Dispatch really delivered in just about every way and proved that episodic gaming can really payoff in the modern age if handled correctly.

When I heard that half the cast was composed of streamers and other internet personalities, I really thought the VO quality was going to be pretty sub par, especially when they were working alongside some of the best talents in the business (Matt Mercer, Laura Bailey, etc.). But I have to admit, everyone really brought their A game and did a really spectacular job. It goes to show how competent the casting producers and VO directors are that they were able to take this mish mash of streamers, professional voice actors, and Hollywood actors and churn out a very quality product where no one really outshone their fellow talent.

Character wise, I think the the game is full of really diverse, likeable, and memorable personalities. The Z team really felt like the rag tag team that they were and that co-worker relationship really shinned through their actions and dialogue. I personally loved Phenomaman (depressed Super-man) and Waterboy (the bumbling custodian) and it was ultimately a really had decision of who I wanted to eventually add to the team. Aside from that, I thought the Invisigal arc and romance was really well done and the general comradery between teammates felt very genuine.

I was pretty hopeful of the the management section of this game after playing the demo, and I was happy to see that they were able to build on the gameplay’s strengths in fun and unexpected ways as I progressed through the 8 chapters. Deducing which stats corresponded to each event’s description was fun to figure out and carefully choosing which team members to send out to ensure each missions success was just engaging enough that I had a really good time with it. On top of the general dispatch, figuring out where to distribute each hero’s stats, choosing abilities for them to learn, deciding which path to go with when given 2 different options of tackling an issue, discovering team synergies and abilities by messing around with different combos, all factored into this being more than the 1 dimensional minigame that it could have been.

I definitely felt like my choices mattered throughout the story and I was really happy with the overall outcome that came out of my personal path for Robert. I’d really love to play through this game again some day and choose all different options as it really does feel like the story can play out drastically different if I were to flip the script and play towards a different direction.

As far as pacing goes, there were some moments that felt a little rushed, but not enough to really be a complaint. Story wise I think this definitely would have benefitted more by being a 12 episode TV show rather than a game, but losing the decision making aspect and RPG management wouldn’t be worth losing for it.

Writing and animation were very strong throughout. The only complaints I had were a handful of scenes that I felt like I could see the actors reading straight off of a script (most notably the first scene in Chapter 1 and 7), but most of the dialogue and interactions came off very naturally.

Compared to the Telltale library, I think this definitely tops the charts as one of the decision based adventure games of all times. And the fact that they were able to do this one a brand new IP really cements that fact that AdHok Studio has the stuff and I’m really looking forward to seeing what they put out next.

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