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In 2018, all eyes were on Tyler “Ninja” Blevins. As the stars — both figurative and, well, Drake, with whom Blevins famously streamed — aligned around “Fortnite,” he rode a wave of momentum to truly unprecedented levels of success. Subscribers begot subscribers. Records were shattered, then shattered again. Viewers flocked to his channel to be part of a moment everybody knew was unlike any that had come before. It’s been three years since that star-making rise, but on Twitch, it feels like it happened a lifetime ago.
At the height of his popularity, Blevins broke Twitch’s records for most concurrent viewers of a single streamer (667,000 during his Drake stream) and most paying subscribers (269,154). Both records have since been broken by other streamers. Blevins, who now streams to audiences of between 10,000 and 15,000 concurrent viewers compared to his heyday of 100,000 or more, has made peace with the current state of things.
“No one’s gonna stay on top forever, especially when it comes to live-streaming; there’s always somebody new and hot,” Blevins said in a recent interview with The Washington Post. “I have no intention of being that guy anymore. I know I’m not going to pull 100,000 viewers on [Twitch] anymore. I don’t have time to do that. I have a wife, I have a family.”
Blevins has had an eventful few years. After both delighting audiences with his onstream antics and bemusing them with incidents in which he rapped the n-word (for which he apologized) and refused to stream with women (something he’s since walked back), he parlayed his Twitch fame into a series of mainstream opportunities that included a Super Bowl commercial and numerous celebrity collaborations. Then, in 2019, he shocked fans by moving his entire streaming operation over to Mixer, Microsoft’s now-defunct streaming platform. While this deal netted Blevins a sizable sum of money — reportedly somewhere in the neighborhood of $15 million per year — his regular viewership took a substantial hit. This, combined with “Fortnite’s” return from the streaming stratosphere back down to earth, meant that when Blevins came back to Twitch after Mixer folded in 2020, his numbers were much more modest compared to years prior.
On Twitch, where live viewership numbers are prominently visible next to each broadcast, fans often fixate on ups, downs and whose best days are seemingly behind them. Numerous think pieces follow a similar ebb and flow, as do the opinions of other streamers. This has resulted in numerous claims that Blevins has “fallen off,” as well as spirited defenses of his legacy from unlikely allies like Twitch’s current top streamer, Félix “xQc” Lengyel. While Blevins has voiced frustration with analytics-obsessed fans in the past, he’s learning to take things in stride.
“[Fans] are focusing on what they can see in front of them, which is numbers and ‘Ninja isn’t getting 100,000 viewers anymore,’ but what they don’t see is everything we created while we were massive and [the] global recognition we have that’s bigger than just streaming on Twitch,” he said, emphasizing his renewed focus on additional platforms like YouTube and participation in mainstream-facing events like the recent UNO world championship he hosted, which featured celebrities like tennis legend Venus Williams and singer Ashlee Simpson Ross.
Blevins sees upsides to this new status quo. No longer beholden to the next big thing, he can stream games that aren’t “Fortnite,” the competitive shooter that helped make him, but with which he’s had a hot-and-cold relationship over the years.
“I have been doing ‘Fortnite,’ which is obviously what blew me up, so it’s great that I’m starting to enjoy the game [again] and can stream it and play it and just have fun,” Blevins said. “But whenever I want to play any other game, I can switch to that and know that it really isn’t going to affect anything on the back end with deals or anything. It’s incredibly relaxing to be able to play what I want.”
Blevins, who has previously spoken about the immense “pressure” and behind-the-scenes workload that come with being a popular streamer, said he also relishes opportunities that allow him to step away from his PC and the thousands of prying eyes that lie behind the camera. In recent times, viewers have gone so far as to speculate that Blevins was addicted to drugs based on changes in his physical appearance when, according to Blevins, he was just suffering from severe canker sores. That level of scrutiny can be taxing — even for someone who streams for a living.
“Back in the day, when streaming wasn’t really mainstream, there weren’t a lot of things to do other than stream, right?” said Blevins, who used to stream 12 to 16 hours per day during his 2018 heyday. "[That] kind of makes people burn out, or they don’t want to do events, and what does that leave them to do when they’re home alone? Just keep streaming for 365 days of the year? That’s just excessive. It’s crazy.”
But it’s not just that Blevins and his priorities have changed; so has Twitch. During Blevins’s time away in 2019 and 2020, a new crop of popular streamers arose with focuses more diverse than just the big video game of the week, month or year. Hasan “HasanAbi” Piker spends the lion’s share of his streams discussing politics. Ludwig Ahgren is always trying some new stunt or gimmick, whether in games or real life — most famously, this year’s 31-day “never-ending” subscription marathon stream, during which he broke Blevins’s record for most paying subscribers on Twitch. Chess had a popularity explosion on Twitch. So did hot tubs. Even though it’s been just three years since Blevins was the fresh-faced talk of the town, a new generation now runs the show.
“These incredible young creators like TommyInnit, Ludwig, xQc, Hasan — some of them aren’t even gamers,” Blevins said. “Some of them just make IRL [in real life] content, and they’re blowing up. It’s awesome.”
Blevins went on to say that even though he’s been exploring nongaming content on his YouTube channel with occasional travel and cooking videos, he’s not entirely cut out for the current Twitch meta.
“Literally that’s the reason I’m kind of stuck, or where I’m at right now,” he said. “I love gaming, and I’m always gonna love gaming. I don’t want to be a react streamer where I sit and watch videos for eight hours. I start my stream, and I’m immediately in a game. Stream goes live, intro’s out and I’m queued up. I’m playing. That’s all I want to do.”