KekRaptor is a satire article series that we post at most, once a week, and makes up <1% of our content.

That said, something happened here that put this on Google News, and for that we apologize. I'm looking into how that happened, so that in the future, literal fake news won't appear in the Google News feed. As a site that prides itself on quality news, and separating fact from opinion, we're not too happy that this appeared on Google News, even if it did give us views. For us, quality comes before news, which is why if you look at the rest of our site, our titles are clear and not clickbait.

In addition, we're sorry for people that don't know KekRaptor. We're talking about making changes in future articles to make it clear this is satire faster, and avoid spreading misinformation.

Clickbait isn't/wasn't our intention. Unfortunately we appear to have missed that mark, and we are sorry for that.

Before views* - why won't you let me edit this disqus haha.

Thank you for addressing this. It came up in my feed and I thought it was real as well and then when I read the article I was upset, thinking that you guys were doing click bait type of shenanigans.

But now I know. But really, maybe just kill this series?

Likely won't kill the series, but plan on making meaningful changes to ensure it doesn't land in Google News again and we're going to avoid subjects like cancellations/delays going forward as well.

Don't censor yourself, cover those topics. Clearly the title format, although 100% appropriate, didn't click for many readers (apparently).

A [SATIRE] label in the title could solve this without something so drastic as limiting the creative freedom of KekRaptor column writers.

I suggest a simple test with that before a more nuclear option like censorship.

Edit: delays and unfinished releases are a real part of this industry. Don't ignore it in your reporting, don't ignore it in your satire. I think it's a bad idea to give bad practices a safe space from satire.

As long as we don't pay for fixes to unfinished products.

Whatever happened on Google News, I am thankful for it because it let me discover your website and laugh my @$$ off reading the Borderlands 3 article. This is quality writing, and you gained a fan. No apologies are necessary for writing witty articles on popular themes. Keep dong what you're doing!!

"This hypothetical game would’ve taken place in the Borderlands universe, but it would have none of the elements that made the other Borderlands games successful"

I died 🤣🤣🤣

LMAO, (first time reader, here from google news)

the butthurt gamers crying that this was in their news. Like the 47 seconds that they might have spent thinking it was postponed cost them 47 years of their lives!

You guys should see if you can buy "T.U.G.S." from Internet Today hosts Ricky(@RickyFTW) and Eliot.

Who the fuck cares if it was actually going to be postponed? Early-ordering fapping teenagers with mommy's credit card?
Boo-hoo.

They shouldn't have access to the card anyway.

Sorry for the negative comments you've received from people who didn't realize this was satire. I'm sure it must be frustrating to have your site appear on Google News when you don't intend it to, and to then be criticized for it. FWIW I found the article funny. I hope this turns around for the best for you all.

Hey Bryan - it definitely is. We NEVER want to mislead people, and this article appearing on Google News definitely did that. It's leading to our best view day ever, but I'm more bummed about it being on Google News than the views we're getting because of the fact that it is counter to how we want to present the news.

Glad you liked it though, Anson got some great lines in there!

I lost brain cells from this

Nobody knows what kekraptor means. Put satire in the title like every other legit site out there. Goodbye from my news feed forever.

We're working on addressing this now, and in the future. This shouldn't have appeared in Google News, and we're figuring out how it was pulled, being in a different section that what Google News should be pulling.

Well for starters kek or formally orcish for lol in WoW before they overhauled the language system so people on both sides can't communicate, has been delegated to memes and people who wish they actually played in the early years of WoW and is now basically used for young wannabe gamers, it's like the term "lag" that morons misuse and generalize as a term for anything that effects visuals rather than the original termed in Doom online days as having a bad connection or high ping being lag....is that enough satire for you.

Holy WHOOSH Batman!

For everyone saying the title is clickbait:

The title is "KekRaptor: Borderlands 3 Delayed [...]"

The first word in the title is "KekRaptor" and is immediately followed with a colon. This very common title format indicates that the source of the info is whatever precedes the colon. KekRaptor, in this case.

The site is called TechRaptor. So with this information, one can safely infer that the source of the info is, if nothing else, a riff on the title of the site.

Has no one here ever read a satire column before? I fear the day you get an issue of Game Infarcer with your Game Informer subscription.

Come on, folks!

If you have to explain the joke, the comments stop being as funny as the article. Way to ruin it, brosephine. Way... To... Ruin it.

You make it sound as if articles, YouTube videos and Reddit posts use punctuation effectively or even have good titles/headline much of the time.

(Read as: they don't. So I put no stock into formatting).

I don't know what content you watch on YouTube or what subreddits you subscribe to so I can't speak to that.

But the title format was used appropriately for this article.

