Popular Twitch streamer Narcissa Wright, known for her speedruns of games such as The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, has deleted her account on the site after being antagonized and harassed online.
Wright made the announcement in a series of tweets posted yesterday, which revealed her mental anguish as a result of her following on the site having declined since last November. With her having developed hand pain causing her to not be able to play games for an elongated period of time, the content of her Twitch channel changed, with her diversifying her output by including videos of her creating art and playing games just for fun. This didn’t sit well with some of her viewers, while some of her more bigoted former followers decided to stop supporting her as a result of her undergoing hormone replacement therapy.
Her coming out as a trans woman was an inspiring and brave move, especially considering the rampant transphobia and misogyny that is so prevalent in the community surrounding gaming. However, her transition led to her facing a backlash from a particularly small-minded subset of loathsome individuals, and their harassment of her has now led to her closing her Twitch account, with her posting a series of alarming tweets:
At the time of this writing, Wright’s Twitch account is still removed from the site, with it being uncertain whether or not she’ll continue to livestream. But although Wright has acknowledged the decline in her viewership, she still does have plenty of fans who have embraced her new content, and who want to see her continue to succeed going forward. Following the announcement of her deleting her Twitch account, there was an outpouring of support from her fans online, with them sending her many messages of encouragment.
Twitch livestreamers who earn their income on the site undoubtedly face a ton of pressure to maintain and increase their following, which means that such drastic changes in Narcissa’s life having an impact upon her career will no doubt be demoralizing and, when adding the harassment she has faced into the equation, downright upsetting. However, hopefully she can see that she still does have plenty of followers online who want to support her through this formative time in her life, and who are still very much fans of her work, whatever she decides to do.
