What this is
One page of games, in order, with an argument for each place. That is the whole product. The ranking is republished as an edition rather than nudged quietly, so if you read it in June and disagree, the June version is what you disagreed with and the August one says so at the top.
The shortlist comes from what is actually installed on the phones in front of the column. We keep a running list of arcade releases that look promising, play them, and drop most of them. What survives is what we would still open a week later without being reminded, and that is a much shorter list than the store's front page suggests.
What we do not do
We do not try to cover everything. There is a genuine cost to that: worthwhile games go unmentioned here every month, and we would rather admit it than pretend the page is comprehensive. We also do not run advertising alongside the ranking, and we do not link anywhere except the official store listing. If you want the price, the permissions and the size of the download, the listing is the only honest source and we send you straight there.
Nothing on the page is paid for. Placement cannot be bought, no developer or publisher sees an entry before it is published, and there is no affiliate arrangement behind any link. We take no commission if you install something. If that ever changes it will be written at the top of the ranking, not buried on this page.
The Evening Report is not connected to Google LLC in any way. We are not endorsed, certified or sponsored by them; we simply read public listings and write about the games on them.
Who writes it
The column is a side project. One person writes it at weekends, occasionally with a second reader checking the numbers before publication, and neither of us does this full-time. We describe ourselves by role rather than by name because the byline would add nothing — you should be judging the reasoning, not the credentials behind it. It also means the cadence is openly slower than the release calendar. A game can be out for six weeks before it appears here.
Corrections
When we get something wrong, the amendment is appended to the bottom of the entry with the date on it, and the original sentence stays where it was. Quietly editing a claim out of existence is the easiest way to lose a reader's trust, and it is also the least useful thing for anyone who read the earlier version. Store figures are the most common thing to go stale: ratings move, prices change, and a download count that was right on a Tuesday can be wrong by Friday.
The details
- Publication
- The Evening Report, published at stillwater-collective.com
- Founded
- 2022
- Cadence
- Weekends, and slower than the release calendar
- Publisher
- Stillwater Collective Media LLC
- Method
- Three criteria, weighted equally — read the method in full
- Corrections
- Write to the column
Read next
The current ranking is short and the method sits underneath it. If you would rather see the working-out first, the journal is the better door.