I'm not sure you understood. I'm saying it doesn't matter -- formats, grammars and lexicons are losing their clarity because people don't care. If they did, there wouldn't be half as many misunderstandings or bastardised words. Punctuation would be proper.

Perhaps I am misunderstanding, but I keep interpereting your latest comment (in the context of our discussion) to mean that because people don't care about proper use of literary concepts (such as formatting, good grammar, and lexicons) that we should not use them?

What would be acceptable to you as an alternative?

People won't notice, if they don't know. If they do know, they're likely to not care.

People are entrenched in how they think things work -- their interpretation -- even if incorrect or misguided.

So, on the contrary, keep doing what you do. But remember that we need to educate them, and to do that, we need to find ways they can care about what we care about.

In my original post, however, I was also alluding to some pros and self-proclaimed pros (YouTubers) making a farce out of the stuff that makes sense. Grammar, headline format, lexicon, literary techniques, what have you. I mean, look at how everything is reviewed: not a lick of it is standardized or systematic in any way.

Then there's the reporting of news: amateurs postulating about leaks and rumours on Reddit do as much of a job as YouTubers do (moreso, because YT channels will mooch off of the work of Redditors).

Anyone with any sense will have so much grains of salt in their diet, when it comes to what they read and watch about video games, that they probably shouldn't and wouldn't have respect for the whole damn thing to begin with... Let alone the grammar someone's using.

Reminder: KekRaptor is satire, and something we post infrequently to have some fun with the industry we absolutely love.

Your site being satire doesn't excuse you for clickbaiting. How about taking the feedback instead of deflecting it with excuses?

That would require integrity which fails to generate clicks

TechRaptor isn't a site that aims for clicks. We aim for clear content, and I think we missed the mark on this satire piece - leading to confusion and anger from readers.

We're working to improve this in the future, but take a look at the rest of the site and you'll see we are far from clickbait.

Honestly if you cant tell that this was fake from the word Kek in the title then you need to re evaluate yourself.

TechRaptor isn't satire, articles like this make up <1% of all our content and are labeled as Satire. See the new featured comment.

Lol this article is pure trash fishing for likes. Even dumber google flagged this as "top coverage"

This shouldn't have appeared in Google News. We're exploring how that happened, and making sure it doesn't in the future.

Satire should be funny. AKA The Onion.

Exactly. I don't see what's so satirical about this piece, its presented as a normal news story too which is pretty annoying. "Clickbait" is accurate...

Seriously though, fuck Google for putting this in my news feed as a legit article. In this day and age. Gross

Satire typically blurs the line between real and fake, and unfortunately Google News picked this up somehow (It's not in a Gnews category), leading to people thinking it was 100% real despite the line that states it isn't.

Our apologies that it showed up there.

Well.. definitely removing this site from my Google feed.

We're working on addressing this now, and in the future. This shouldn't have appeared in Google News, and we're figuring out how it was pulled, being in a different section that what Google News should be pulling. Our apologies on that!

This article wasted my time... and I'm okay with that. Lols. Cheers Mr. Chan

Disgusting clickbait that will only serve to confuse some people while failing to be funny.

I think we missed the mark on this one a bit, and the fact that Google News pulled it (it shouldn't have) definitely amplified the confusion for many. I've messaged Google News about removing this from our list of articles, but communication between Google News and publishers is typically poor :/

You spell "educate" funny... Never seen it spelt C-o-n-f-u-s-e before.

If you're confused by a satire article (i've never been to this website before in my life, no clue what i was clicking on, just a looong ti e borderlands fan from day1)... Then you need some more education in life.

This was free education.

Now maybe you wont give that Nigerian prince from your email inbox mommy's credit card number... Or think Penis enlargement is actually a thing that's possible...
Or that vaccines cause autism...
..or donald trump is honest.. or rich... or a happy marriage
..or that strange man actually only wants to give you candy in his van

Life, it educates... Live some more years and listen to it

Please stop trying to edgy or witty. There's only room for one alpha personality in a room, and it sure as heck ain't yours.

It's pretty ironic that you're the one that's confused. I didn't fall for this for a second, just recognizing dumb clickbait where I see it. Read next time.

So funny when people don't read comments and embarrass themselves.

His satirical confusion even got you... Jesus...

It’s not clickbait if it’s satire though...

I love this and whats written here but....it shouldnt be in the google goog feed cuz i i thought its its

Agreed - we're looking into how it did.

Screw you for writing a shitty click bait article.

Sorry that you feel this way, and my apologies if you came from Google News (it shouldn't have pulled this article, but it did somehow).

It showed up in my Google News feed. It's clear that Borderlands 3 is a popular search which could explain why a satirical article like this showed up in news feed.