[VG Streams] YouTube Gaming now Live! Extra-Life in November!
KoopahTroopah
The koopas, the troopas.Philadelphia, PARegistered User regular
The koopas, the troopas.Philadelphia, PARegistered User regular
Video Game Streams
Table of contents
1. Introduction - What video game streaming is about
2. About Me
3. Who and Why?
4. How to Stream
5. Popular Streams
6. List of PA Streamers
Introduction!
Greetings Citizens! Welcome to the Streaming thread, where we talk about everything related to streaming video games to the internet for general public viewing. A lot of people might ask why and what's the entertainment value in this? Well I'll get to those questions in a minute but first let me explain more about what it is.Table of contents
1. Introduction - What video game streaming is about
2. About Me
3. Who and Why?
4. How to Stream
5. Popular Streams
6. List of PA Streamers
Introduction!
Video Game streaming is very similar to regular TV and has grown enormously over the years. It's simple really, any gamer just like you and me, can send live video to the internet of their computer or TV screens. People log on to different websites to watch the streamer play games and complete challenges, while chatting with other viewers about the experience simultaneously. Websites such as Justin.tv and Own3d.tv have pioneered interest in the subject and brought lots of attention from news media and press around the world.
About Me
I've been streaming video games for a couple years now, mainly of a Defense of the Ancients clone called Heroes of Newerth. I started out taking tips from other HoN streamers like Pwn, Obi(Ragers) and DangerousDan (now in S2 Games). I have a stream with about 600k views and 1.25k followers(subscribers). Unfortunately, when I came to college I became too busy to play everyday like I used to, so my viewer base dwindled. Lately, I've been taking less credits and in turn have more time to stream when I play video games and I'm trying to build my base back up. If you ever have any questions on streaming, hardware, or just want some entertainment, check it out.
So, why stream?
It's a hobby, just like sports or musical instruments. We as a gaming community have taken our interest of games and shared it among the masses of other people and other gamers. Some people do it for entertainment value, others do it for the spotlight, and some even do it to gain a profit from advertisements, donations, and endorsements. Imagine being able to capture that first moment you've beaten the water temple from Zelda OoT on video, and being able to re watch that video and share it with your friends. Or being the world first to beat SC2 on brutal difficulty, all while having a live audience watching. After awhile it really becomes an addiction. I stream every single player experience now as well as my multiplayer ones.
Well that sounds all good, but how do I do it? And can you point me to some popular streams of other players?
It's KoopahTroopah's
How To Stream For Dummies And Classassins
Here's all the details you should need for setting up a basic stream using Open Broadcaster Software, a step by step setup process, as well as my computer's specs and screenshots of my personal stream settings.
PLEASE READ - Disclaimer!!! Warning!!! BEWARE!!!
NEVER EVER EVER STREAM ANYTHING TO THE INTERNET THAT YOU DON'T WANT THE ENTIRE INTERNET TO SEE!!! It's easy to forget that you're broadcasting your actions to the internet, which is full of trolls/pirates/thieves/stalkers/etc... Never put personal information, banking info, FaceBook, your email inbox, photos of you naked (which we all know you have :disagree: ), photos/videos of anyone else naked, anything illegal, or whatever else up on stream. Please be smart and responsible with your broadcasting. That being said, let's get started...
Things You'll Need
Essentials:
- Open Broadcaster Software
- A Twitch.tv or equivalent broadcaster service account
- A decent download/upload internet connection. (I recommend at the very least 5mbps for each)
- Capture Card (Only required for console streaming, unless you're using those dang nabbit new gen console contraptions)
- A computer! I recommend a fast one. The better spec'd, the better it will perform and the better it will look.
Recommended:
- A second monitor - This is to keep your chat, your preview/control window of OBS, and any other programs in view but off of the broadcast.
- A headset/headphones + mic setup - I like to keep everything on one output audio source, which will be broadcasted on the stream. Also it's nice to be able to directly talk to your viewers. Personality makes it easier to like the broadcaster.
