By Andrew Dodson on August 25, 2015 at 7:55pm
About this time last year, Google lost Twitch.tv to Amazon and now the internet giant is about to launch it's own video game streaming service - YouTube Gaming.
Even before it's launched, YouTube Gaming is already being seen as Twitch.tv's biggest competitor because while Twitch.tv already has a solid base of users, a lot of those users still use YouTube to store older streams. YouTube Gaming is a one-stop shop for both casual and professional streamers.
Being that the new service will be YouTube based, it will use a HTML5 video player and will come with a built-in "DVR mode" which will allow people watching a stream to rewind and catch up on parts of the game that they missed. This will make streaming less of a "scheduled" event and allow interested people to watch live streams without necessarily having be 'live' - so you can go to the bathroom or take a break for a few minutes and then come back, starting right where you left off.
The video player itself looks a lot like what you'd expect from YouTube, but with a nice chat window on the side. The main page utilizes Google's new toolkit - Polymer - which makes YouTube Gaming have a really nice 'app' feel, with the ability to slide tabs around to see more information or navigate to a different user. The site will also keep track of what you're watching and what you like and will try to make recommendations to you for other streams that might interest you.
YouTube Gaming will be available tomorrow anywhere that YouTube is available. It will also be available on both iOS and Android devices.
