipment is important, it’s also important that your setup includes your own personal gaming chair, like that of an office chair, your game streaming setup needs you to have a chair that you can be comfortable sitting in for hours on end. Professional streamers like “Ninja’ or “Myth” do game streaming for at least twelve hours a day, and at that time they need a sturdy chair that can handle the kind of hours they put in, and be able to adjust to the height and positioning they want.

An individual chair is great for single-players, but for channels that use more than one player for their videos, have more of a group dynamic, it’s okay to want to switch that setting to a couch, for more than one occasion.

These are just a few of the important equipment pieces needed in order to make sure you have the best streaming experience possible, in order for you to make it as a professional game streamer yourself, the rest is up to you. Good luck.

What to do and not to do during a Livestream

Streaming is a great way for gamers to gain online notoriety and if you play your cards right, you might become the next big thing. With the help of XSplit’s broadcasting system, you could be the next Ninja or PewDiePie. But, that really depends on what kind of format you want to use for your channel. There are different options that content creators can base their channels on. There are a few things that online gamers should and shouldn’t do when they’re trying to produce their own content. Especially to a live audience, otherwise, you’re going to catch the wrong kind of attention.

Do Talk During Your Livestream

As an aspiring gaming influencer, it’s important that you interact with your audience and express yourself with enthusiasm. One of the best ways for you to do that is by talking into the microphone during your live stream. If you’re planning on doing a live gaming podcast, it requires a lot of vocal legwork from your end.

Start your video by introducing yourself to your viewers, talk about the game you’re playing, and how far along in it you are. You can also try making a guide on what you want to talk about during the stream. It saves time before start shooting, to know what you want to say and when to say it. It lessens instances where you don’t know what to say and lessen the fillers. This way, you can have a set of talking points during the broadcast and create a natural to start the conversation with your audience.

It’s okay if you find yourself stuttering, and stammering during the broadcast, nobody’s perfect, especially first-timers. But it can help serve as a chance for you to figure out what kind of character or personality you want to present to people when you’re streaming.

Do Not Scream or Swear Into Your Microphone

As important as it is, that you should express yourself on the internet, it’s also just as important that you watch what you say in the middle of a live stream, cause you never really know who’s watching, especially when there’s a finite possibility that it might be children.

When you’re deeply immersed in the gameplay and your character suddenly dies in the middle of a match, any normal gamer will start to get frustrated and upset. You might start raging and along the line, you may have dropped a couple of F-Bombs without even knowing it. This kind of an outburst is very common among gamers age twelve and under, and it usually ends with viewers having to listen to them have some kind of a tantrum that may or may not end with a very offensive racial slur.

Outbursts like this can have a serious impact on a player’s reputation. Such language can cause your channel to be flagged for being vulgar and be taken down.

We are only human and outbursts are normal. Here is where we need to exercise some restraint and control. We’re not saying that you should filter your language, we advise you to react appropriately and civilly even when provoked/ teased during a broadcast.

Do Look Into The Camera

For gamer streamers using a close-up camera for their film setup, looking into the camera is great for showing your viewers how expressive you are, and how you react when your playing. This will allow your viewers to get a closer look into your personality, and make you feel like you’re bonding with your subscribers from beyond the screen.

This can also serve as practice for content creators who want to spend more time in front of the camera in the future. They can observe how they project on-screen, how to get used to being in on camera, and maybe practice a signature catchphrase. A lot of gamers come off as more entertaining when they express themselves more, and more often than not begin to make more direct contact with the camera.

This is especially true for gamers who plan on developing a podcast on their channel with video included.

Dress Appropriately on Camera

There are cases of streamers taking off their clothes on a broadcast. Sometimes it’s accidental but in other cases it’s intentional. One pro-tip for those who want to keep their content family-friendly, make sure to end your stream properly. Content creators will be caught off guard and it might be an accident but let’s not try to prevent that from happening. Turn off the camera and end the stream properly to avoid unnecessary content.

Videos content like this is likely to get flagged and taken down. Your channel will take a beating, demonetized or worse deleted. Your channel will most likely have a community strike and will hinder you from streaming or posting as you like. Inappropriate content might be taken down but it doesn’t mean that it’s gone from the internet. If you have the time, read your platforms’ Community guidelines and know which content to avoid. You can read the extensive list over at Twitch and Mixer to know more about this.

Do Talk To And Interact With Your Chat

In line with speaking to your audience frequently while streaming, it’s important that you acknowledge the live-chat of comments that will be appearing from your subscribers while you’re playing. This will allow you to be more interactive with your audience like the way a musician interacts with a large crowd of fans during a concert.

