A Change in Direction

“Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run,
There’s still time to change the road you’re on…”

Messrs. Page, Plant / Led Zeppelin / Stairway to Heaven

One cannot be a noteworthy villain for particularly long without coming across the infamous quandary – when faced with having one’s plans foiled for the umpteenth time – of having to make the decision to change tack and begin nefarious plans anew, or to regroup and attack with renewed vigour.

For quite some time now I, the Flaming Monocle – infamous Twitch villain, fragrant evildoer, and intellectual legend – have been appearing on Twitch-based livestreams with the intention of playing video games with ‘a slightly-skewed moral compass’. Now we know that’s what gets said when folks drop-by and have no idea what’s going on. But of late I’ve realised – far later than most, I expect – that this has rarely been the case. In fact, most streams have been very much like ‘person plays video games online and talks to people in chat’. It’s a tried and tested formula that works better for some than others.

But it is not what I had intended.

Early on in 2017 I refreshed the look and feel of the channel and was happy enough with the result to keep it for some time. Some nice animations and transitions and whatnot got me some little notoriety within the Twitch universe and resulted in a few invitations to speak on the topic of production value at events like TwitchCon. Yet I could not help feeling as though I had cheated – and not in the fun evil way. It is true that I value a slick production over pretty much anything else on the show, but it felt as though I was just slapping together fun visual clips whenever a raid or some other gameplay-interrupting event occurred. That’s apparently enough to qualify as ‘good production value’.

I’ve seen streamers invest thousands of dollars into a unique experience tailored exactly to them, branding that matches throughout their social media presence and with such flair and style that I cannot help but feel nothing but raw unadulterated envy at their splendour. Yet a lot of these folks have similar viewership figures than plenty of streamers who download the nearest freebie stock template and go live with nothing but a webcam and gaming footage, with a total mishmash of visual design, and a complete lack of branding consistency.

I recognise that there is no guaranteed formula to be a popular streamer, but one cannot help but feel slightly robbed when one sees streamers far more popular than yourself put in relatively little effort yet be rewarded with more attention from the masses. How very dare they! I spent HOURS on this little animated thingummy, and you cast thine eyes at another?! Can’t you see I’m the better streamer here?

Apologies, sometimes those petty things slip out.

I have not streamed since February of this year because of this quandary. You might think it foolish, childish, or plain strange to avoid doing the thing you love because of something as simple as you feel it might not turn out the way you want, but since day one I have made it my number one priority to put out a product I would be happy watching myself. I’m a tough customer to please.

So, with all of this in mind, I’ve come to a decision. Well, a couple of them, in fact:

1. I still want to play video game content, but I don’t wish for it to be the main focal point outside of unique events.
2. I much prefer the format of interacting with viewers on the live shows.

With that in mind I have decided to re-orient the shows to fit the vibe of a variety-style talk-show. A Podcast-feel but maintaining the live elements of video gaming as a backdrop. Sure, it’s not a new idea by any means and won’t negate any of the issues I’ve had that I’ve outlined above, but I hope to bring something fresh to a category that feels a little saturated and have a blast in the process.

I mean, it’s a work-in-progress.

I would love to be the nefarious host of a themed talk-show that invites people to discuss a diverse array of topics bound within the videogame sphere, adding some cutaway elements such as our musical maestro Kyle Sevenoaks delivering a delightful dose of diabolical doings, ‘fan mail’ segments, themed giveaways and so forth. Of course, the fun spin on the average talk show though would be an element of evil because that’s what we do in the lair, right?

Guests will be given the opportunity to discuss things with as one might expect in any given late night show you might have seen, but at the end I’d like to include a segment with each guest that I lovingly call ‘Justify Your Existence‘. Very much like the lovechild of ‘Mastermind’ and ‘Room 101’ – guests will have a short quick-fire exchange with me, explaining why they should be free to leave the lair ‘alive and well’ before the audience determines their fate.

I feel it’ll be popular. It’ll give me a good reason to air-out the lava.

This has dragged-on longer than I had wanted it to. I’ll wrap things up for now. This is the germination of an idea I’d like to run with, and invest in. In the meantime, I’ll be firing up streams again in the old style while I put some money away to fund this fresh look and feel. So, fear not, evil will be returning to Twitch shortly!

I remain your rambling fiend,

The Flaming Monocle
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