How did a game about reincarnated anime horse girls become one of the most-watched games on Twitch?
Check out our new MEME STORE: https://thememestore.com/
Subscribe to our channel to learn more about trending memes, hear interviews from meme personalities and more! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCbrPqq29C9Q_TQP7OFFRzcw?sub_confirmation=1
00:00How did this game about racing anime horse girls become a viral hit?
00:03Come on, Gold Ship! Put it into high gear! I need all you got right now!
00:08The Kentucky Derby's on the line!
00:11The game is called Uma Musume Pretty Derby, and it's been a popular multimedia franchise in Japan since 2018,
00:18when the first season of the Uma Musume anime aired.
00:20Uma Musume is about horse girls who are reincarnations of famous Japanese racehorses.
00:24The girls attend Trace and Academy to train as both racehorses and idols.
00:27The first season of the show focuses on Horse Girl Special Week based on a real racehorse who won 10 of his 17 races.
00:33Although it started as an anime series, the video game is the most well-known piece of media.
00:38In the game, players are tasked with training their horse girls and competing in races.
00:41The game is built around a gacha mechanic, where hundreds of possible horse girls can be unlocked through pulls of a gacha machine.
00:48The game was released in Japan in 2021 and became a big hit.
00:52On June 26, 2025, the game was finally released in English, ushering in a whole new wave of fans and a massive boost in popularity in North America.
01:00Fan art and memes based on the game's more popular horses have been going viral across social media as players pick their favorite racers to idolize.
01:08Uma Musume has also become a massive hit with streamers and Let's Players,
01:12entering the list of the top 25 most-viewed games on Twitch in early July and inspiring more than a few viral clips.
01:18One popular clip from streamer Niko shows just how intense the races in Uma Musume can get as Niko yells at his horse and spanks himself with a roll of paper,
01:25mimicking a jockey using a crop on his horse.
01:27Several posts have gone viral, hoping that Uma Musume adds the racing horse Skibiti Riz to the game.
01:32Skibiti Riz is a real racehorse bred in Kentucky.
01:35He began his career in 2025 and raced six times between March and July 2025, although he won none of the races, with his highest placement being third.
01:43Uma Musume has become particularly popular with VTubers, who have been dedicating their streams to horse racing.
01:48In one wholesome viral clip, VTuber Cleo runs alongside her horse as she wins a race, leaving the other horses in the dust.
01:55There's also a meme going around where artists redraw photos of real horses as Uma Musume characters and depict Uma Musume girls doing things that horses might do,
02:04reminding everyone that these anime girls are, in fact, reincarnated racehorses.
02:08Ultimately, Uma Musume is proving to be many gamers' latest addiction as they work to hone their horse girl's stats,
02:14get those big wins, and maybe get a viral streaming clip out of it in the process.