- A Camera - If you want to put your face in your stream, really not necessary but some people do prefer it
- A CPU Capture Card - Relieves stress on the CPU and GPU which means faster streams, less frame drops, better quality and less side-effects on your gaming
Koopah's Personal Computer Specs and Stream Settings (Updated 7/23/2014)
Building computers has always been a hobby of mine and my CPU goes through lots of changes usually, but this latest machine has been kicking for 3 or so years and it's still pumping out great performance. So no real need to change up just yet, but who knows I might make an even better one once I get some income. I'm not going to recommend computer hardware here, but if you'd like my opinions on how well your machine can stream send me a PM and I'll let you know what I think. Here's my current gaming rig to run at 1080p at 60 frames per second with minimal to no frame drops.
CPU - Intel i7 930 2.6GHz Overclocked to 3.2 GHz. A good CPU is the foundation of a fast stream.
***Video Card - EVGA nVidia Geforce 760GTX 2gb Superclocked - I put stars here because a decent video card is REQUIRED to stream at high quality. This was upgraded from a Radeon and added in within the past 1-2 years, and I haven't looked back. Most newer geforces come with a special optimized broadcasting codec called NVENC. Which I will get into later.
Memory - 12GB of G.Skill 1600mhz RipJaws memory. Not necessary to have THIS much, but I also did a lot of 3D modeling and animation stuff for school. I think 4-8GB of a decent speed is enough.
CPU Capture Card - Avermedia Live Gamer HD - This is a CPU capture card, which takes stress off your video card and CPU which increases frames and performance. Not required at all, but is helpful.
Console Capture Card - Intensity Shuttle USB 3.0 - I don't really recommend this card as it's been nothing but trouble since I've gotten it, but the updates that have come out have improved quality and performance. I would recommend a Hauppauge HD-PVR, that's like the industry standard card for streaming consoles.
Now before I get into a step by step on how to configure OBS, here's some screenshots of my open broadcasting setup and what everything is set to. I will refer to these in the guide later.
Here's a shot of my main window. In it I have a single scene setup with several sources, which is actually a little disorganized.
The sources are:
1) BRB - A text overlay that I put up when I go AFK.
2) Video Capture Device - My Microsoft LifeCam HD-3000 for when people want to see my ugly face.
3) Text (which I just now renamed) - A text box at the bottom of my stream which shows what music is playing from Winamp or Pandora.
4) Game Capture - Relatively new to OBS, this will inject a capture plugin directly into the graphics plugin used by a program. Thus capturing the render frames directly from the program instead of capturing your GPU's render of your monitor.
5) Console Capture Card - My Intensity Shuttle. For Streaming my Wii U and Xbox 360.
6) Capture Card - My Live Gamer HD
7) Software Capture - Back when I didn't have a Live Gamer and Game Capture wasn't a thing yet, this is what you would use to capture your entire monitor's screen. Unlike Game Capture, this captures text and other windows besides the game you're playing.
Here's all my OBS Settings in one long image. Spoilered for length.
Here's my current internet speedtest:
Welp, let's get into how to setup your stream!
Detailed Step by Step Setup Guide
1) Download OBS from the link provided above. I recommend getting the 64bit version if you have a quad-core processor and more than 4GB of RAM Memory. While the software is downloading go create an account on Twitch.TV or something else if you'd prefer. However, please keep in mind that these instructions are going to be for Twitch.TV. Install OBS when it's finished.2) Open OBS and click on Settings/Settings. Here you can refer to my settings picture to match if you have a similar build. The important sections are Encoding, Broadcast, and Advanced. Everything else could practically be left to default if you don't want to fine-tune or do something unique. In the following in-between steps I'll go through each setting block and explain what it do, and how I tune it. If you don't need it, just skip to step 3.
