Kotaku Says Everything At Kotaku Is Fine, As The Water Reaches Their Noses

Kotaku, the forever little sibling in the strange business that is gaming journalism, recently published another opinion on Google Stadia. Much like their rivals, Kotaku thrives on doing the least amount of effort and research as humanly possible before publishing their content. Whenever Kotaku pops out an article, you know the Clickbait-o-tron and copy paste has been hard at work to deliver. Quick, shallow, and ignorant. I imagine these are their mantras.

So here's an article from me, who'd love nothing else than to call myself the esteemed title of gaming journalist (real talk, it's blogging). So sit back, grab a drink or something, and enjoy the copy paste and find and replace work that went into this. It was difficult to write and I've uncovered so much insider intel, so please leave a comment. Actually don't, because I don't really care, I just have to act like I do.

The last 17 years or so have been rough times for Kotaku. Low reader numbers, it's better writers leaving left, right, and center, issues with pushing out quality that truly changes the world. But according to Kotaku, a company famous for posting clickbait articles and wasting fossil fuel power, everything is fine. They posted a hint on a bug in Animal Crossing New Horizon and a very clickbait photo. Nothing to worry about!

This reassurance that Kotaku is “alive and well” comes from nowhere. During the nothing, as they assured us that all was well, I got the distinct feeling that all at Kotaku isn’t well at all, and that the company is mostly rearranging chairs on a sinking Titanic, while pointing towards anything to distract folks from the rapidly rising water levels. And the fact that this ship doesn’t have many people on it.

When asked what Kotaku was doing that proves it’s actually “alive and well” Kotaku pointed to all the articles being added to the blog. “We’re well on our way to over 100 new articles launching on Kotaku in 2021,” explained Kotaku, “And we’re continuing to make Kotaku a great place to read articles on devices you already own.” When pushed by no-one to give a real answer, Kotaku offered more jargon and gibberish instead, saying Kotaku is, “focused on delivering value for our partners and on behalf of our readers.”

According to Kotaku, writing about old games and outdated memes is how they are “delivering value” to their readers. That meme, from my own experience, isn’t very good. That’s odd considering where Kotaku started as a company, but fully in keeping with Kotaku, which continues to feel half-baked.

During the interview, it’s also pointed out that we still don’t know how many people are actually reading Kotaku. The company doesn’t disclose these numbers. No-one, did tell someone that Kotaku readers are “very hungry for articles and are engaged, vocal readers.” But that still doesn’t tell us how many people are going onto Kotaku every day to read articles about how you can get more cash in Grand Theft Auto Online or how turnips still sell in Animal Crossing New Horizon. Based on a report from earlier this year, where it was revealed Kotaku spent no time being critical and in depth in their research only to miss its quality target by hundreds of thousands of readers, I’d say things aren’t going well.

In fact, during the ongoing Epic vs. Apple court trial, lawyers and witnesses seemed unable to clearly answer the question whether Kotaku was still operating or not. That’s a bad sign. While Kotaku claims Kotaku is alive and well, I’d start digging out a spot in the large and growing blog graveyard, because I don’t think it’s long for this world. But hey, as it sinks beneath the waves, at least not that many people will drown?

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