After starting his career covering college football and basketball for ESPN.com, Greg Collins found a way to merge his love of sports and games into one job. He's been in charge of Magic event coverage since 2004.

Magic's live event coverage went through a revolution in 2012 when we expanded Pro Tour video coverage to all three days of competition. A big part of that transition was working with a relatively new video streaming platform called Twitch. Not even a year old at the time, Twitch held amazing promise as a gateway to bring Magic to a much wider audience.

Fast forward to 2017 and it's safe to say that Twitch has become one of the most influential brands in all of gaming. Last November, Wizards announced a partnership with Twitch that makes it the exclusive video content broadcast, streaming, and distribution partner for Magic premier play events. I'm excited to delve deeper into what this partnership means for 2017 and beyond.

Expanded Schedule

Plain and simple, this partnership means more video coverage. This year will have at least 40 Magic events streamed on twitch.tv/magic, up from 22 in 2016. Here's how that breaks down by event type:

4 Pro Tours

Magic World Championship

World Magic Cup

32 Grand Prix

Magic Online Championship

Super Sunday Series Championship

All told, that's a premier play event streamed on 35 different weekends. This schedule reflects an increase of nearly 400 hours of video content, bringing the total to roughly 1,000 hours of live-streamed Magic events. If you want to watch every minute, that's an average of 2 hours and 45 minutes every day.

This is an incredibly robust schedule, featuring coverage of every major format from every region. I'm particularly excited to announce that we will be streaming English-language coverage from a Grand Prix in Brazil for the first time. We will also be streaming from a Japanese Grand Prix, along with a deep slate of North American and European events. The majority of weekends will feature one streamed event, but we're doubling up the stream on four Standard Grand Prix weekends to delve deeper into the format across multiple regions.

You can see the full schedule of streamed events at the bottom of this article. But that may not be all; as the year goes on, we'll be looking for additional opportunities to bring you streaming video from events far and wide.

Subscriptions

We're also excited to announce that effective this week, we are launching subscriptions for the twitch.tv/magic channel. When you subscribe, you'll get immediate access to our six launch emoticons and the subscriber badge.

Our community team spent countless hours over the holiday break testing these six emoticons across all our internal messaging tools. Higher levels of consciousness were reached as complicated strands of thought were encapsulated within 28-pixel-by-28-pixel images. (Frankly, I'm surprised that group still communicates with words at all anymore.)

Along with those sweet icons, subscribers will get special access to members of Magic R&D in the form of subscriber-mode Q&As in Twitch chat. We're still in the process of developing cool ways to give subscribers more benefits, but look for them to debut during Amonkhet preview season in a few months. We're also exploring ways to increase engagement during Pro Tour coverage, such as Q&As with pro players and casters and other interactive features during the stream.

And that's just the start. We have more to roll out already in the queue, but we'd also love to hear what you think about these. So hit us up on Twitter @wizards_magic with feedback.

Subscribers will also get a badge showing the Planeswalker symbol next to their name in chat. One-month subscribers will receive the common badge, three-month subscribers an uncommon badge, six-month a rare badge, and 12-month subscribers will receive the mythic badge, as below.

Next Steps

Magic video streaming has come a long way from the tiny 240 pixel–wide video window we embedded in Pro Tour coverage more than a decade ago. We couldn't have taken that journey without our many, many fans, and we thank you for your immeasurable investment of time and passion in this game. As we take these big new steps forward, we want to hear from you about your likes and dislikes with Magic coverage and how you think we can make it better. Our community team's ears are up, so reach out to us on Twitter (@magicprotour and @wizards_magic), Facebook, and Tumblr with your thoughts.

So tune in to twitch.tv/magic this weekend for the new Standard format at Pro Tour Aether Revolt on Feb. 3–5 from Dublin, Ireland!

Complete Streaming Schedule

Date Event Format January 7–8 Super Sunday Series Championship Mixed January 28–29 Grand Prix Prague Limited February 3–5 Pro Tour Aether Revolt in Dublin Standard/Booster Draft February 11–12 Grand Prix Pittsburgh Standard February 18–19 Grand Prix Vancouver Modern February 25–26 Grand Prix Utrecht Standard March 3–5 Magic Online Championship Mixed March 11–12 Grand Prix New Jersey Standard March 11–12 Grand Prix Barcelona Standard March 18–19 Grand Prix Porto Alegre Standard March 25–26 Grand Prix Orlando Limited April 1–2 Grand Prix San Antonio Team Unified Modern May 6–7 Grand Prix Richmond Limited May 12–14 Pro Tour Amonkhet in Nashville Standard/Booster Draft May 20–21 Grand Prix Montreal Standard May 27–28 Grand Prix Copenhagen Modern June 3–4 Grand Prix Amsterdam Standard June 3–4 Grand Prix Omaha Standard June 15–16 Grand Prix Las Vegas* Legacy June 17–18 Grand Prix Las Vegas* Modern June 24–25 Grand Prix Cleveland Team Limited July 22–23 Grand Prix Kyoto Limited July 28–30 Pro Tour Hour of Devastation in Kyoto Standard/Booster Draft August 5–6 Grand Prix Minneapolis Standard August 12–13 Grand Prix Birmingham Modern August 19–20 Grand Prix Denver Standard August 26–27 Grand Prix Indianapolis Limited September 2–3 Grand Prix Washington D.C. Standard September 2–3 Grand Prix Turin Standard Sept. 30–Oct. 1 Grand Prix Providence Team Limited October 6–8 Magic World Championship in Boston Mixed October 28–29 Grand Prix Phoenix Limited November 3–5 Pro Tour "Ham" in Albuquerque Standard/Booster Draft November 11–12 Grand Prix Atlanta Standard November 11–12 Grand Prix Warsaw Standard November 18–19 Grand Prix Portland Standard November 25–26 Grand Prix Lyon Team Limited December 1–3 World Magic Cup in Nice Mixed December 9–10 Grand Prix Oklahoma City Modern December 16–17 Grand Prix New Jersey Limited

*Video coverage of Grand Prix Las Vegas will focus on the Legacy and Modern events, but will also include some coverage of the Limited Grand Prix running on June 16–17.

Editor's Note: Grand Prix Metz was originally announced as receiving live video coverage. As announced on March 16, Grand Prix Indianapolis will be receiving video coverage instead for that weekend.