Twitch recently posted a sad farewell to the Biblethump emote, a small image of Isaac’s head from The Binding of Isaac which deals heavily with religious themes and aesthetics.
In their post, Twitch called it the end of an era and that it was “sad news”. But their statement was quickly called out as being an entirely self-inflicted situation. Edmund McMillan, the creator of The Binding of Isaac is vocally open to letting Twitch renew the rights to use the emote and seems enthusiastic about keeping it going.
At the time of writing, the original Twitch post even received a Community Note from X users.
The end of the BibleThump Era (2013-2024) is nigh! On 9/30, the rights to our beloved emote expire. 😭 While this is sad news, we know that all emotes go to heaven. SPEAKING OF SAD – we’re going to need a new emote to spam these feelings…
— Twitch (@Twitch) September 25, 2024
Edmund McMillen, creator and current rights holder of The Binding of Isaac (the property the emote originates from) has said publicly he is open to renewing the rights and/or working out a deal. It is Twitch’s choice not to do so.
Speculatively, Twitch may be trying to update their branding. A few years back, Twitch changed the “pogchamp” image from the iconic face of streamer Gootecks to a generic raptor. It may be that The Binding of Isaac isn’t familiar to younger audiences, or that the game is too niche for mainstream Twitch viewers.
