This article is sponsored by PewPew Games
It’s not every day a brand-new game manages to knock Valorant and League of Legends off their perch on Twitch, but that’s exactly what happened on August 1st when Terminull Brigade climbed to the top of the platform’s game rankings. The whole thing went down Friday night around 10 PM ET. Twenty streamers hit the go-live button at exactly the same time, and suddenly everyone was watching this co-op shooter that barely anyone had heard of two days earlier.
Within an hour, over 99,000 people were tuned in. To put that in perspective, most AAA games would kill for those numbers on launch week. This thing had been out for 48 hours. You’d think coordinated Twitch campaigns would feel forced or artificial, but this one actually worked. Maybe because Terminull Brigade isn’t trying to be everything to everyone. It knows what it is.
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Twitch Crowns A New King? Terminull Brigade Takes The Top Spot
The game comes from Pew Pew Games and Level Infinite, and it’s built around this idea of mixing third-person shooting with roguelike progression. You either go solo or grab two friends. Coming to the mechanics, you’re fighting through this place called the “Nullverse” – every run throws different challenges at you and gives you new gear to experiment with. It has that addictive Hades loop where you keep wanting to try different builds.
The six launch characters each bring their own playstyles. Blade specializes in close-quarters sword combat, while Heynckes focuses on dual-pistol gunplay. Aurora takes a support role, commanding drones from range. The differences are substantial enough that each character requires adapting your strategy.
The Twitch explosion didn’t come out of nowhere, though. The game had been climbing Steam’s trending charts since launch, pushed along by forty creator videos that dropped around the same time. So when those twenty streamers all went live together, there was already an audience ready to check it out. That two-pronged approach (Steam visibility plus Twitch domination) is why it didn’t just vanish after one night.
And then there’s the on-the-ground presence. At Gamescom, Terminull Brigade had one of the more memorable booths. Visitors had to pick between two paths: play the game for a 20-minute run or step into a cosplayer photo zone. The play path was neatly structured – staff helped you settle in, hinted at perks, and then tossed you into either Ringed City or Wasteland with a countdown to a mini-boss gate.
What caught my attention was how quickly the developers responded to early feedback. The same day they hit the top of Twitch, they pushed an update making two characters (Max and Blade) free to unlock through normal gameplay instead of requiring purchase. They even compensated players who had already bought them. That’s the kind of move that shows developers who are actually paying attention to their community instead of just hoping problems go away.
Recent updates have focused on quality-of-life stuff too. Clearer boss health bars, better inventory warnings, the unglamorous work that makes a game feel polished. Looking ahead, Season One drops September 24th with a new character, fresh map, and additional stages with their own boss fights. Standard live-service roadmap stuff, but the execution will determine whether this early momentum translates into lasting success. The current Steam player count hovers around 900–1,300 concurrent, which isn’t massive but shows decent retention for a brand-new free-to-play game.
But you know what? Getting 99,000 people to watch your game beat Valorant on Twitch is impressive, but keeping players engaged through dozens of runs is a different challenge entirely. The core loop seems strong enough to support it, so my fingers are crossed. What made this Twitch moment work probably wasn’t just the coordination, but the timing. Right game, right audience, right moment in the streaming cycle.
Plus, it doesn’t hurt that the game underneath the marketing campaign actually seems worth playing. Whether Terminull Brigade becomes a lasting hit or just another option in the endless parade of free-to-play shooters remains an open question. But for now, it’s managed something most games never do… which is to get people to stop what they’re doing and pay attention in an incredibly crowded market.
Want to see what all the fuss is about? Terminull Brigade is free to download on Steam and Epic Games Store. More details at terminullbrigade.com.
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