This is particularly important when you plan on doing a live Q&A broadcast with your fans and subscribers. People are going to be constantly typing in questions and comments, some of them might seem pretty repetitive, so it’s always important that you make it a point to scroll through the chat feed to find the more individual questions that you can answer while also acknowledging the users who simply just want to say hi.

Do Not Insult Or Threaten Your Chat Subscribers

Everyone knows that when there are fans on the internet, there are just as many haters and trolls too. And they’ll definitely be commenting in your live-chat posting mean comments about how your gaming is, or maybe just want to talk about how bad your outfit looks.

Other times there are going to be commenters that want you to take your clothes off during the stream. People who want to post comments like that are, intentionally, trying to provoke you to curse at the chat comments.

Instances like this can have serious damage on an influencer’s brand, especially if they end up saying something incredibly offensive and racist.

So as nice as it is to talk to your live-chat, it’s also important that you watch what you say around them, so as not to start a whole is a thing.

These are just a few tips for how to handle yourself during a gaming live stream, good luck out there, and have fun.

Types of Games You Will See On A Livestream

When you’re browsing through streaming channels, there are a lot of different forms of gaming content that you’ll find online, there’s more than one way to run a streaming channel, just like there’s more than one way to cook a steak or to drive to the mall. The internet is a massive treasure trove that’s capable of showing thousands, if not millions, of different faces and personalities of the gaming world. And with the help of XSplit’s Gamecaster’s streaming technology you can go to Youtube, Twitch, or Mixer, you’re going to find people more than just one kind of gaming platform, some more than others. Here are some of the most common gaming platforms that you will see being played on a live stream.

Online Multiplayer Shooters

One of the most common content featured on your subscription feed, gamers like to use their streaming platforms to upload footage of themselves playing popular first-person shooter games like Counter-Strike, Call of Duty or Rainbow Six.

The content that they show on their streaming channel for games in this kind of genre would feature the streamer playing online with two or more friends in the middle of a deathmatch against an opposing team of players on a selected challenge map. They’d be fighting for a limited amount of time, seeing who can get the most kills, and seeing who respawns more than others.

This form of content is popular for its fast-paced action, infinite loadout options and constant development updates for their online gaming community on a regular basis. It provides players with numerous social sharing opportunities. These kinds of games are regularly updated with new challenge maps, weapons and competitive gaming opportunities for players to take part on a regular basis.

Open World Roleplaying Games

This type of gaming takes place on multiplayer titles that are set more in a fantasy-based environment. Titles like this include popular titles like World of Warcraft, League of Legends, and DOTA (Defense Of The Ancients).

These games feature players using custom characters to explore a fictional kingdom alone or with the help of online friends. Players can use a mystical spell, weapons, and strategies to progress while earning experience points, and leveling-up.

Gameplay content like this is popular among PC gamers. Fantasy titles like Warcraft, provides players with the chance to think about battle strategies on a more spaced-out map.

Online Battle Royale Matches

Battle Royale games are growing in popularity these days and you’ll see more gamers playing this during a live broadcast. Gaming titles that are popular in this category are PUBG (Player Unknown Battlegrounds), Fortnite, and Apex Legends.

Similar to a multiplayer deathmatch – where players are fighting to the death but with very different mechanics and rules.

For starters, there is one main battle map where players are dropped onto after jumping out of a moving air-vehicle. They will have to scavenge for weapons hidden around the area after they land. Players do not respawn here, once your character dies, you’re out, and the last player standing is declared the winner.

Games like this are great for testing a player’s survival skills. Players are tested in a setting that almost mimics the Hunger Games – with realism and science-fiction elements that make gameplay interesting.

This particular gaming platform has been gaining popularity in recent years. Players have more freedom to explore within the game, and game developers are constantly adding new content to keep players playing.

Triple-A (AAA) Single Player Story Titles

These critically acclaimed game titles that are well-known for their storylines, relatable characters, and cinematic set.

Single-player story games are popular online for their cutscenes and gameplay walkthroughs. Also, special videos containing secrets and treasures are scattered around the open-world map.

Games like this are popular on the streaming scene during the release. Some viewers are more likely to watch walkthroughs to learn how to play the game. It is most likely that they already know the storyline of the game and would want to know how to complete it.

Gaming Podcasts

While not based on playing games, speaking about gaming is also medium that content creators use their live streaming platforms.

In gaming podcasts, content creators can talk about their favorite video game titles. They can also share their thoughts on the unique aspects of latest game releases. They can also let their audience know that makes a game worth playing. Set an interview with game developers and let them share their creative process when they conceptualized their most popular titles.

