HappyKids partners with Amy Lee on Minecraft Witchcraft!

A collaboration with gaming YouTuber Amy Lee (993,000 subscribers), this tween-skewing series features her playing a Minecraft experience that follows a young witch on a journey to obtain her “witch’s license.” The episodes range in length from 13 to 19 minutes in this 15-ep HappyKids original.

Such gaming partnerships have helped HappyKids stand out in an increasingly packed AVOD and FAST market where these services are rising in penetration, with platforms like Tubi and Roku seeing double digit growth year-over-year, according to Nielsen.

Even in this competitive landscape, HappyKids’ viewership has increased by 20% in 2024, says David Di Lorenzo, SVP of kids & family. Driving much of this growth is the streamer’s UGC/gaming content catalogue—including acquisitions from family-friendly gamers and HappyKids exclusives that were co-produced with such creators as K-City Gaming (1.56 million YouTube subscribers) and Kin Tin (1.66 million YouTube subscribers).

HappyKids is keen to build out its gaming catalogue and wants to work with more family-friendly creators in this space, either through co-pros or acquisitions, says Di Lorenzo. The plan is to expand its existing content on Minecraft, Roblox and EA sports while venturing into more underserved titles. “Nintendo is probably an area [where] we’re a little bit weaker in terms of bringing in additional content, so that’s a potential area of focus for us as well.”

To further invest in the appeal of games, Future Today is also busy teeing up a co-view original series that’s all about IRL games. Family Game Competition (working title) is aiming for a Q4 2024 launch on HappyKids as well as the company’s other AVOD app Fawesome. While details are still under wraps, Di Lorenzo teases that each ep will feature two families competing against each other in a mix of classic games such as charades and rapid-fire questions based on current events/trends.