Gaming
Gary 'BreaK' Marshall was recently crowned as your favourite UK PUBG streamer – now he's here to tell you how to improve your streaming skills.
PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds is still one of the most-watched games on Twitch, with players such as Gary 'BreaK' Marshall, De4dCert and Hayz attracting loads of viewers.
Many of these fans helped Gary 'BreaK' Marshall top our best UK PUBG streamers poll. Following his victory, we spoke to him about streaming Battlegrounds and he shared some of the secrets of his success.
When you started streaming what was your set up like? What do you use now?
I started with a typical PC setup. Headset mic, no stream PC, the usual really. I think the only thing I had in the beginning was two monitors which really helped.
What gear would you recommend to someone who wants to start streaming Battlegrounds?
If you're on a budget, just having two monitors helps out loads for streaming. You can see OBS, if your mic's muted and if you're dropping frames. You can have chat and your notifications up too so you can answer questions and all that good stuff.
If you want to go a step further, I think a decent mic is next on the list. It makes a huge difference having your sound on point. For anyone super serious, a dedicated stream PC, mixer and DSLR camera are great and are becoming the norm with high tier streamers.
Are there any other general tips you would give to someone who is starting out?
When starting out, you can’t look at the money aspect of streaming – it absolutely has to be for fun. A lot of people starting out get too focused on money and quit their jobs far too early before they're established. Keep your full-time/part-time jobs and stream on the side for fun. If you have fun, your community and viewers will have fun and more people will join. Quitting your job too early puts way too much pressure on you and the fun quickly diminishes.
Do you have any tips for increasing stream attendance?
I say this quite a lot but I think on Twitch you can either be really funny, crazy interactive with chat or super skilful at a game. If you're hitting two out of three of those or completely excel in one then you have a great chance of making it, in my opinion. T
Then the obvious stuff like keeping notifications to a minimum, having a little bit of info about yourself below the stream, having great mods to answer questions or to prompt you to answer questions you miss. Also, be the example you want to set – if you do this then like-minded people will be drawn to you and your community will naturally flourish with nice people.
Moving onto Battlegrounds, what has been your favourite game mode to stream?
My favourite game mode is probably squads. You can work together with your partner and get a lot of kills if you play super aggressive. We played the Zombie mode for a while but I enjoy fighting too much.
Do you notice stream attendance going up for customs over duos and squads or is it all relatively similar? What’s more popular?
I don't really notice much difference with customs in PUBG. One thing I do know is that a lot of people prefer me playing solos. I can interact with chat a little more and be more of an idiot, I guess.
Can you give us any tips for PUBG itself? Are there any common mistakes you notice with PUBG players that might stop them from getting a win?
One main tip for PUBG is be confident, especially at a higher level. Play aggressively when in first person and make sure you do damage. You'll either kill them or do so much damage that they'll think twice about engaging you again and you get in their heads then. Put them on the backfoot.
Do you have any memorable moments from streaming/playing PUBG that you can tell us about?
My most memorable moment to date is probably my win at [the] Gamescom [invitational]. It was the first game ever played in a competitive environment on LAN. Going into a 1v1 in the final circle with one of my biggest adversaries from Arma 3 BattleRoyale and him being on one of the other large esports teams was huge pressure. I was shaking so much during the game that I don’t think I'll ever be nervous again at LAN – I used it all up in that one game.
