Kings and Generals

Kings and Generals or K & G (formerly Nurrrik & Phoenix), is a multi-national YouTube channel that focuses on history. It started as a gaming channel, but it has since moved on to history documentaries. Its content includes its titular Kings and Generals series (the channel was named after the series when it became the most popular on the channel). The videos concentrate on military history, but also address the history of politics, law, institutions, socio-economics, demography, culture, ethnography, language, religion, art, and science. The Canadian owner's former policy with history was not to go beyond World War I – although the prelude to WWI such as the Balkan Wars remained fair game.https://twitter.com/KingsGenerals/status/936709308342968320 This policy no longer exists as of 7 May 2018.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SHSFp7carAk On 16 March 2019, a secondary channel was launched called The Cold War which focuses on the 1945–1991 period.The Cold War Channel - Release Date Announcement. Kings and Generals, 26 February 2019. On 1 December 2021, another side channel named Wizards and Warriors was launched for fictional battles in popular fantasy and sci-fi universes, such as The Lord of the Rings and Star Wars.Wizards and Warriors - Fantasy & Sci-fi Channel Announcement Trailer. Kings and Generals, 1 December 2021.
==History==
===Pre-Kings and Generals (May 2016 – March 2017)===
The Channel started as Nurrrik & Phoenix on May 7th, 2016. ("Nurrrik" written with the letter "r" thrice.)
Early series on the channel included playthroughs of Total War games, including the Age of Justinian mod for Total War: Attila and a playthrough of The Last Stand of Greece, which overhauls the Wrath of Sparta DLC for Rome II. Most of these playthroughs are now unavailable and it is unknown wether or not they still exist. Other series included the top 10s. These series did not end with the channel's renaming to Kings and Generals, and only stopped in August 2017.
===Testing the waters (March – August 2017)===
The channel's most popular (and currently namesake) series, Kings and Generals, was launched on 4 March 2017 with the Battle of Magnesia. Initial popularity was small, with the first episode only gaining ~3000 views. The video was somewhat popular on /r/totalwar, and it gained positive reception there.https://www.reddit.com/r/totalwar/comments/5xh863/roman_seleucid_syrian_war_192188_bc_documentary/ Because the pilot is now unlisted, it is usually incorrectly assumed that the Byzantine–Sasanian War of 602–628 was the first episode, when this is not the case. The early episodes were voiced by the Azerbaijani voice actor Red Phoenix. All of the Season 1 episodes are now unlisted, and a good portion of the videos have been remade since. On 13 May 2017, the Hundred Years' War series began. Due to remakes and delays, this series would would not be completed until 12 September 2021 - 4 years, 3 months, and 30 days later. On 18 June 2017, the 8th episode of Kings and Generals was released, covering the Battle of Manzikert.https://www.reddit.com/r/Documentaries/comments/6i0hw7/battle_of_manzikert_malazgirt_documentary_on_the/ This was intended to be their final video.
===Brand establishment (August – September 2017)===
Kings and Generals came back on August 6th, 2017 after almost 2 months of inactivity. The first new episode done was the Byzantine–Sasanian War of 602–628, at the request of his first Patron, Koopinator.
Kings and Generals has stated that Manzikert was supposed to be the final video, and it was only thanks to a last-second Patreon donation that they decided to continue the series, saying that - We lost heart. Seemed that no one was excited. Your donation inspired me. "Hey, somebody thinks that there is a potential here".
August 2017 brought drastic changes, including the switch from an Azerbaijani voice actor to an American (later Canadian) voice actor and later switched to British voice actor OfficiallyDevin, the abandonment of top 10s and let's plays, and replacing the old Google Earth map with an original one. The channel was re-branded from 'Nurrrik & Phoenix' to 'Kings and Generals'.
The channel also started collaborating with 2 other YouTubers - OfficiallyDevin as the main narrator and Malay Archer as the Machinima creator with Total War games and later one of the editors/animators of the channel.
