Twitch is the go-to place for streamers, but YouTube isn’t taking its hat out of the ring. Just this week, YouTube Gaming has poached TimTheTatMan and DrLupo, two huge Twitch stars, in exclusive deals.

With E3 this year canceled due to COVID-19, a number of other events have popped-up in its place. The Summer Game Fest produced by Geoff Keighley will be partnering with YouTube Gaming for some exclusive content.

Live streaming has become a massive trend in the gaming world with platforms such as Twitch and Mixer gaining popularity. To launch new platforms or keep players on a specific option, some of these services make exclusive deals with popular streamers and, in line with that, YouTube Gaming has today announced an exclusive deal with PewDiePie.

Back in September of 2018, Google announced plans to merge YouTube Gaming with the standard YouTube platform and immediately made its content available in both locations. Now, YouTube is officially pulling the plug on that standalone app in just a few days.

Following expansion into television last month, YouTube is now aiming to capture the eSports market after partnering with FACEIT. YouTube will exclusively stream the Esports Championship Series (ECS) competitive gaming league, as well as work with players to build audiences on the video platform.

After adding gameplay recording features to mobile apps alongside its new YouTube Gaming platform launch earlier this month, Google is today updating its Google Play Games app for Android with similar features.

The update will allow users of the Play Games app to quickly hop into gameplay recording with the ability to share their own commentary simultaneously using their device’s front facing camera and microphone.

It’s simple. In the Play Games app, select any game you want to play, then tap the record button. You can capture your gameplay in 720p or 480p, and choose to add video of yourself and commentary via your device’s front facing camera and microphone. When you’re done recording, you can quickly edit and upload your video to YouTube.

Google notes that the feature should come in handy for some of the content creators contributing to the roughly 144 billion minutes of gaming videos and live streams viewed on YouTube each month.

The updated Google Play Games app for Android is rolling out to users in the US and UK starting this week with users in other countries getting access in the near future.

YouTube Gaming, Google’s attempt at taking on Twitch, is allegedly set to launch tomorrow, August 26, according to TechCrunch’s sources. The site will go live at gaming.youtube.com tomorrow in the US and the UK and will act as a central hub where viewers can find and watch people live streaming their own video gameplay.

Google announced that it would be getting in to gaming live-streams a couple of months back and has been working behind the scenes to get its service ready for a public rollout. Once live it will act as a direct competitor to Twitch, an Amazon service which lets gamers stream their gameplay and offer it up to viewers to watch. It’s a huge market to get in to, and one which YouTube clearly has the infrastructure to manage. Just searching through YouTube for game walkthroughs or live-streams should be enough to convince anyone that the game-streaming market is huge.

The questions is: Will YouTube compete with Amazon’s Twitch effectively? Twitch has more than 1.5 million broadcasters and amasses over 100 million visitors every month and cost Amazon nearly $1 billion in September last year. Interestingly, Google itself was an interested party and was bidding in competition with Amazon to buy Twitch last year — at times Google was even believed to have closed the deal. YouTube Gaming will be available to download on Android when it launches.