Tyler Blevins, aka Ninja, has made his way back to the Amazon-owned video game streaming platform, Twitch. Ninja left the platform for Microsoft’s Mixer, a year ago and we don’t how long exactly is his return on the service. This was his first stream on the platform since leaving in 2019 and also after Mixer’s shutdown in June. The first stream, in which he played Call of Duty: Warzone attracted over 100, 000 viewers on the platform.
Ninja streamed the battle royale game with his partner streamer Lupo. Microsoft announced the shutting down of Mixer in June. Mixer’s closure released Ninja’s exclusivity with Mixer, and he can now freely stream on other platforms. He told his fans that he currently doesn’t plan to stream and is looking for the options. Howver, he later started streaming on YouTube from July 8.
Fans thought that Ninja had signed a new deal with Twitch to return to stream on the platform. But, renowned eSports journalist Rod Breslau later reported that Wednesday’s stream has nothing to do with the platform, meaning he hasn’t yet signed any deal with the service. However, he did mention that the top streamers like Ninja, Shroud, and even Dr. Disrespect are negotiating with several platforms for exclusivity.
When Ninja streamed on Twitch, he was the most followed active streamers in the platform. He used to stream Fortnite and he reportedly had over 14 million followers on the service before he left for Mixer. Ninja’s account is still the most followed channel in the service, with 14.9 million followers. Blevins left the platform for $50 million 2019 exclusivity deal with Mixer.
Ninja’s wife (also his manager) told The Verge that Ninja had to leave the platform to grow his brand outside of the streaming and gaming community. Mixer had provided such relaxation in their exclusive deal but Twitch had limited the growth. Ninja has been teasing several streaming services that he is still capable of pulling impressive numbers. When he streamed to his 24 million subscribers on YouTube in early July, his stream garnered over 4 million views in just a month.
Now, Microsft out of the picture, and Ninja clearly has no intensions in joining Facebook Gaming, Twitch may come in the scene and offer Blevins a lucrative deal. Twitch has officially restored Ninja’s original channel and the channel would be crossing a 15-million mark in the coming few days.