2A) Encoding - At the top of the video encoding section are three selections, two of them are probably grey-ed out unless you have a newer GTX card. If you have NVENC available, I would suggest using it as I heard it's less stressful on the CPU which is always good. If not, use x264. CBR is “constant bit rate”. This means that you will constantly stream at the max bitrate that you have chosen. I have this enabled to keep quality consistent. Padding means it will buffer some frames ahead of time to keep quality from dipping down. The buffer size doesn't really matter though, so I leave that unchecked. ***The Max Bitrate*** depends on the upload rate of your internet, this is the quality of how your stream will appear. A low bit-rate will appear artifacty and blocky with muddled pixels, a higher bit-rate will be clearer and less pixelated. Go to SpeedTest.net and see what you can handle. I would not recommend using all of your upload rate, this will slow your internet down to a crawl and may affect your stream. I also wouldn't go too high either, remember that this is the video rate you're broadcasting at, which means that viewers will need a high speed download rate to even view it without missing frames or constant buffering. Anywhere from 2-4k is usually the range. Faster games require a higher bit-rate to capture everything, slower games can handle a slower rate.
The audio encoding is pretty simple, just follow the screenshot. I'd leave the codec at AAC, and set the bit rate/format to whatever you can handle. I tried to max all my stuff out, but Twitch optimizes better with specific settings. Stereo instead of Mono of course. For those scary streams where viewers use headphones.
2B) Broadcast Settings - You can follow the screenshot here as well. Set your server to a local server near you for optimum ping so you don't drop frames broadcasting. Here you can also see a box for your stream key. Go to your Twitch.TV dashboard and it will be one of the options.(www.twitch.tv/YOURUSERNAME/dashboard/streamkey) Click Show Key, and copy what's here into the Stream Key box in OBS. OBS will then cover the key with password protection. NEVER EVER STREAM YOUR STREAM KEY LIVE TO YOUR BROADCAST. Anyone with your stream key will be able to broadcast to your channel.
2C) Video - Leave as is. You can set your resolution here if you don't want to broadcast your full monitor. If you're having performance issues or quality issues, you can also downscale your resolution. This is so you can turn your 1080p resolution into a 720p stream. Actually pretty helpful if you're having frame rate issues or if your PC isn't fast enough for 1080p.
2D) Audio - I think I left everything here at default. Really only necessary if you change your default audio device a lot in Windows and don't want OBS to do the same.
2E) Advanced - In the general section check multithreaded optimizations if you use a dual-core or quad-core CPU. Leave the priority class at Normal. You can adjust the scene buffering time to how you'd like if you're seeing quality issues, but I don't think it needs more than the default. Turn on Allow other modifers on hotkeys so you can still use hotkeys for other applications if it's not on by default.
In the video section, change the CPU preset to veryfast and the encoding to main. Messing with these settings can slow down your stream unless you know your computer can handle them. Change the keyframe interval to 2 so that Twitch is happy, and enable CFR. Leave the other two settings at default. I never touched Audio settings or Network settings.
2F) Microphone Noise Gate - This is actually really helpful and I just set this up in the past couple months or so. This is for if you have background static in your microphone when no one is speaking or if your mic is just really strong and picks up EVERYTHING. You can enable the preview to see a green bar and adjust on how you talk. I really like this option and it helps the quality of my stream because of all the noise and music playing. And we're done setting up the OBS program itself! Now you're ready to stream, so let's put some things in a scene and get it going!
3) Back at the OBS main screen, create a new scene by right clicking in the Scenes box at the bottom and clicking Add Scene. Title it however you'd like. Now in the right box labeled Sources, right click and hover over Add. In here are all the different kinds of sources you can stream from. If you'd like to stream your entire monitor, task bar, windows, programs, and all, select add a Monitor Capture. If you'd like to only stream the game that you're running, select Game Capture. If you have a capture card or camera that you'd like to take footage from, select Video Capture Device. Image for images, Image Slideshow for multiple images, and Text for text. You can add multiple sources on into a single scene. The sources will be rendered from the top of the list down, so if a full screen source is on top of a windowed source, the windowed source will be ignored and will not be rendered. I'll go into the different settings of Monitor, Game, and Video capture here.
3A) Monitor Capture - If you have multiple monitors, choose which monitor you'd like to broadcast here. Select Capture mouse cursor so the viewers can see where your mouse is. You can adjust gamma brightness to how you see fit. I leave everything else as default or unchecked.
