I must admit that watching Twitch streams has become sort of an addiction for me, especially on my android tablet before going to sleep. Though, Twitch's Android app is mediocre at its best. Its interface is very barebones and definitely an afterthought compared to its iOS version. The worst offenders are that you can't view the Source quality and that you're limited to high, medium and low presets. There's also no way of viewing the chat in landscape mode, which is half of the fun of Twitch streams. Holding a 16:9 tablet in portrait mode is very awkward and the video becomes so small that you can't make out what's happening on the screen.
Yesterday, I found this awesome app named "
Vortex" and it's everything I wanted the Twitch app to be. An useful main menu that presents you your followed channels and the most played games at that moment. It's the stream page that makes all the difference though, you can finally view the chat in the usual Twitch form complete with all the emoticons! You can also select the "Source" quality and if your tablet/phone can handle it, you can view 60FPS streams and overall an unprocessed higher quality video.
You also don't get Twitch ads and there are no other ads embedded in the app.
Take a look at these comparison screens:
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| Twitch app homescreen |
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| Vortex homescreen |
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| The only mode in Twitch map where you can view the stream chat and the video. |
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| Neat! You can keep track of chat and video very easily. |
Edit: Since this post is getting a lot of Google traffic, let me tell you that you can't select the Source quality for partnered streams anymore. The developer removed it for some reason. Fortunately
Team Liquid's R1CH uploaded this older version APK, which has the source quality option. Enjoy!
https://www.copy.com/s/PkmsiEBPCBU6
I'm an engineer who likes to write extremely long articles about games that border simulation and mainstream.
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