I was very skeptical at first. Modern day story writing is at its lowest point across every industry, probably ever, so naturally, what hope would I have for Dispatch? Well, initially none. I watched the game first, through the eyes of a friend in a watch party. To say I was floored is an understatement. Dispatch is an achievement in storytelling, and animation, even in spite of some overplayed arcs and cliches, and a few small issues I could nitpick. For once though, I'm going to forego nitpicking because what this game does do right, it smashes it out of the park. I have not been properly invested in anything driven purely by its story in a long time, and because of that, I wound up buying the game knowing exactly what happens, and playing it anyways. I can make it worth my while by getting all achievements in it. Gameplay is fine, if a bit disjointed and counter-intuitive at times.

Most people want a Season 2, but I think the story is fine where it is, and I think a sequel is more likely to undermine the greatness of what we have now, rather than expand it. Telltale learned that the hard way with their Walking Dead series, having all subsequent seasons past the first one being divisive at worst. I don't want that for Dispatch, and AdHoc now. I want the nearly universal praise to stay, and not be tainted in the future.

This is the kind of game you play, fail to understand, but thoroughly enjoy, and then watch a 4-hour video essay on how great it is, and then you can fully appreciate it.

This game is total lunacy from start to finish, and I love it. Banger music, chaotic movement, and crude, but mostly forced humor make for a manic trip of a platforming game. Spread this one around, it deserves your attention if you like platformers, and retro styled games.

Very fun little in-between cross of Super Monkey Ball, and Marble Blast. I had a great time 100%ing it.

However, I must point out some things I want to stress. The game is short, only taking me about 5 hours to 100%. Not an issue on its own, but in conjunction with the fact that I personally think the game is quite pricey for its size, at only 99 levels that are done twice at minimum throughout Campaign and Arcade modes. Custom levels can alleviate this concern, but this game is quite hidden under the slop, and as a result, naturally, custom levels don't really exist yet. Share it around with people who are fans of marble games! I know I will be.

The game currently misses some QoL that would make it fantastic. As far as suggestions go, I'll just list off what I think the game could use, if the dev is still working on this game.

In campaign mode:
- Having buttons to go to the next level, or retry the level you were just on in the level results screen would be fantastic, instead of having to back out and go back in every time. It's not so bad to go in and out, there's practically no load times, but it would be nice, since I tend to play the levels in order anyways.

- Selection wrap-around when picking the world and level, as well as sustained movement while a direction is held. Very minor nitpick, yes.

In general:
- A quick reset button while playing a level. I imagine it would behave identically to pausing, and picking Restart. The left bumper isn't used for anything, so that would be a great button to use. Maybe make it double tap by default to prevent accidental resets, and then have a separate option to make it single tap to reset.

- Input buffering for fast forwarding level intros. It doesn't speed up until you have pressed the A button during the level introduction sequence. Probably the most nitpicky thing I could have suggested, yes, but that's who I am.

- Game advertises 100 levels, but it actually has 99. I'll forgive this egregiously false claim because you can import custom levels into the game, but that's definitely the biggest sin on this list. (This one isn't actually serious)

I mean, you get what you pay for.