Nova is an Argentinian streamer and was the official broadcaster of the History Hit Open, our $5,000 Age of Empires II tournament which concluded on 17 October 2021. We talked with Nova about the joy he finds streaming for a global Age of Empires community and the things he’s learned while developing as a caster.
1. Hey Nova, tell us about yourself!
Hi guys! Thanks for having me. I’m a 90s kid from Argentina, currently involved in the AoE community as a caster and small tournament admin and host. I enjoy a lot of things besides Age of Empires, namely media production, music and I also love learning new things, which at times makes me wish the day had 48 hours!
I believe life is too short so I try to follow my dreams, do the things I love and pour my heart into them.
2. What was your role in the History Hit Open?
I had begun covering the early stages of the History Hit Open on my own channel when I was recommended by Django to cast the finals for the official account. I covered the remaining matches on History Hit’s own Twitch channel. I also designed and put together the stream scenes we used for that weekend.
3. What’s your background with Age of Empires and casting?
As a child I used to play AoE2 so much, but then my teen years got in the way. I got started with music, playing in bands, and suddenly gaming fell to the side. Already into my twenties I found out the game was actually still alive with some videos from Zero Empires on YouTube.
I’ve always loved this game so much that the moment I saw it had a buzzing competitive scene and people were doing commentary, I started watching AoE2 replays during meals instead of watching TV.
I was sold. I immediately started putting together a YouTube channel of my own. Alas, due to some random life stuff I ended up scrapping the project. It’s something I sometimes wonder about… like “what would it have been like if I had actually started back then?”.
Surely enough though, a few years later I got access to a good enough internet connection to start streaming and decided to go for it. After a while, I noticed shoutcasting was something I really enjoyed, so I stuck to that and I’ve been doing it ever since.
4. Why do you enjoy broadcasting on Twitch?
I enjoy streaming, and Twitch currently is where the majority of the AoE2 (my original favourite title from the franchise) community lives. Streaming is a great way to meet new people from all over the world who share your passion, as well as to push yourself to your limits if you really want to make it as a content creator given how cut throat it can be.
In my pursuit for improvement as a caster, and streaming in general, I spent hundreds of hours trying to improve my English pronunciation, exposing myself to other esports casting and trying to understand what professional matches are really about, what to look for, etc.
Due to some financial constraints, I ended up picking up all sorts of skills to improve my channel since I couldn’t commission any of that work. Now that also serves as a bit of a safety net for the future.
5. What’s next?
Even though it’s been a bumpy road at times and I feel like I still have a long way to go, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my journey so far and I’m very excited about the things to come. Things will only get better I feel.
One final thing that comes to mind when thinking about AoE2 casting is all the crazy things I’ve gotten involved in through the years, from casting for Voobly (the community platform for playing Age 2 before the definitive edition came out), my participation as a co-caster on both King of The Desert 3 as well as Battle of Africa 2 with Memb, and even you guys.
All of these experiences really remind me how I’m kind of living the dream in a sense. These things I only thought of some years ago as something completely out of reach all of a sudden start happening. I’m hoping one day I’ll be able to host my own large events and maybe I’ll be able to bring someone along and make them feel the same joy.
Nova casts on Twitch at twitch.tv/novaaoe
