Live streaming has become more and more popular over the years, particularly when it comes to not only esports but interactive gaming too as it is a great way to involve the audience.

As part of Pocket Gamer Connects Helsinki Digital, Genvid Technologies director of developer relations for Europe Chris Hamilton took to the stage as he gave a superstar session dubbed designing for interactive game streams: incorporating stream viewers into your vision.

Interactive events

Epic Games has held massive interactive live events in Fortnite through concerts with singers such as Travis Scott.

"Here games are appealing to more than just core gamers," said Hamilton.

However, it's not just the games industry that are utilising interactive live streams, the May Day celebration in Finland also embraced the format.

It's great for the audience as they can determine just how involved with the stream they become.

"In order for games to be successful in this space, we need to look at the success from other media," said Hamilton.

Hamilton used sports as an example, given it involves the players, audience in the stadium and those that view the event from home. However, in terms of games, we have the player and the viewers watching the stream via Twitch, and this is not exactly the best thing for the audience.

Underserved

Currently, the audience can only watch through the player. Therefore a viewer may not fully understand what is going on should they not play the game themselves.

"Game developers are only now starting to build that spectator value," said Hamilton.

Essentially, viewers of streams and esports tend to be underserved. But, there is an opportunity to fix this, and to provide the viewers with the chance to take part and feel included via interactive experiences.

For example, when it comes to games, perhaps viewers could be given a chance to impact the game directly by either helping the player through providing health. Or, maybe they want to impede the player via traps.

Pocket Gamer Connects Helsinki Digital is the best of our Pocket Gamer Connects conference in an online form, with an entire week of talks, meetings, and pitch events taking place from September 14th to the 18th. You can read up on all the tracks taking place throughout the week here.