VCT 2022 Stage 2 Challengers: Community-Casting and Japanese Audience Growth

The second stages of Valorant Champions Tour 2022 Challengers have ended in almost all regions. Independent commentators have traditionally contributed a lot to the viewership of the top tournaments: they cover the matches on their personal channels and thereby compete strongly with the official broadcasts. In a new Esports Charts article, we will tell you about the dynamics of their influence compared to Stage 1, and explain why Japan may become the main region for Valorant in the foreseeable future.

Statistics on Europe, North America, and Japan

The majority of European VCT 2022 Stage 2 viewers followed the tournament on the official broadcasts — 77.1% compared to 22.9% of viewers who watched the broadcasts of community casters. However, the Average Viewers number decreased by 29.79% and 32.62%, respectively, compared to Stage 1.

We should also mention the number of Hours Watched, as on the official European broadcasts it dropped by 21% compared to Stage 1, while in the case of the community casters it increased by 4-5%. All this is against the background of a general decrease in the number of channels. Put simply: interest in Valorant in Europe is gradually decreasing, and local viewers are more and more preferring to watch the community casters rather than the official broadcasts, although the latter still retain the main part of the audience.

The popularity of Valorant in North America has slipped a bit. The number of Hours Watched on official broadcasts decreased by 40.68% compared to Stage 1. But community casters saw a 10.59% increase in this metric. A similar shift in the audience can be seen if you check out the Average Viewers number on the broadcasts: -34.96% and +20.72%, respectively. If you put the numbers aside, it's clear that the popularity of Valorant in North America is becoming more and more dependent on influencers and community casters. And here it is worth asking why viewers watch these broadcasts: because they are interested in the game and the tournament, or because they are fans of a particular streamer?

We can see the opposite situation in Japan. The number of Hours Watched increased considerably during Stage 2 — the official broadcasts saw a 29.82% increase, while the community casters had a 52.30% increase. At the same time, the number of Average Viewers on official broadcasts increased by 46.32%, and on unofficial broadcasts decreased by 7.34%. First of all, this indicates the rapid growth of the popularity of Valorant in Japan. Second, more and more viewers are choosing official broadcasts.

Official Broadcasts vs Community Casters

VCT 2022 Challengers Stage 2: Official Broadcasts vs Community Casters

The most watched official channel during Stage 2 is valorant on Twitch, which hosted the English broadcast that accumulated almost 8.3 million Hours Watched. In second and third place are the Japanese channels valorant_jpn and VALORANT Japan, which got half as many HW as the leader. The official Brazilian channel valorant_br rounds out the Top 5 .

The leader by Hours Watched among community-casters is tarik — his broadcasts on Twitch accumulated 4.4 million Hours Watched. Japanese streamer fps_shaka ranks second, and sinatraa is in third place.

The Japanese channel valorant_jpn is in the lead by Peak Viewers at Stage 2 broadcasts, which were watched by more than 113.8K Peak Viewers. The Turkish channel wtcn showed the best result among the community-caster, reaching 84.1K Peak Viewers. The Top 5 also includes tarik, fps_shaka, superbuss_ and Mixwell.

Is Japan the new mecca of Valorant?

As you can see from the numbers above, Japan is now becoming one of the key regions for Valorant. Unlike Europe and North America, there has been a steady and steady growth rather than an outflow of audiences.

VCT 2021 Japan Stage 1 Masters had a Peak Viewers number of 29.5K people, while VCT 2022: Japan Stage 2 Challengers saw an increase to 290K PV. The number of Hours Watched went in turn from 600K to 10M, with a similar jump in the Average Viewers number on the live broadcasts. In short, the Valorant audience in Japan increased tenfold (!) in just a year.

What is the reason for the "Japanese miracle"? There are several factors, and the main one is the Japanese performance on the international stage. Only a year ago local teams were considered outsiders, who couldn't overcome the group stages of major tournaments. But that rough patch was cut short at Valorant Champions Tour 2022: Stage 1 Masters in Reykjavik. ZETA DIVISION won bronze in the World Championship, unexpectedly for the entire community, defeating world-class teams such as Fnatic, Ninjas in Pyjamas, Team Liquid and DRX. This result led to a boom in the popularity of Valorant in Japan.

ZETA DIVISION at Island. Source: valo2asia.com

Another important factor is the growth of competition within the region. Previously Japan was represented mainly by Crazy Raccoon and ZETA DIVISION, but now Northeption has joined them. That team will go to the World Championship in Copenhagen as the winner of VALORANT Champions Tour 2022: Japan Stage 2 Challengers.

We should mention the latter tournament individually. Japan has become one of the few regions to host Stage 2 Challengers in LAN, and it was at the huge Saitama Super Arena. The tournament was organized at the highest level, and the number of spectators and the large stage were reminiscent of Worlds or The International atmosphere. Europe and North America, in comparison, held Stage 2 tournaments online.