Streaming your favorite games on Twitch has never been so easy before. If you ever wanted to stream your games so your friends could jump in and watch you, here’s how to use OBS and get started in minutes
1 Get OBS
OBS is open-source software and 100% free. You can download a copy at https://www.obsproject.com/
2 Add Global Sources
Open OBS and you will be greeted by a grey window. Very boring, let’s get something on the screen right away.
1. Step Click on Global Sources:
2. Step Click Add
3. Step Select Game Capture
4. Step Enter a name, e.g. the name of the game you want to stream (Planetside 2, Archeage, etc)
5. Step Select the game from the dropdown. If it does not appear, game capture is not supported by your game. Planetside 2 works just fine with OBS.
6. Step Confirm with OK
3 Setting Up A Secene
1. Step Select a Scene and right-click into the white area Sources
2. Step You can then pick the global source we just set up in step 2!
3. Step Click the button Preview Stream and you will see a black screen
4. Step Drag OBS to your 2nd screen. Alt+Tab into your game and back to the desktop. You can then see if it is capturing your game correctly.
4 Editing Your Scene (Twitch Config)
Select your scene and click “Settings”
Go to Encoding:
You might see a red warning, if you do, simply click the “Optimize button”. You might want to tweak the max bitrate a little, e.g. change it to 3200.
Go to Video:
Twitch requires a 16:9 resolution for a high-quality stream. Enter 1920×1080 as your custom resolution
5 The Twitch Stream Key
Twitch will provide a Stream key that you have to enter into the “Play Path” on the settings screen (Broadcast Settings).
You can get your Stream key from this link: twitch.tv/broadcast/dashboard/streamkey
Copy and paste this key. Confirm with Apply, then OK
You are ready to stream your first game on Twitch using OBS!
Drag OBS to the 2nd screen and click Start streaming and you’re good to go. Alt+Tab back into Planetside 2 or whatever game you want to stream and you are “on the air” broadcasting to a huge audience
Final Words On Twitch Streaming: Making Money From Subscribers
Now streaming may seem like a great way to make some money from stream donations and subscribers, but it’s really not that easy. I do not want to discourage anyone, but chances are you will never get past 100 viewers. Even if you’re a skilled player and get a thousand viewers occasionally, it will not be good enough to make any decent money. Top earners on Twitch not only have to be good entertainers, they also have to build up a huge following, which can take years if you are just starting out. It’s not as easy as it seems and only top streamers manage to get past 1000 subscribers. Anyway, with that being said, it has been done before, so if you really think you have what it takes, go for it, personally I would only stream for fun.
Sidenote: If you want to pick up some real skills that you can turn into real money, here’s a useful guide on setting up Raspberry Pi that I’ve written for beginners, very easy to follow. It’s a great way to get started with Linux and programming. Good programmers are always in high demand and make a lot more money than any Twitch streamer out there.