Editor's blog: Bringing back mobile and tablet game reviews
A game is a game is a game.
When we first introduced App of the Day to Eurogamer 12 months ago, we did so because mobile and tablet games seemed to be reaching the peak of their powers and we wanted the site to reflect their growing significance in our gaming lives.
12 months later, we're taking App of the Day away again and bringing back traditional mobile and tablet game reviews, and the reason we're doing it is much the same: we want the site to reflect their significance.
Mobile and tablet games no longer feel like special cases. They have seeped into our gaming lives and found their level, and their designers have wrapped their unique qualities - instant readiness, advanced connectivity, touch controls - around concepts that now feel no more alien or threatening to us than dual sticks in a console first-person shooter or Nolan North on the voice cast.
A year ago we were just coming to terms with this, but after 12 months where we've been just as comfortable playing something like New Star Soccer, Letterpress or Beat Sneak Bandit as we are playing anything else, treating those games differently feels less progressive and increasingly anachronistic.
Towards the end of the year we also noticed that our App of the Day model - every game has to be good or at least sufficiently interesting to warrant a recommendation - was starting to prove restrictive. We used to simply ignore rubbish apps because they seldom had any redeeming or even interesting features, but increasingly we had to break our own rules to incorporate things like Curiosity. And generally when we notice that self-imposed editorial guidelines are preventing us doing good stuff then we know it's time for a tweak.
So there we are. From now on, we'll be covering mobile and tablet games in all the ways we cover anything else - if there's something interesting to report then we'll tell you about it, and if we think they're worth a review then we'll review them.
As ever, mobile and tablet developers - for any platform - are welcome to get in touch to ask about coverage, and you should start noticing the change from this week onwards.