===Rising popularity (September 2017 – January 2018)===
In September 17, 2017 the Battle of Kosovo video went viral. It gained 160,000 views within the first week (by comparison, the previous video gained less than 10,000). This caused a boom in subscribers, and he gained more subscribers in September alone than in the entire year before that. This boom in followers caused an increase in Patrons and a significant increase in production quality.
Starting with November, old episodes would be remade.
===Stability (January – April 2018)===
Season 4 started on January 1st 2018 when Kings and Generals announced a schedule for 2018, where he announced several new series, including the Rise of the Mongol Empire, The Wars of the Diadochi, and the Great Heathen Army. Popularly requested episodes such as the Battle of al-Qādisiyyah would be made. He also started focusing more on multi-episode arcs than standalone history videos.
Another notable change was that the fan-favourite Napoleon series was put on hold.
===Reforms (April 2018 – present)===
Starting with April 2018, Kings and Generals would experiment more with his channel. Thumbnails were changed in format and the production collaborated with Cogito. He also dropped the "No wars past 1918" rule, with the creation of video covering the Battle of Stalingrad (1942–3). He also reintroduced the old "Armies and Tactics" series which was thought to be a one-off.
On 16th August 2018, Kings and Generals released another unique artistic format into the channel which production collaborated with a new animator - Oguz Tunc, with his new video "Crassus: How did he become so wealthy?".
By July 2021, Kings and Generals had obtained more than 2 million subscribers. By February 2022, there were 2.4 million.
== Series ==
As of February 2022, series (playlists) with 10 or more videos include:
;Thematic series:
* Kings and Generals Documentary Series (68 videos)
** Period: all of history (especially socio-economic and cultural history), also includes fictional battles from Star Wars and Game of Thrones.
* Armies and Tactics (47 videos)
** Period: all of history. Emphasis on Ancient Greece, Rome, medieval Europe, and Central and East Asia.
* Shorts (47 videos)
** Period: all of history, focus on military tactics. 50 to 60 seconds long.
;Chronological series:
* Ancient Civilizations (39 videos)
** Period: generally until 500 CE, excluding Mesopotamian Civilizations (separate series) but including early Muslim conquests until 15th century
* Pre-Columbian Civilizations (10 videos)
** Period: 8000 BCE – 1572 CE (Incas, Aztecs and Mayans) 
* Roman History (90 videos) 
** Period: c. 1200 BCE (Etruscans) – 1453 CE (Byzantines)
* Ancient Battles (33 videos)
** Period: 1274 BCE – 654 CE
* Chinese History (25 videos)
** Period: Warring States Period (5th century BCE) – 17th century CE (so far)
* Caesar, Gallic Wars and the Civil War (18 videos)
** Period: 58–44 BCE
* Medieval Battles (40 videos)
** Period: 600–1605
* Early Muslim Expansion (9 videos) 
** Period: 7th century to 8th century
* History of Russia (10+ videos)
** Period: c. 750 CE – 1920 (so far)
* Mongol Invasions (35 videos)
** Period: 12th century – 15th century
* Ottoman History (30 videos)
** Period: 1389–1571 (so far)
* Thirty Years' War (10 videos)
** Period: 1618–1648
* Napoleonic Wars (14 videos)
** Period: 1800–1809 (so far)
* Pacific War – Week by week (18 videos)
** Period: 1941–1945
* Modern Warfare (45 videos)
** Period: 20th century
Note that some videos are included in multiple playlists (e.g. 'Roman History' and 'Ancient Battles') and therefore counted double.
==Channel milestones==
===Subscriber milestones===
*1,500,000 subscribers: October 16, 2020https://twitter.com/IlkinGambar/status/1316964572402778117
===Video view milestones===
*100,000,000 views: November 5, 2019https://twitter.com/KingsGenerals/status/1191780888864014336
==Trivia==
*Kings and Generals started with a collaboration with a few gaming YouTubers. These channels are CommisarBro, OfficiallyDevin and Malay Archer.
*The Wars of the Diadochi series is the only series which is not narrated by OfficiallyDevin.
==References==
Category:Users who joined in 2016
Category:Canadian YouTubers
Category:Educational YouTubers
Category:One million subscribers
Category:Two million subscribers