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Easily Add Polls, Mini-Games, And More With Twitch Extensions

With this new platform, Twitch is bringing interactive tools to all creators and giving streaming a massive facelift.

Charles Singletary Jr

August 31, 2017 4:10 PM

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Up until now, the path to creating more dynamic Twitch streams involved harrowing trips into third-party territory. A handful of entities have made the addition of polls, informative overlays, and the like easier to manage but Twitch is bringing these tools closer to home with their new Twitch Extensions platform.

Extensions kicks the doors open on Twitch’s Developer Portal, helping third-party developers reach Twitch creators directly so that they can customize their channels with dynamic and interactive content.

“Twitch is a platform where communities create, share, and interact with the content they love,” said Ryan Lubinski, Product Manager for Extensions at Twitch, in a press release for the announcement. “With Twitch Extensions, we’re taking interactivity to the next level by empowering our developer community to create customized interactive content, directly integrated with the Twitch platform, opening up a whole new world of creator-viewer interaction.”

With a massive influx of affiliates, it behooves Twitch to give their creators access to as many tools as possible as they work to make their channels as professional and engaging as possible. Direct integration like this goes a long way to making the platform as accessible as possible for creators with varying levels of experience. Twitch Extensions will be arriving really soon and here’s a list of all the extensions that will be available at launch:

• Destiny Armory Overlay by Grab Games: Dive into Destiny gear, view details on perks, get class info, and more - all seamlessly incorporated into the stream.
• Gear on Amazon: This panel highlights Partners and Affiliates’ favorite products on Amazon, making it easy for viewers to find and purchase them. It also helps fans support their favorite creators, since members of the Amazon Associates program earn commissions.
• Hearthstone Match Ticker by Battlefy: Live ticker for Hearthstone tournaments on Battlefy.
• Innkeeper: Interactive Hearth Overlay by Curse: Interactive deck overlay and card tooltips.
• Isaac Tracker by Pretzel Tech: Allows viewers to view the level seed and details on items picked up while playing Binding of Isaac.
• Kappa Pet by Porcupine: A virtual pet that lives on the channel page, which responds to viewers, evolves as the stream runs, and goes to sleep when the creator is offline.
• Leaderboard by Muxy: Automatically displays the channel’s top five cheerers.
• Live Emote Reactions by Porcupine: Allows viewers to react by sharing emotes live.
• Loyalty, Music, Polls & Games by Streamlabs: Shows loyalty points, receives song requests, displays polls, lets viewers enter giveaways, and host mini-games.
• MasterOverwatch by Master Network: On-screen statistics overlay for Overwatch broadcasters.
• OP.GG For League of Legends by OP.GG: Provides in-game statistics for creators, including summoner spells, runes, and masteries.
• Overlay by Muxy: One stream overlay with many interactive apps.
• Schedule by Layer One: Keep your community up to date on your scheduled Twitch events in their local timezone.
• Smart Click Maps by ExMachima: Shows a “heatmap” of clicks, allowing viewers to suggest the creator’s next move, card, or weapon by clicking directly on the video.
• StreamLegends by Proletariat Inc: Fight monsters, loot treasure, build your channel’s town and raid together.
• Summoner Info by Legendary Builds: A summary of the creator’s League of Legends player info with runes, masteries, most played champions, and recent ranked games.
• Teams by GameWisp: Promote a Twitch team you belong to with the Teams panel.
• TRN Battlegrounds (PUBG) Live Tracker by Tracker Network: Shows live updates of PLAYERUNKNOWN’S BATTLEGROUNDS stats. Both Overlay and Panel options available.
• TRN Destiny Live Tracker by Tracker Network: Tracks Destiny progress and loadout.
• TRN Rocket League Live Tracker by Tracker Network: Tracks Rocket League skill ratings.
• What’s Playing by Pretzel Tech: Shows what music is currently playing on stream.

“As thousands of developers already know, the opportunity to build a business helping creators earn a living on Twitch is expanding rapidly,” said Kathy Astromoff, VP Developer Success, Twitch. “Today, we’re inviting developers to help us innovate on one of the most-watched interfaces on the internet: the Twitch channel page. At our TwitchCon Developer Day on October 19, 2017, we will share more about what’s coming next, including how streamers and developers can make money through Twitch Extensions. You won’t want to miss it.”

The company launched their new desktop app this month, are giving PS4 Pro streamers a boost, and Twitchcon 2017 is also right around the corner. Full steam ahead on the hype train.

Charles Singletary Jr

News Editor

Charles Singletary Jr keeps the updates flowing as the News Editor, breaking stories while investigating the biggest topics in gaming and technology. He's pretty active on Twitter, so feel free to reach out to him @The_CSJR. Got a hot tip? Email him at Charles.Singletary@Shacknews.com.