YouTube is preparing to relaunch its live-streaming service with a focus on competitive gaming and eSports to compete with Amazon's Twitch.TV.

The relaunch will remove some of the social features found on YouTube's current streaming service. Similar to Twitch's Justin.TV, the lack of focus on gaming has cost them a lot of users.

Like Us on Facebook

Cracking the gaming market will be hard considering Twitch.TV has a strong hold over all streamers and eSports. Even if YouTube offers lucrative contracts and sponsorships, Twitch has 40 million users always checking up on their favorite streams.

Popular Twitch streamers can't simply abandon the platform either, considering some have huge subscriber numbers paying $4.99 per month to watch the channel. The guarantee of 30,000 concurrent viewers is also a good draw for streamers.

Luckily, Twitch doesn't seem to have contracts for the streamers, meaning most are free to stream on multiple platforms. This could have major consequences on performance for gaming however, forcing the streamer's hand to the more popular service.

YouTube might be able to draw in big eSports events since Riot Games already streams League of Legends games on YouTube's live-streaming service.

The move might be announced at E3 this year alongside a subscription mode for the main YouTube service, allowing users to have a full ad-free experience. The video platform has experimented with various subscription options in the past. All have failed.

TagsYouTube, competitive gaming, eSports, Livestreaming