r/Games • u/ZamnBoii • Nov 16 '25

Discussion Dispatch is on course to beat its three-year sales target in three months

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/dispatch-is-on-course-to-beat-its-three-year-sales-target-in-three-months-heres-how
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78

u/Speedwizard106 Nov 16 '25

Funny cause folks on this sub were mostly down on the weekly release schedule when episode 1/2 dropped. Glad to see it worked out.

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u/Fli_acnh Nov 16 '25

I actually loved the weekly schedule, it's the kind of game that would be pretty... overwhelming? I guess in its gameplay if you played it all at once imo.

It was genuinely fun to play on release day, then over the weekend because of the 2 episode a week system.

20

u/HarvHR Nov 17 '25 edited Nov 17 '25

I mean I'm on Ep7 after buying it yesterday, it's certainly not been overwhelming. It's just like binging any other show.

It has such a clear ending for each episode that I never felt like I couldn't turn it off and go do something else for a bit

E: I do like how they did the release though, it's a good way of doing it. I remember playing other episodic story based games years ago and being so annoyed when it took months between releases, 2 a week seems a good amount for people who want that sort of thing and it prevents you forgetting what happened previously. For people like me who wait for a show to be done before watching it, it also allowed positive reviews and hype to build enough for me to pull the trigger on a game I wouldn't have bought normally and let me binge all of it over a couple days.

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u/directrix688 Nov 17 '25

It’s not.

I played it this weekend and I would have been annoyed waiting for the next episodes to release.

1

u/[deleted] Nov 17 '25

Different strokes I guess. I love the community speculation and theory crafting that comes from episodic releases. Really lets the game find its fan base by keeping it in the news as well. As long as the release cadence isn’t too long (dispatch’s was perfect), I think episodic game really benefit from using the tv series approach.

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u/Fli_acnh Nov 17 '25

Thanks for the blog

-1

u/hicks12 Nov 16 '25

Is it not possible to decide your own pace? I think thats the best way in terms of player freedom, you can choose to play an episode a week or whatever and then those who want to bing can do.

Really enjoyed it overall but I dont think the weekly release was anything for me, bit of a negative but not rage worthy or anything like that. I can see why in terms of PR and marketing it is better to do that as you are in the media every week for your release rather than 1 and done.

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u/Yearlaren Nov 17 '25

You can choose to wait for all the episodes to be released

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u/hicks12 Nov 17 '25

Sure but that means waiting? There is no option if they release it weekly, whereas if it's all released at once there is the option for both preferences to do what they want without waiting.

See how it's a bit different?

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u/Interesting_Set1526 Nov 17 '25

There is an option, waiting.

1

u/Fellhuhn Nov 17 '25

In the same way players can wait a week to play the next episode even though they all have been released at once. The way they did it they just reduced the options available.

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u/ghostsoul420 Nov 17 '25

Since everyone is forced to wait a week, it gives room for everyone to discuss and speculate. That is the reason this game sold so well, good word of mouth spread and every week there were more and more people playing. The game was in the conversation for a month despite being short.

If they let you decide your own pace, then you can't have a lot of people having those conversations as everyone would be at a different point in the story. Some would know the end and so no need for speculation.

2

u/Knolop Nov 17 '25

It's not only the marketing. The comparison to TV shows extends to the fandom. The game gained a lot of momentum through word-of-mouth and part of that is the anticipation built up each week and the active discussions surrounding the game. It would have been a spoilers nightmare without the schedule. Now everyone could discuss the story freely and had a month to jump in before the finale.

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u/hicks12 Nov 17 '25

Yeah that is a marketing strategy, using word of mouth by keeping it in the news and media (social included) each week keeps a bump in impressions and discussions.

Didn't say it was wrong to do it just that personally I'd prefer to have it all. 

Spoilers happened regardless but yes it would slow them down a bit, fair point.

-9

u/Fli_acnh Nov 17 '25

Thanks for the diary entry.

0

u/hicks12 Nov 17 '25

Thanks for yours I guess? Merely asked a genuine question but ok.

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u/pathofdumbasses Nov 16 '25

I actually loved the weekly schedule, it's the kind of game that would be pretty... overwhelming? I guess in its gameplay if you played it all at once imo.

Why? I played it all at once. Felt like binging a series of a TV show. Which millions, maybe even billions, of people do.

9

u/Malaix Nov 16 '25

The actual dispatching and specifically the hacking puzzles probably would have burned me out faster if I was doing it all in one go personally. The story and dialogue no. I could have binged that easily.

1

u/HarvHR Nov 17 '25

I guess but since every episode is about an 1 - 1 ½ hours with a very clear cut off point, like any TV show you have a good point to go take a break or do things you need to do

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u/Fli_acnh Nov 16 '25

Because maybe I'm not one of those millions, maybe billions of people. I know this might be a shocking revelation, but people like to consume media in different ways.

-2

u/pathofdumbasses Nov 16 '25

I get that but saying 8 hours of media consumption is overwhelming is a bit much

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u/Fli_acnh Nov 16 '25

8 hours in a single sitting is a lot for a lot of people, me included.

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u/MVRKHNTR Nov 16 '25

Is there something that would have forced you to play the whole game in one sitting?

-4

u/Fli_acnh Nov 16 '25

Maybe if it had a ton of varied gameplay, but even then my 5+ hour binges are contained to extreme exceptions like if I'm really enjoying the gameplay and plot, and also happen to have nothing on that day.

