Twitch superstar Imane ‘Pokimane’ Anys weighed in on the great debate between who is the greatest streamer of all time (in their prime) between Felix ‘xQc’ Lengyel and Tyler ‘Ninja’ Blevins.
xQc has become a household name on Twitch. The former Overwatch League pro rose through the ranks over the years and has eclipsed every individual streamer on the platform in terms of earnings, as shown by the 2021 Twitch leak.
Ninja, meanwhile, set numerous Twitch records prior to his departure to the now-defunct streaming site Mixer. However, those records, such as most subs and most-viewed stream, have since been broken by Ludwig and TheGrefg, respectively.
Now, Pokimane has explained why she believes xQc, right now, is far more valuable than Ninja was when he was on top of the Twitch ladder.
xQc vs Ninja
During a stream, one of Pokimane’s viewers claimed that Ninja was an “S-tier” streamer at the time of his move to Mixer and questioned why she felt Twitch could keep xQc from leaving to YouTube.
“I think xQc is more valuable now than Ninja was, even in his peak. Is that a hot take? I don’t know,” she said.
According to Pokimane, Ninja’s success stems from the fact that he was primarily playing Fortnite when it was incredibly popular, whereas Lengyel doesn’t have a connection to any one game or genre.
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“xQc will get viewers doing anything. Ninja was the top Fortnite streamer when Fortnite was popping. Two very different things. You can’t just look at view count and think that’s everything,” she explained.
Anys went on to add that many sponsors make the mistake of just looking at views, noting how someone who gets 10K viewers streaming League of Legends wouldn’t get the same amount playing a different game.
“That’s not to downplay how valuable Ninja was, but it can’t make or break a whole platform,” she concluded.
With the stream wars commencing yet again and YouTube making some major moves, xQc could end up being a critical piece to the puzzle as both sides compete for streaming supremacy.