It's 2026. I'm looking at my Twitch profile, and it reminds me that I haven't streamed in January. 35 followers, all real people.

The statistics remind me of what I have neglected. It means I have to look beyond the dashboard and ask myself a few questions.

Truth be told, I haven't streamed in months, not since August. I told myself that I would, with all the new games coming out in 2025, be ready to test. Heck, I've even managed to avoid spoilers for Deltarune's third and fourth installments. And yet, with all the chaos that ensued in 2025 from the real world, gaming, and the speculative fiction industry, setting up the area where I stream has become harder.

It's not because that area is in our guest room. No, the reason is more emotional: I streamed for myself and other people. Now I need to stream for myself again this year and have fun regardless of who comes to watch.

Why Do I Like Streaming?

I enjoy streaming on Twitch because it allows me to connect with my friends. Part of the reason I streamed Spelunky for so long, despite taking several years to beat the game, was that more than a few people who had heard me on voice chats were surprised to hear me swear. My online bestie even started a "fuck" counter after I ran into multiple hazards. Geometry Dash went even worse, as I immediately switched back to Spelunky after a few minutes of navigating a colorful shape through an obstacle course.

Sharing a gaming experience means going on a journey through story-rich games. I've struggled with Celeste as mentioned, but I ,also gave therapy to a robot and used a friendship to save a girl and her monster. The iffy games allow me to commiserate with the viewers who are similarly disappointed with the payoff.

Sharing a gaming experience with others also allows me to measure my amateur skills against professionals who can remain charming and hilarious. I like finding the underdogs, the games that an average Steam customer may not see on a first perusal.

What Happened in 2025?

Thanks to real-life events kicking me in the teeth and the heart at the same time, I left a friend group that I had joined nearly ten years ago. I won't go into the details, but it wasn't fun. Mainly, I'd stream, and people from that group tended to join. They're the ones that helped inspire how I would stream because some had the know-how, and others had the spark. One iconic moment had our friend group trying to guess how to find a star in one of the Deponia games; the answer left everyone, including the player and us viewers, baffled. (In hindsight, Deponia always goes for the absurd answer, but at the time I was saying "What?!" a lot when we got to that moment.)  

I'm still friends with some of those individuals, and others I have held at arm's length. Since then, however, preparing a stream has taken more physical and emotional effort. When you lose that many people after realizing you both have changed too much, it leaves you feeling empty. The void didn't register until halfway through the year, as I had games I wanted to stream but lacked the energy for setup and timing. I was sad and upset, letting the pain weigh on me. But I didn’t realize the consequences of sadness until the very end of December. 

Back to Streaming for Myself

If I were to stream for myself again and not worry about the emptiness, I would find a balance between troubleshooting the lag issues and enjoying the ride. Instead of worrying that I get boring when I get serious, as I stop talking and completely focus on the screen, I'd be me. That means accepting all the flaws.

In February, I hope to carve out that time and find the fun in streaming again. That means diving into Deltarune as well as new Steam arrivals. So many new creators want to show their games, and I want to give them a fair shake and an audience, even if it's a small one. First, though, I have to recover from this head cold. It's harder to say "fuck" when your voice comes out as a groaning squeak.

Twitch and Cover announced on social media it is now possible for everyone to use an emote based on the CEO of the Hololive and Holostars Vtuber company Motoaki “Yagoo” Tanigo. Access appeared the evening of January 8, 2026 worldwide. It is now possible for anyone logged into the platform to use it in chat. 

The Yagoo Twitch emote release first happened as a Hololive and Holostars Holoday Vtuber event on Twitch on November 20, 2025. That was the day a number of Cover performers from the English and Indonesian branches joined and all began streaming on Twitch. People who watched streams for set periods of time could earn three special emotes.

Only one of the three Yagoo Twitch emotes from the Hololive and Holostars event is now available for everyone. It’s the “Kingoo” design that features Motoaki Tanigo’s gold, smiling face. When the event happened, that was known as the “Kingoo” one. The other two were copper “Yagoo” and silver “Sadgoo” styles. To use the one now available, input :yagoo:.

Here's how it looks:

The Yagoo Twitch emote is now live for everyone on the platform, but the other two Holoday ones still are exclusive to people who earned them during the November 2025 event.

The post Twitch Emote of Hololive CEO Yagoo Returns appeared first on Siliconera.

Tortellini, a goldfish that defied pretty much every conceivable odd to beat some of Elden Ring’s toughest bosses, has died. He was three.

YouTuber and streamer Eric “Pointcrow” Morino informed his community of Tortellini’s passing on Twitter late last week.

"Unfortunately, my goldfish Tortellini has passed away," Morino wrote. "He's been unwell for the past couple weeks fighting a systemic bacterial infection and took a turn for the worse last night. I'm doing my best as a goldfish keeper, but fancies are incredibly fragile, and it seems that after 3 years it was his time to go." 

Goldfish can live to be older than ten with proper care and space, but there are many misconceptions around their actual needs and even their supposedly fleeting memories, which studies have shown are much more sophisticated than colloquial myths have led people to believe. As a result, goldfish in captivity often fail to reach their golden years.  

“Rather than wax on all [the] mistakes I've made keeping [a] fancy goldfish, lessons I've learned too late (there is so much to know), and how devastated I am over this loss, I really want to highlight all the accomplishments Tortellini has done,” Morino wrote. 

Tortellini led a distinguished life among video game-playing animals. Breathing – or extracting from water, via gills – the same rarified air as Peanut Butter the speedrunning dog, Tortellini managed feats that have eluded the majority of human beings. Specifically, he toppled a slew of Elden Ring bosses, including Melania, considered to be the base game’s hardest boss, and Consort Radahn, the final boss of the Shadow Of The Erdtree DLC. 

This involved a setup that mapped Tortellini’s tank onto a grid, each portion of which corresponded to a controller input. Repeats on the grid ensured that Tortellini was never doing nothing as long as he kept drifting around, but that didn’t stop him from, for example, repeatedly trying to swig health flasks even when he had none. Attempts took hours, as well as a special build that focused on armor and bleed damage, minimizing the number of times Tortellini – whose memory might be better than assumed, but whose perception of the human world and all its terrors still leaves something to be desired – would have to hit enemies and dodge. 

Tortellini also proved to be a capable Mario Party player.

Videos of his accomplishments have racked up over 10 million views in total, meaning that, as Morino has observed, Tortellini might actually be the most famous goldfish in history.

After Morino announced that Tortellini had gone to the great goldfish tank in the sky, mourners poured into not just his Twitter post, but also years-old videos and even games. 

"Had to come back and watch this absolute legend of a goldfish after hearing the sad news," wrote one video commenter. "I will miss you little fish."

Recent years have seen a growing number of viewers raise questions about the ethics of pets and content creation, whether it’s the storm of bad-faith nonsense surrounding Hasan Piker’s dog or more legitimate concerns like Logan Paul’s pig being found abandoned in a field, disheveled and unhealthy, after she was “irresponsibly rehomed” according to the animal sanctuary that ended up saving her. Aftermath reached out to Morino for more details about his approach to taking care of Tortellini, as well as what he self-admittedly learned over time, but did not receive a response as of this publishing.

"[Tortellini] was there to make us all laugh and bewilder us on how a small fish could do so much,” Morino wrote in his Twitter post. “He's lived a god damn good life. I miss him so much."

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