The game Hogwarts Legacy, released this week amidst controversy, broke the record for concurrent viewers on Twitch for a single-player game.
On its first day of availability via early access via the deluxe edition, the Avalanche Software studio’s RPG reached peak of 1.3 million concurrent viewersbeating Cyberpunk 2077’s record with 1.1 million as of December 2020.
According to figures from Ginx.tv, only titles like Valorant (1.72 million in April 2020), League of Legends (1.78 million in November 2019) and Fortnite (2.3 million in June 2020) had more viewers .
One of the reasons that contributed to the record was Twitch Drops, which gave viewers the chance to unlock in-game gear by watching 20 minutes of Tuesday’s launch stream.
Hogwarts Legacy takes place in the Harry Potter universe, created by JK Rowling. The game has been facing several controversies due to the author’s transphobic opinions, with players boycotting the production.
JK Rowling’s comments were controversial and even made film actors, such as Emma Watson and Eddie Redmayne, publicly manifest themselves in support of the transgender community.
Resetera, considered the largest independent video game forum in the world, banned threads about Hogwarts Legacy due to the author’s comments. Although JK Rowling was not involved in the development of the game, many users that the author will profit from the title and benefit from its popularity.
