Review | Dispatch Episodes 1 & 2 – Telltale Signs
Superhero media has long since become oversaturated, arguably even before the Marvel Cinematic Universe took off. Even superhero parodies are difficult to make nowadays because all the obvious jokes have been done to death and — as evidenced by the success of James Gunn’s Superman movie — people want sincerity again rather than another subversive examination about how disruptive and awful a superhero society would be.
As such, Dispatch’s premise of a workplace comedy in a superhero setting doesn’t sound that particularly unique on paper. In fact, DC beat it to the punch in 2017 with short-lived sitcom Powerless. However, Dispatch does offer a unique hook in that rather than focus on a superhero or a normal person living their life in a superhero society, our lead bridges the gap between these two worlds as an ordinary guy whose job is to “dispatch” his superpowered co-workers on missions from his office cubicle.
That’s a very simplistic overview, though. In actuality, Dispatch’s star — Robert Robertson (voiced by Aaron Paul) — was an Iron Man-esque superhero called Mecha Man, but after his hulking mech suit is damaged beyond repair, he takes up a dispatcher job in exchange for getting his suit fixed. But the job’s easier said than done as he’s put in charge of a Z-team of ex-supervillains who have no respect for Robert and aren’t very good at the whole reformation thing.
It's a premise I’m 100% down for and after playing through the game’s first two episodes (yes, this is one of those episodic games, with two episodes releasing every week for a total of eight), I am already invested in Robert’s story and the world he inhabits, in spite of the very hit-or-miss dialogue writing and the unfortunate return of Telltale Games’ worst traits.
For context, this isn’t a Telltale game, but the debut title of AdHoc Studio, which was founded by former Telltale staff after the studio’s collapse in 2018, with the goal of creating more “interactive narrative titles” in the same vein as The Walking Dead and The Wolf Among Us. If you’ve played any of Telltale’s old work, Dispatch will immediately feel familiar as it follows the same structure.
It’s not one-to-one identical, however, since there’re no point-and-click style puzzle sections. You’re essentially watching a TV show, and occasionally you get to pick Robert’s response to any given situation (complete with those trademark “so-and-so will remember this” messages) or do a QTE during an action scene. Said QTEs are mostly irrelevant, as evidenced by the fact they can be turned off, and failing them does nothing but slightly tweak how the scene will play out. It’s the difference between Robert knocking out a goon immediately with the butt of a gun or needing to hit them twice. There are also occasional hacking minigames, which aren’t especially complex but aren’t super obtrusive either and help break up the pacing.
Unfortunately, it feels like your decisions have just as little impact as the QTEs, at least at this early stage. I played through both episodes twice and the impact of my choices was tantamount to window dressing. Some of Telltale’s old work barely hid how little your choices mattered but it’s especially bad in Dispatch’s first two episodes. There is a specific narrative the game wants to follow, and you are railroaded down that path no matter what.
Some of the small changes are neat, like an encounter with an ex-villain in a bar ending with him either permanently losing a tooth or his eyebrows, but moments that feel they should be more pivotal are so lacking in consequences, it begs the question of why the player’s even being offered a choice. The most egregious example comes in Episode 2, when you have to pick between two instructions to give to dispatched hero Invisigal: no matter what you pick, she calls you an idiot and does the opposite. She is Schrödinger’s superhero, where she has no opinion of her own until you share yours.
AdHoc has described Dispatch as the kind of game that’s shaped by the decisions of the player but based on the first two episodes, it really doesn’t feel like that’s the case. If I’m going down a linear path anyway, why offer any element of choice to begin with? With how much AdHoc has compared the game to a TV show, it just makes it seem like that’s what the team would rather be making (which is especially strange when it already has one in the works).
Fortunately, Dispatch does justify its status as a video game through the actual dispatching. Once per episode, you have to coordinate your roster of heroes, assigning them to missions as they pop up on your office monitor. These sections are more involved than you may think since they have some light RPG elements woven in. Every hero has their own stats you need to consider before dispatching them, which in turn can be levelled up once they gain enough experience. For example, retrieving a child’s lost balloon requires high mobility while fending off a gang of criminals demands someone with good combat capabilities. Even then, the right hero for the job only increases the odds of success as there’s still a random chance that they’ll completely biff it.
