Tyler ‘Ninja’ Blevins has given a new interview to the BBC in order to promote a charity stream, and the surprising thing is how downbeat a lot of it is. Blevins began his career as a pro gamer, and achieved some success, but was a relatively low-level streamer until 2017/18, when his fondness for Fortnite coincided with the game exploding in popularity.
This led to some incredible numbers for Blevins, who became synonymous with the game on Twitch: thanks to team-ups with stars like Drake and Travis Scott, some streams were pulling in just under 700,000 live viewers. He was so big that in 2020 Epic added Ninja skins to the game. These days Blevin is still huge: the third most-popular streamer on Twitch, with over 67 million followers across platforms. But those kinds of numbers are now beyond him (or most anyone), and elements of the internet won’t let him forget it.
Blevins says every time he streams the “haters” are straight in to “berate” him for his lower viewership numbers:
“I think I’m the only streamer on the planet who was pulling 100,000 viewers [per stream] consistently, but now I get like seven or eight thousand across Twitch and YouTube,” said Blevins. “So that’s something that the Internet and trolls remind me of every day and the last couple of years have been rough.”
Obviously Blevins can console himself with the many, many millions he’s made streaming, but at the same time it’s not nice for anyone to get a load of abuse “literally every day” when they’re just doing their thing. Blevins’ moderators use the ban-hammer liberally on such folk, but as we all know the internet in this respect is like a game of whack-a-mole.
Blevins understandably (and I would say accurately) puts his own fall in viewers down to a drop in the popularity of Fortnite, but said “I still love it and have a community that is strong and stays with me. I’m a gamer and an entertainer at heart—it’s in my blood.”
The interview was given to promote of Blevins’ 24-hour charity stream, which is live now, and raising funds which go towards skin cancer detection and prevention. Last year medics discovered two cancerous moles on the streamer’s skin, which were subsequently removed.
“Me and my wife were going to give to this cause no matter what because it’s going to be important to us for the rest of our lives,” says Blevins. “But it’s not just about us giving our money, it’s the awareness aspect too.”
The stream will feature guest appearances from doctors, has a target of raising $250,000 and Blevins says he’ll make a large donation himself: but he especially wants to encourage us all to get our own moles checked.