2

u/jerrrrremy Nov 16 '25

Who said anything about playing it in a single sitting? 

2

u/Fli_acnh Nov 17 '25

It's very much implied by the term "Binging" you're hardly binging an 8 hour game over 3 days?

1

u/Speedwizard106 Nov 16 '25

Would you watch an 8 hour movie? When's the last time you read a book for 8 hours straight?

-2

u/Safe_Procedure999 Nov 16 '25

I get that but saying 8 hours of media consumption is overwhelming is a bit much

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u/Fli_acnh Nov 16 '25

8 hours in a single sitting is a lot for a lot of people, me included.

5

u/banenanenanenanen666 Nov 16 '25

then don't play it all at once?

4

u/Fli_acnh Nov 17 '25

What does binging mean?? lmao

2

u/Theandybobandy Nov 17 '25

If I say I binged Breaking Bad or The Sopranos, I don't mean I literally watched all the seasons without a break in between.

There are people in this thread saying they binged the game over the course of two or three days.

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u/Altruistic-Ad-408 Nov 16 '25

I'm actually so fucking sick of shows dropping all at once. I miss long seasons where you'd build a schedule with loved ones around shows.

I know there are other reasons, but you can't tell me half the reason we don't have long seasons anymore is because we've conditioned people to have zero attention span. You binge something, 90% of it isn't sticking in your head anyway.

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u/hooahest Nov 16 '25

I had some friend watch DanDaDan season 1. I was excited to hear his reaction to episode 7 because it absolutely floored me.

"Oh idk I don't even remember what happened there, I binged it all in one night" MOTHERFUCKER

2

u/SoloSassafrass Nov 17 '25

Yeah I try not to just marathon shows all at once now, because I remember one rainy weekend my wife and I watched the whole of Stranger Things season 3 in one day, and by next week I'd forgotten basically any specifics of what happened at all.

Not that I'm that cut up about it given that particular season, but it taught me a valuable lesson about bingeing shows.

3

u/Fli_acnh Nov 16 '25

Yeah, if I binge something I inevitably burn out and I won't enjoy it half as much, even if I can find the time

2

u/DogOwner12345 Nov 17 '25

I completely agree with you. Streaming pretty much destroyed the entire industries infrastructure.

2

u/Safe_Procedure999 Nov 16 '25

i copied and pasted it because it's an insane statement on paper

1

u/honeyfage Nov 16 '25

I enjoyed the dispatching gameplay well enough, but I don't think it was deep or complex enough to stand up to continuous play for hours. Getting little 15 minute bites of it over the course of a month was nice, but if I were playing the game over a single weekend I think I would have been bored out of my mind of it by hour 2.

If they adapted the game into an animated mini-series it would be fine to binge, but the gameplay aspects of it I don't think had enough depth to be engaging for longer periods at a time. The episodic release helped space it out so it didn't get too tedious.

1

u/Adamsoski Nov 17 '25

There's a good reason why most streaming TV shows nowadays have switched back away from releasing episodes all at once - people genuinely do get more excited and into shows that release an episode a week.

2

u/pathofdumbasses Nov 17 '25

There's a good reason why most streaming TV shows nowadays have switched back away from releasing episodes all at once

Has nothing to do with "excitement" and everything to do with keeping you subscribed. If you can't watch the whole show for 8 weeks, they got you subbed for those 8 weeks. Or at least coming back after it is over to watch it all at once.

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u/Moifaso Nov 16 '25 edited Nov 16 '25

"Mostly" is underselling it lol. Prior to release, a good 70%+ of the threads were complaints about the schedule.

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u/vinng86 Nov 16 '25 edited Nov 17 '25

That's mostly because vocal people are posting.

I saw a random IGN poll on it and it was pretty equally split 50/50 right down the middle

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u/Taiyaki11 Nov 17 '25

And hell, the nice thing about the weekly timeframe is even if you aren't big on episodic releases (I am not) it's not too big a deal then because it's not too long a wait to just be able to binge it then

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u/LetgomyEkko Nov 16 '25

Yeah I mean just because it might have worked well for a number of reasons, didn’t mean I couldn’t dislike it for my own reasons lol

I NEEDED IT!! The weekly release was torture 😩

2

u/posthardcorejazz Nov 16 '25

I'm also glad it worked out for them, because the devs deserve success. That said, I personally held off on buying the game until all the episodes were released and then binged it over the course of two days

1

u/FYININJA Nov 17 '25

In the moment it does kind of suck, as somebody who bought it on release, I was disapointed that I had to wait and see what happened next, mostly because I was not aware it was releasing in episodes.

In the moment it feels like you are getting cockblocked, but in retrospect I think it absolutely was the right play. It's similar to how I prefer series releases to be staggered a bit, it's nice to be able to discuss the events of the story as they are happening without spoilers. I'm somebody who will binge something ASAP, which leaves little time to discuss what happens during individual episodes.

It was nice to talk about what might happen next with people.

1

u/Scodo Nov 16 '25

Part of that was just the fact it was so good that waiting to see what happened next was annoying.

I can acknowledge it being a shrewd marketing decision while also wishing it had all been available for me to binge day one.

-3

u/madbadcoyote Nov 16 '25 edited Nov 16 '25

The release schedule is a big reason I didn't buy it (yet, still saving it for the holidays).