Jerma985's Dollhouse Stream

Overview

Jerma985's Dollhouse Stream or Jerma985's The Sims Stream refers to three interactive Twitch broadcasts by streamer Jerma985 tied in a single narrative during which his viewers fully controlled his actions, similar to how a person playing The Sims would control a sim. The streams received significant viewership and inspired memes and discussions on social media in August 2021.

Background

On August 3rd, 2021, Twitch streamer Jerma985 announced a series of special streams, inspired by The Sims video game series, during which viewers would be able to control his actions to have him perform various tasks (shown below, left).^[1]

On August 17th, 2021, Jerma985 held a Q&A stream^[2] in which he answered questions about the upcoming stream (shown below, right).

We're doing a three-day dollhouse stream, and you guys get to control me in a house. We have an incredible extensive extention that is being made, custom-built for this purpose. It's gonna be three-day event. You guys are gonna have a ton of control over pretty much everything.[…]
I'm insanely excited for it. It's by far the biggest thing I've ever done, both logistically and monetarily, and it should be a lot of fun.

Between August 18th and 21st, Jerma held a series of three streams,^[3][4][5] over 13 hours long combined. During the streams, Twitch viewers using the custom Dollhouse extension could vote to control Jerma's actions (YouTube reuploads shown below). The streams used a combination of live sets and visual effects to create an impression of Jerma living in a two-story house with a backyard. The streams were assisted by a support crew with a number of special guests, including fellow streamer Ludwig, performing various roles.

Online Reactions

The streams attracted significant viewership in mid-August 2021, with the final day broadcast garnering over 1.2 million views and Jerma985 setting a personal concurrent viewers record with over 101,200 viewers.^[6][7] The event was widely covered by the media, with Dexerto,^[8] PC Gamer^[9] and other outlets reporting on it.

On social media, the broadcasts became a subject of memes, discussions and fan art. For example, on August 20th, 2021, Twitter^[10] user @emmymonstercock tweeted a clip from the stream, writing, "this is someones first jerma stream." The video gained over 155,800 views, 3,600 retweets and 15,900 likes in three days (shown below).

Multiple memes, clips and screenshots from the stream were posted in the dedicated /r/jerma985 subreddit and by the Jerma Out of Control (@JermSansContext) gimmick Twitter account, with multiple posts going viral.^[11][12]

Search Interest

External References