3B) Game Capture - This application selection box will automatically refresh when a new application is loaded. This will auto detect when a game is loaded and inject into the application, if your stream does not find the right application just come back here, refresh, and set it to the one you want to stream after you open the game.
3C) Video Capture Device - Select the device you'd like to use. Hitting configure will open the devices personal control panel. Leave everything else unchecked or default. Only use Deinterlacing if you're having interlacing issues(when rows of pixels update at different times causing a jagged effect). Everything else can be left to default in Video, Audio, and Chroma Key. If the default resolution in video doesn't match your scene default resolution then enable use Custom resolution and change that. Keep at 60 fps if possible, or 30 if limited.
4) Now we have a scene and a source set up! Before you hit start streaming, click preview stream. Now you should see your screen if you have a capture card or a monitor source setup. If you're using Game Capture, open up a game and see how it looks. Right click in the preview pane, go to position/size, and select Fit to Screen to maximize your window or application to the entire broadcast size. Make sure everything is organized and sources are set as you'd like. Click Stop Preview when you're finished.
5) Click Start Streaming! There's a 20-30 second delay on what you stream to what shows up at Twitch because of their new video servers. They haven't said anything about improving it yet, so we'll have to deal with the delay. Be sure to check your audio levels on your microphone and speakers on your Twitch so you're not deafening your audience without knowing it. Fine tune them in the OBS main window by clicking on the red bars next to the microphone and speaker. Clicking either the microphone or the speaker will mute them respectively.
And that's it! You're all set. Get to streamin'! If you have any questions don't be afraid to stop by my stream at KoopahTroopah Gaming, or PM'ing me here. I'm glad to help. Have fun!
Popular Streams and Sites
Mario Marathon - What a great group of people here. Just amazing friends sitting on a couch playing various Mario games over and over again without breaks to raise money for Child's Play. This past time they raised over $111,000!!! Simply incredible.Siglemic - He's a machine. This streamer speed runs Super Mario 64 on an actual Nintendo 64. Constantly battling for the 70 star and 120 star world records.
Kripparrian - Lately the most popular D3 stream given his latest achievement of being the first to beat Inferno Hardcore Diablo.
Destiny - The Starcraft 2 zerg player. Funny as hell, great plays, gives good advice.
Angry Testie - This professional HoN player has been given the spotlight by S2 themselves as the popular stream of Heroes of Newerth. He offers lessons and gives entertainment value to playing public matches in the game.
Most of these streams are hosted on Twitch.Tv. There you can search by game to see how many viewers each game is getting, and what gamers are streaming live. Other sites include but are not limited to: Own3d.tv, livestream.com, and ustream.com.
List of PA Streamers
1. Koopahtroopah - Streams Dota 2, and various(usually backlog) other games to capture that "first play" feeling.
2. Delphinidaes - D3 Monkathon! and PA LoL caster
3. Trynant - Plays a random collection of games from his backlog
4. CorriganX - Plays a games from backlog and horror/bad games for charity.
5. TestSubject23 - Streams for charity and plays what the viewers want to see.
6. MsMya - Streams Backlog, starting to stream more frequently.
7. Mudzgut - Random Backlog, usually streams in the evening EST.
Let me know if you're a streamer! Give me a link and what you play and I'll add you to the OP!
1. Koopahtroopah - Streams Dota 2, and various(usually backlog) other games to capture that "first play" feeling.
2. Delphinidaes - D3 Monkathon! and PA LoL caster
3. Trynant - Plays a random collection of games from his backlog
4. CorriganX - Plays a games from backlog and horror/bad games for charity.
5. TestSubject23 - Streams for charity and plays what the viewers want to see.
6. MsMya - Streams Backlog, starting to stream more frequently.
7. Mudzgut - Random Backlog, usually streams in the evening EST.
Let me know if you're a streamer! Give me a link and what you play and I'll add you to the OP!
KoopahTroopah on
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[3DS] 3394-3901-4002 | [Xbox/Steam] Redfield85
Twitch: KoopahTroopah - Steam: Koopah
I only tuned in last year when the event was about 3/4 done, luckily I actually caught the start of it this time.