The more you engage with dispatching, the more layers reveal themselves. Heroes will be temporarily unavailable after completing missions since they’re on break and recuperating. Some missions can have more than one hero assigned to them, which increases the chance of success but means you have less options for when the next one or two missions pop up. Missions will expire if you don’t assign someone in time (fortunately, the selection process pauses everything so you can take your time with decision-making), which means you may need to send someone less suited to the task. Heroes also have passive abilities that only reveal themselves once you meet the conditions for triggering them. Invisigal, for example, can complete missions faster when on her own.
There’s a lot more I can mention but the point is that these dispatch sections aren’t low-effort scripted sections disguised as a management sim. They’re honestly my favourite part of the game, to the point that I’m actually disappointed they seem to only happen once per episode. It also appears missions aren’t randomised and come in a scripted order so it’s entirely possible to figure out an optimal route, but that’s not much of a deal breaker. I’d honestly happily play a full game of just these sections.
I’m also a fan of Dispatch’s art style and animation (described as Western anime by the art team), which allows for some pleasing and expressive visuals. Not to knock Telltale’s old stuff, but its character animations could often be quite stiff, lending to some awkward movements and facial expressions. That’s not the case here and one could very easily mistake this for a high-end indie animation you’d see on YouTube.
The writing I’m less sure of, primarily the dialogue. Dispatch obviously wants to be a story for adults, which means it falls into the trap of peppering its dialogue with a near constant flurry of swears. I’m no prude (though if you are, there are censorship options) but when characters are dropping “fuck” every other sentence, it makes me think of when 10-year-olds first discover the word and become obsessed with it. It ironically makes the script less mature and more childish. Said script also makes a bad habit of having characters dissect their own dialogue and jokes, which is occasionally amusing but grows tiring quickly before it becomes tiring.
It's a shame since there’s plenty of fun banter between some characters (I don’t enjoy Chase’s chronic swearing, but his back-and-forths with Robert are entertaining) and I got a soft chuckle out of a few lines. The best joke, though, is hearing one character misread the word subscriber as “subscribber”, which made me pause the game for a bit because I was laughing so hard, possibly thanks to Travis Willingham’s line delivery (one of several big-name voice actors Dispatch has in its cast).
Dispatch’s adult tone thankfully doesn’t mean we have yet another cynical take on superheroes. It’s certainly not all smiles and sunshine — and is filled with crude and lewd humour — but its principal cast is comprised of fundamentally good people… or people who are at least trying to be. Blonde Blazer is a quintessential Golden Age superhero, but she’s far from a paragon and feels grounded in her optimism. She’s only naïve at worst and is never condemned or punished for believing in the best in people. Invisigal is coarse and abrasive, but there’s clearly more to her, considering she willingly ditched the supervillain life and signed on as a superhero. I also love the addition of her being asthmatic, which when combined with how she needs to hold her breath to turn invisible means she’s frequently puffing on an inhaler, a trait that welcomingly jars with her in-your-face attitude.
Robert himself best exemplifies the kind of tone Dispatch is going for. Despite the obvious Iron Man comparisons, he is far from a genius billionaire playboy philanthropist. He’s a scrappy underdog who clearly hasn’t had the easiest time being a superhero, having driven himself to financial ruin maintaining his suit, with Paul providing a weary, sardonic performance. But despite a blunt personality, he’s not an overly cynical asshole who regrets his hero days and resents the world around him. After his suit is trashed, he still tries to thwart some robbers with a broken arm. He helps an obviously nervous newbie janitor correctly put on a tie before his job interview. And most importantly, he has a cute dog he clearly loves. He’s a soft guy with a very rough exterior and he quickly makes himself an endearing protagonist, with his brutal honesty serving as both a strength and a flaw depending on the occasion.
If you’re at all interested, I’d recommend the digital deluxe edition if only for the in-game art book, which goes beyond just showing concept art and actually explains some of the design processes behind how characters look. It really goes to show the team are superhero fans through and through and care about the world they’ve created, which is well suited to becoming a multimedia franchise. There are plans for a tabletop game, but I could see more video games encompassing different genres taking place in this superhero world, helping flesh it out beyond what we see in Dispatch.
Criticisms about the illusion of choice and dialogue aside, Dispatch is off to a decently strong start. Even if my decisions really don’t matter in the long run, I’m still interested to see where Robert’s journey takes him and try out more dispatch jobs. Hopefully, there’ll be more interesting plot diversions and consequences resulting from my decisions, but those can be made up for if the overall plot, like a superhero arriving to save the day, sticks the landing.
