Crunchyroll and Twitch have announced a partnership to host a five-day marathon of recent anime hits spanning over 15 series. The Crunchyroll anime marathon will include episodes from Yuri on Ice, Mob Psycho 100, Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid and Rokka: Braves of the Six Flowers.
The marathon starts July 27 at 3:30 p.m. PDT and runs until Aug. 1, but the full slate of featured anime and complete streaming schedule will not be revealed until July 21. The marathon will air on Twitch.tv/TwitchPresents, Twitch’s programmatic content channel for “special presentations, marathon-style broadcasts, and other exclusive events.”
Don’t know what programmatic content is? Me neither, so I looked it up. “Programmatic is the practice of using software and algorithms to place targeted content in front of defined groups in highly specific and relevant situations,” said these guys.
Another site explains it in a multi-step kind of way, where “brands produce content and distribute it across the web based on their target audience, interests and activity. This content is then served within a publisher’s editorial stream, identically matching both look and feel whilst being contextual relevant to their site. The story is clearly marketed as sponsored and when the user interacts with a call to action, they are taken to the brand’s destination.”
I’m still not sure why TwitchPresents is labeled “programmatic content” when something like this Crunchyroll stream seems to be curated by real humans, but I’m not an egghead, just a weeb schlub like everybody else.
Anyway, Twitch will release brand new, exclusive emotes themed after some of the series shown in the marathon. These emotes will be accessible to any viewers who subscribe to the TwitchPresents channel.
“Anime content on Twitch always sparks a lot of positive feedback from our community given how gaming and anime culture have borrowed a lot from each other,” said Annie Berrones, director of emerging content marketing at Twitch, in a press release. “By partnering with Crunchyroll for our first ever anime marathon and featuring more than 15 different series over the course of five days, we will be able to tap into this passion of our community in a much more robust fashion than ever before.”
“Crunchyroll and Twitch bring together passionate fan bases unlike any other in our respective communities -- so this first-ever anime marathon is the perfect partnership for Twitch and Crunchyroll fans alike,” said Kun Gao, co-founder and general manager of Crunchyroll, in a statement. “We’re bringing two powerful fandoms together around our shared passions, and we look forward to introducing new viewers to some of our favorite anime series starting next weekend.”
Any guesses on what other anime might be streamed in this Twitch first? They’re clearly appealing to as wide a range as possible, so I’m putting down my money on thriller mystery Erased and possibly ReLife or ReZero, all of which are about guys redoing life in different ways, but in different genres and settings. (Too bad Amazon’s got its greedy mitts on Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress, and I just don’t think Attack on Titan is destined for this stream. Come back in two days to tell me if I’m wrong!) Grimgar of Fantasy and Ash was popular but rather slow-paced. Maybe Rage of Bahamut: Virgin Soul? Or Food Wars for the comedy shonen crowd?
Previous Twitch marathons include Bob Ross’ The Joy of Painting, Julia Child’s The French Chef, Pokémon, Power Rangers, Cosmos: A Personal Voyage, Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, and Mystery Science Theater 3000, but this partnership with Crunchyroll is the first time Twitch has marathoned anime. What are you hoping to see? Feel free to let us know in the comments section below.