Sorry the time zone is EST. So they're about 52 minutes in at the moment. Already at a great start, they've already raised about $15,000.
http://www.mariomarathon.com/
Twitch: KoopahTroopah - Steam: Koopah
Switch (JeffConser): SW-3353-5433-5137 Wii U: Skeldare - 3DS: 1848-1663-9345
PM Me if you add me!
That's a shame. Don't worry though, they're not stopping anytime soon haha.
Twitch: KoopahTroopah - Steam: Koopah
Official PA Forums FFXIV:ARR Free Company <GHOST> gitl.enjin.com Join us on Sargatanas!
Twitch: KoopahTroopah - Steam: Koopah
Twitch: KoopahTroopah - Steam: Koopah
I'd love to stream other stuff too. Always wanted to try my hand at a fundraiser like MM with friends.
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[3DS] 3394-3901-4002 | [Xbox/Steam] Redfield85
Haha sounds pretty cool. I never really got into sports games. Except for like Mario Tennis and Strikers (which is awesome and I want to buy it again)
I'm going live for a couple hours and having MarioMarathon muted on my second screen before I go out for the night. If anyone wants any tips or questions on anything come say hi.
Twitch: KoopahTroopah - Steam: Koopah
Anyone have experience in streaming charity VG events, like the Mario Marathon? My local gaming club wants to do something similar for charity, and I have questions.
My mall had an N64 24 hour marathon way back when, if that's what you're asking about. It doesn't have to be streamed online if you coordinate with your local charity.
What questions do you have? I'm sure even if we haven't run something, we could offer advice of some kind.
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[3DS] 3394-3901-4002 | [Xbox/Steam] Redfield85
Twitch: KoopahTroopah - Steam: Koopah
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[3DS] 3394-3901-4002 | [Xbox/Steam] Redfield85
Twitch: KoopahTroopah - Steam: Koopah
Tumblr | Twitter | Twitch | Pinny Arcade Lanyard
[3DS] 3394-3901-4002 | [Xbox/Steam] Redfield85
They're just at 39k too. I'm excited to see how far they go.
Twitch: KoopahTroopah - Steam: Koopah
They're at 45k $ dollars now, by the way.
I second that motion. I ended up being stuck on the sliding level back when I was playing Sunhsine on my Gamecube.
Oh, and fan art comic.
HOT HOT LAVA! Hahaha. This is so fun.
edit: I love when he plays guitar. It is like a bonfire party.
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[3DS] 3394-3901-4002 | [Xbox/Steam] Redfield85
Twitch: KoopahTroopah - Steam: Koopah
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[3DS] 3394-3901-4002 | [Xbox/Steam] Redfield85
I think they racked up over 400 deaths in Super Mario World
Playing Mario 3 now..with a giant NES controller :rotate:
I wish I knew these guys in real life.
Twitch: KoopahTroopah - Steam: Koopah
Game-wise, they "just" need to 100% Mario 64, Sunshine, NSMB Wii and Galaxy 2 now.
I was up till 4:30am today. Ha. I was there when they figured out they had the wrong TV mode on and it was giving lag. Haha. They skyped with Jamie too (Child's Play-Penny Arcade). Was fun. She has been in the chat most of the day too.
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[3DS] 3394-3901-4002 | [Xbox/Steam] Redfield85
Twitch: KoopahTroopah - Steam: Koopah
Also, they're almost at 100k $ total. Crazy.
I was with them from midnight till about 8:30am. My God. Haha. Jed was so cranky toward when he left. It was funny. He made butter by going out and buying cream and jars and shaking the cream for a few minutes. It was glorious.
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[3DS] 3394-3901-4002 | [Xbox/Steam] Redfield85
In personal streamer news, I woke up on Sunday with a strange urge to play Donkey Kong Country. So, I did. Not only that, I got a friend to play it with me in Competitive Mode. We played online using some tools that shall not be named. We had a lot of fun, but just finished the first DKC last night. So, we plan on starting DKC2 sometime today or tomorrow. Also, I plan on attacking that backloggery of mine this weekend. Probably starting with Skyward Sword. See ya then.
Twitch: KoopahTroopah - Steam: Koopah