Smashcast was a live streaming platform that mainly focused on gaming content and gave gamers the opportunity to broadcast their game plays, interact with their viewers, and develop communities around their best games. It was launched in 2017 as a merger between Hitbox and Azubu, with the aim of providing creators and viewers with an immersive streaming experience.
One of the main features of Smashcast was its emphasis on real-time streaming, which allowed creators to interact with their audience members instantly. This made it possible for gamers to have instantaneous communication with their fans, thus promoting unity and closeness while they were airing.
Different tools and services were offered by Smashcast to enable both creators and viewers have a better experience when using this platform for live-streaming. Users could fully tailor their streams by employing overlays, graphics, and alerts, as well as having direct interaction with audiences via chat rooms broadcasting comments in real time, polls, giveaways, etc.
On top of that, subscribers were able to support streamers by sending small amounts of money called donations or subscribing to channels, while shoppers could buy virtual gifts that could be exchanged for different advantages, such as rewards or perks.
Besides gaming events, Smashcast also featured other types of content like e-sports tournaments, talk shows, musical performances, etc. By doing so, it brought together very many people who had various interests in terms of viewing content, thereby creating a vibrant creator community representing both sides on the site.
In August 2020, however, Smashcast announced its closure, citing financial difficulties along with challenges related to the increasingly competitive market in live streaming. Consequently, operations at Smashcast came to a halt, and the website and mobile applications became unavailable online anymore.
Even if one cannot access Smashcast any longer, there are memories shared by users and experiences they went through but most importantly, this is still evident from current thriving into gaming communities on other platforms where streamers make it possible to play games live.
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