Zack Hoyt was born in Florida and raised in Austin, Texas. He grew up with an interest in video games, particularly role-playing games (RPGs), and was introduced to World of Warcraft by a friend in 2006.[14] He quickly became captivated by the game and began playing it extensively.[15] Hoyt later attended college, but dropped out to focus on his streaming career.[16]
Career
Hoyt began his online career in 2009 by creating YouTube videos about World of Warcraft, sharing his insights, strategies, and game knowledge. His YouTube channel grew steadily, and he began live-streaming on Twitch in 2011, initially as a hobby; he started active streaming on the platform in 2014.[17] As of 2019, his content mainly consisted of gameplay, guides, discussions, and reviews related to World of Warcraft expansions and patches.[18]
With the release of World of Warcraft Classic in 2019, Asmongold's popularity surged, and he became one of the platform's most prominent streamers in that year.[19][20][21] He remained one of Twitch's most popular World of Warcraft streamers during the Shadowlands launch in 2020.[22] On July 3, 2021, he played Final Fantasy XIV for the first time before hundreds of thousands of viewers.[23]
Business ventures
In October 2020, Hoyt co-founded One True King (OTK), a streaming and content creation organization, with other content creators, including Mizkif and Sodapoppin. In August 2022, he announced OTK's new PC building company, Starforge Systems, in collaboration with fellow content creator Cr1TiKaL.[24] The company received backlash over to the high prices of their products, to which they responded by reducing their prices by $100.[25] He hosted the weekly Steak & Eggs Podcast alongside current and former OTK members Emiru and Tectone;[26] the first episodes released on February 17, 2023.[non-primary source needed] On February 21, 2025, Asmongold announced that he had stepped away from his leadership roles within the organization.[27]
Hoyt has been described as being "technodeviant"; of being part of a group of typically involuntary celibate, white, heterosexual males whose privilege is alleged to displace marginalized communities from the gaming space. His non-gaming content has been described as being "carefully constructed to largely read apolitical unless taking up a particular right-wing grievance". The authors further said the "suggestion is that he is performing his brand for an audience, and that his statements do not adequately reflect his personal beliefs". Reference is made to a series of misogynistic comments he made which alluded to a former girlfriend and felt "obligated to say ... because his audience would want to hear them". In 2019 while in response to the murder of George Floyd in 2020, Hoyt provided "powerful commentary on disguised racism in the design of emotes" on Twitch.[31]
In early 2024, Hoyt, alongside other prominent YouTubers, aided in spreading "anti-woke" conspiracism around Sweet Baby Inc.'s work in promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion.[34] In a Twitch stream on October 14, 2024, Hoyt called Palestinians "terrible people" from "an inferior culture" that "kills people for their identity" and "is directly antithetical to everything Western values stand for."[35][12] He also said that they "have genocide built into Sharia law right now, so, no, I'm not going to cry a fucking river when people who have genocide that's baked into their laws are getting genocided."[13] This statement was later called a "racist tirade".[36] His ZackRawrr account on Twitch was banned for 14 days due to violating the platform's hateful conduct policy.[13][11] He posted an apology, stating that he deserved the backlash and the ban.[37]PC Gamer criticized his apology, stating "that quite a few people don't consider "my bad" a sufficient expression of contrition and reconsideration for espousing grossly racist attitudes".[36] He is noted for calling the "identity-focused left" "retards".[38]
In October 2024, he stepped down from leadership roles at both OTK and Starforge following the backlash, explaining that his involvement with OTK restricted him from making the content he wanted to do, made it difficult for the company to find sponsors, and left other members open to harassment.[37] Hoyt criticized the results of the 2024 Esports Streamer of the Year Award after streamer Samy Rivers was announced as the winner, claiming it was a "diversity pick" because she's a woman and that other male nominees were more deserving.[39][40][41]
After Elon Musk was accused in January 2025 of paying third parties to boost his Path of Exile 2 account, Hoyt challenged Musk to prove that he himself had leveled a character to 97 in hardcore mode, after which Musk unfollowed Hoyt on X (formerly Twitter), removed his verification check, and posted a screenshot of their private messages. A community note under the post stated that leaking private messages without permission generally violated X's guidelines.[42][43] Musk later deleted his tweets and the two have subsequently interacted with each other on X about other topics.[44][45]
By 2025, political commentary had become a major component of Hoyt's streams. On one occasion, he mocked Democratic Congressman Al Green's disruption of President Donald Trump's 2025 Congressional Address, stating that Green's actions make "people think [he's] a fucking retard." Hoyt has also expressed support for universal basic income and a constitutional right to abortion. He has said that he places no weight on "principles or morality", describing such views as "top-down ideas that are given to you by the elites."[46] As part of his political commentary, Hoyt controversially claimed that "every trans kid is a victim of a parent with mental illness".[47]
Personal life
Before beginning his streaming career, Hoyt worked for the Internal Revenue Service for two tax seasons, in 2012 and 2013.[48][non-primary source needed] He earned a business degree and was preparing to apply to law school, but abandoned that plan while taking care of his mother.[49] In October 2021, his mother died after complications from advanced COPD, leading him to take a temporary hiatus from streaming.[50][51] In July 2025, his father was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. His death was announced on September 18th, having passed away a few days prior.[52]
^Ålander, Juhani (2021). Katsojainteraktiiviset pelit ja niiden historia [Viewer Interactive games and their history] (Thesis) (in Finnish). Kajaani University of Applied Sciences.
^Houle, Kamran (2024). "The Paranoid Style of Internet Politics: Gamer Backlashes and 'Politics' as Imposition". POLIS: Sociology & Anthropology Undergraduate Journal. 1.
