The game Hogwarts Legacy is a big topic on Twitch. Following statements by Harry Potter author JK Rowling, some people on Twitter and Twitch are calling for the game to be boycotted. The situation escalates in the “Girlfriend Reviews” twitch stream: The streamer meets the criticism, she seems dissolved. In the discussion about the incident, big Twitch streamers like Asmongold or xQc find very harsh words – against the critics.
This was the situation beforehand:
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That was the incident: The Hogwarts Legacy stream saw a lot of protest in Twitch chat against the stream. The streamer apparently saw this as a hopeless situation:
Ultimately, the streamer says, there’s no way to properly handle the game. Her boyfriend defends her: she didn’t program the game, she’s just showing it.
While the streamer is telling this, she already sounds pissed off.
Later, her boyfriend says: He’s only in his second fight and every time he looks at the chat, it weighs him down.
The girlfriend already sounds audibly upset, says she needs a break and is going to withdraw.
The friend says, “You did it.” The toxicity in the chat apparently made the streamer give up.
Much criticism of streams, even a “black list” existed
What is this protest? Resistance against Hogwarts Legacy has been forming since March 2022. The reason for the protest is the author JK Rowling, who has been sharply criticized for statements about transgender.
Some are calling for the game to be boycotted so that JK Rowling doesn’t make any money from it. Because with the money she would support transphobic organizations.
In protest, Hogwarts Legacy has already been tagged with tags like “transphobic” or “anti-Semitic” on Steam.
Now that the release is getting closer, the discussion arose as to who is showing the game on Twitch and who is not.
In the meantime, there was even a “list” of streamers showing Hogwarts Legacy. The site was apparently meant to “brand” streamers who broke the boycott call and showed the game. The site has since disappeared from the web(via dexerto).
Twitch streamers who chose not to show Hogwarts Legacy are also being criticized. German streamer Kalle Koschinsky says he was insulted and attacked in comments after clearly positioning himself against Hogwarts Legacy. That threw him off track (via twitter). Other people even received death wishes and threats.
Twitch: Gronkh asks, “Am I a bad person if I don’t care about JK Rowling?” – Trending on Twitter
Asmongold Responds Sharply to Boycott Call “You’re Just NPCs”
This is how the criticism from big streamers is commented: In Germany, the discussion about Hogwarts Legacy and that it was wrong to show the game hit the great Twitch streamer “Gronkh”, who reacted sympathetically to the criticism of him, tried to compensate, admitted that he had expressed himself wrongly .
The biggest Twitch streamers in the US are now reacting completely differently to the tense situation:
MMO streamer Asmongold puts personal freedom above all else. He has zero sympathy for anyone wanting to tell someone else what to show on Twitch:
I don’t know what’s wrong with people on the internet who think that just because they have a problem, someone needs to listen to them. Nobody cares about your opinion. You are just a name on a screen. You are just NPCs.
Asmongold urges streamers to ignore such people and not invest emotional energy in them or justify themselves. People would have to be banned and anyone who interfered would also have to be kicked out.
xQc reacts to the criticism with hard flames
The world’s largest streamer for Hogwarts Legacy, xQc, reacts even more blatantly. Responding to criticism that Harry Potter author JK Rowling may be capitalizing on the game’s success and promoting transphobic causes, he says:
“People fund all sorts of sordid stories with their purchases. Anything you can think of, okay? And now they’re trying to make people feel bad about buying a video game?”
Then it gets very drastic. Let’s describe it a little softer:
People could visit him where there is no sun. They are “fucking liberal Andys” – what’s the point of that crap anyway?
This is behind it: There is a big difference in how Gronkh is handling the situation, who asked for understanding, tried to penetrate the issue and find a solution, and how the US streamers are reacting.
Asmongold and xQc, both major streamers, have a completely different approach to criticism of game streams. They react with complete incomprehension, refuse to have these topics even pushed upon them and slide into vulgarity.
Especially xQc, which is also considered “not brand safe” because of its passion for gambling, doesn’t seem to bother the subject at all.
xQc is by far the biggest streamer on Hogwarts Legacy: it has already been watched 1.9 million hours – that’s more than 3 times as many hours as the number 2 has accumulated on Twitch.
Hogwarts Legacy is a huge hit on Twitch, breaking Cyberpunk’s record despite boycotting some streamers