This is something a lot of popular video game journalists have done in the past and continue to do. Whether they are from a known publisher or indie, creators use podcasts as a way to talk about their thoughts in the world of gaming.

These are just a few of the popular options that you can find when surfing your Twitch or Youtube subscriptions. As a gamer, you can choose one of these outlets to base your streaming channel on. Or you can come up with a new outlet all on your own together.

Good luck, and just remember to have fun.

Problems You Find On Your Stream

Streaming is a great way for players to share their own personal gameplay experiences online in real-time. Here gamers have the chance to display their talents while sharing their own unique reactions to certain set-pieces to entertain people. All you have to do is just be yourself, this is a great way for players to kickstart their online gaming careers, by putting themselves out there, and finding an audience who wants what they have to offer.

It all sounds great, but just like driving, or performing surgery, there are a lot of different ways it can go wrong, and a lot of different problems that you’ll encounter along the way, some more than others.

Here are three of the most common problems that people face whenever they’re trying to do a live stream.

Insufficient Bandwidth

This is something a lot of first-time users find themselves facing whenever they try to live stream themselves gaming. They try to use the live gaming feature on their console or PC, but then they get a warning saying they don’t have enough signal strength to broadcast, and when they try to share their gameplay anyway, they end up getting cut-off in the middle of playing.

This can happen unexpectedly too, sometimes you can’t even start broadcasting video for more than ten minutes without the signal cutting off, other times you manage to record a live stream for more than an hour before the video starts to cut out.

This happens for a multitude of reasons, one can be because there’s more than one person using the wifi in your house, and you don’t have enough internet to share. Or it can also mean that your wifi connection doesn’t have enough gigahertz to support a live broadcast, which is understandable.

For players who want to record videos of their gameplay or do a gaming livestream, you’re going to need a network connection strong enough to carry your broadcast for as long as you need it to.

A lot of general wifi networks don’t normally have the capacity needed to properly support a video stream, and uploading one takes up a lot of data, but that doesn’t mean you should start spending money to better upgrade your plan. There are other options you can go for so that you can save money, and apply for another data subscription.

The best solution you can look for is to use the XSplit Broadcaster software in order to give you a better signal strength connection that can support video streaming, and uploading. This streaming software will allow you stream yourself doing gameplay, or a podcast for as long as you want, hours on end without having to worry about getting cut-off. XSplit will also allow you to upload pre-recorded videos faster in a matter of minutes instead of just hours.

Bad Audio Output

There are going to be few instances when your streaming, and you’re going to find the sound quality on your videos to come out a little choppy, the audio will probably start cutting in and out while you’re talking, and you might hear some static on your chat frequency.

For players aiming to be the next Pewdiepie, or the next Ninja, it’s one thing to want to simply broadcast your gaming footage online, but it’s another to want to be able to showcase your own reactions and personality while playing. And in order to do that, you’re going to need the right set of equipment so that you can capture everything you say and do while you’re playing.

First-time players will probably want to resort to using the earbuds that came with their console-setup, which will work for a few months, but after a while, they start to get worn out, and they begin falling apart. This means you’re going to need a proper gaming headset with a built-in microphone so that you can hear your teammates online better.

As for the microphone, you can have the option to use the one built into your headpiece, but if you plan on using your streaming channel for a podcast or to record commentary, getting a high-def recording mic so that you can get a clearer sound quality on your channel.

System Crash

If you don’t take good care of your gaming system there is a definite chance that it will break down while you’re playing, either from loose snack crumbs, or from a broken exhaust fan in your system, or worse…

Any computer owner can tell you that there are plenty of different ways for you to wreck your system, a lot of them are pretty obvious, but there are times when you could be breaking your computer without really knowing it. One day you’ll find yourself online, and next thing you know your cursor won’t move, or your screen froze, and next thing you know, you’re going to have to buy a new computer altogether. This can mainly stem from accidentally downloading malware data from random browsing sites, or from a lack of using your computer’s built-in antivirus software.

In order to prevent this kind of thing from happening, or from happening again, it’s important that you get a security software that can actually tell you which you surf websites are actually harmful to your computer before you actually log-in to them.

Another thing you need to do to keep your computer safe is perform regular quick system scans on your PC on a daily basis (at least) in order to make sure that there aren’t any problems with your software updates.

And along with doing quick scans, you should perform a full security scan at least once a week, in order to be extra thorough. Full scans take about two to three hours, depending on how much data and programs you have stored in your unit.

These are all pretty common accidents that happen to a lot of gamers, especially for the first-timer streamers, but as long as you remember to learn from your past mistakes, and have all the right equipment ready, you should be fine.

So have fun and try not to accidentally set your system on fire.