| Gatorbox | |
|---|---|
 Gatorbox station icon. | |
|
First broadcast |
December 2012 |
|
Final broadcast |
Still in production |
|
Headquarters |
Corpus Christi, TX |
|
Hosts |
Draco |
|
Produced by |
Gator Company |
|
Schedule |
Mondays, 7PM (CST) |
|
Network |
Twitch |
Gatorbox is a weekly variety stream produced by Gator Company that airs on Twitch every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday with the show on Friday acting as their primary broadcast. Since 2013 the series has been anchored by Draco and occasionally other co-hosts are featured. The channel is most well known for their Super Mario Maker series "Your Level SUCKS" as well as their annual charity marathons for Extra Life.
Gatorbox first went on the air on December 21, 2012 and has continued to broadcast its main Friday show with little interruption to this day.
Format[]
The Friday night Gatorbox stream lasts approximately three hours and consists of an opener segment followed by two hours of gameplay. Usually the opener is "GatorUNbox" where Draco takes a look at various kinds of tat however the first Friday of every month is reserved for a side series. Currently this side series is "Gatorbox (of Crayons)", an art stream. Former featured side series include "Fanfiction Factory", where fanfics are read live on the air.
Streams on Mondays and Wednesdays are referred to as "chill" streams and usually focus around long-form content. Usually this is a segmented playthrough of a longer game such as Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts or Hollow Knight. Occasionally these streams feature the platform RetroAchievements which add unlockable achievements to games on classic consoles via emulation. Certain Mondays are also reserved for community game nights where the Jackbox Party Pack and What The Dub? are played.
Extra Life[]
Starting in 2013 Draco has hosted a 24 hour video game speedrun marathon in order to raise money for Driscoll Children's Hospital through Extra Life. To date the Gatorbox community has raised over $11,000 for the charity which Draco has matched with additional donations of toys and stuffed animals. Gatorbox's fundraising efforts have been recognized by the Extra Life organization by way of awarding the stream their gold fundraising medals and in 2023 Gatorbox received Extra Life's lifetime achievement award for collectively raising over $10,000 across all of their events.
The 2013 and 2014 marathons were hosted live on-location from the Rackspace Castle building in San Antonio, Texas as this was the official Extra Life event headquarters for those two years. Starting in 2015 the marathon was hosted out of the standard Gatorbox set however. There was no marathon in 2017 due to Hurricane Harvey destroying most of the Gatorbox studio though community members still donated to the charity out of tradition.
Major viewership draws to Gatorbox's annual marathons include stunts such as playing through Kirby's Adventure with a non-standard controller. In the past this has been things such as an NES flight stick controller and the Cabela's "Top Shot" light gun for the Xbox 360. Draco also performs the "cheeseburger challenge" for MC Kids where he eats one whole McDonald's cheeseburger each time he loses a life in the game. Another big pull are the community game challenges; for every multiple of $100 raised Draco draws a random viewer-submitted game challenge and has 15 minutes to clear it or else it's a failure.