Valorant swings out of the gate with 1.7 million Twitch viewers

League of Legends dev Riot Games just made a new shooter called Valorant, and gamers are really curious if it's good or not.

Valorant aims to usurp the current FPS market. With 120Hz tick rate servers, ultra-accurate aiming, and Overwatch-like hero abilities in a 5v5 setting, Valorant is attracting major FPS enthusiasts and pros everywhere. The game isn't out yet, but Riot is holding a huge closed beta with some of the most popular streamers, and gamers are tuning in en masse.

At the time of writing, Valorant has over 1.7 million viewers across the globe. This is huge for any game, but it's well-timed on Riot's part now that everyone's home over COVID-19 quarantines.

Streamers like Dr. Disrespect praise Valorant's smoothness, and affirm the shooter is "very technical." But many streamers, including Doc, are on the fence about it. There's no real peeking mechanics and people are still figuring out the meta--the crucial interactions in how specific heroes and guns interact with others.

"I dunno about Valorant yet, I need more time with it," Dr. Disrespect said in a non-sponsored stream. "But I could see myself playing this game."

There's some possible issues with spectating though. Doc says the game may not be all that enjoyable to watch. But that hasn't stopped 1.7 million people from checking it out.

"I don't think this game is going to be a very fun game to watch, from a Twitch standpoint. It's kinda like Overwatch. Overwatch, for me, is a lot of fun to play but it's not fun to watch. I think this game is going to be the same way."

Valorant is set to release sometime in 2020.