PlanetSide 2 Embeds Live Gameplay Streaming to Twitch

Uploading videos of one’s gameplay has been a “thing” in the gaming community ever since YouTube (News - Alert) happened, but Sony Online Entertainment is taking it a step further by embedding the ability to livestream a gaming session into PlanetSide2, the rabidly anticipated sci-fi multiplayer online first-person shooter due out Nov. 20.

Users will be able to, with a touch of a button, turn on the livecasting feature, which will stream the gameplay to the Twitch gamer community site, where more than 20 million gamers gather every month meet to broadcast, watch and chat about gaming.

 “With the Twitch community now in excess of 20 million gamers, live broadcasting has evolved from a niche novelty to an integral part of the gaming experience,” said Matthew DiPietro, vice president of marketing at Twitch. “[Now, the] community to will continue to grow since the biggest barrier to entry has been removed. There is no easier way to broadcast game play to the Web than this.”

Other titles are expected to follow, but PlanetSide 2 will provide an excellent test base for the concept. It’s a free-to-play title that has logged 21 million minutes to date across 100,000 users in its beta testing phase. It allows players to battle in massive environments alongside and against thousands of players, engaging in intense air and ground combat that spans the alien planet of Auraxis.

“We’re in discussions with the industry’s largest developers and publishers, so there’s no question that integrating turn-key live broadcasting into games is the future of this industry,” added DiPietro. “With SOE being the first to illustrate the appeal of instant in-game streaming on Twitch, we couldn’t ask for a better partner to validate this movement.”

For Sony, it’s a way to deepen player engagement. “At SOE we believe very strongly in providing deeper social and emergent gameplay experiences,” said John Smedley, president at Sony Online Entertainment. “The ability for our players to broadcast their gameplay directly to Twitch will provide Twitch’s huge user base a chance to see the massive scale battles in PlanetSide 2 for themselves. We’ve gone out of our way to make the interface extremely easy to use and allow players to cast with just one-click.”