Dispatch writer Pierre Shorette regrets cutting sex scenes from AdHoc’s episodic superhero workplace comedy.
The first series of Dispatch wrapped last night, with the release of episodes seven and eight. While much of our time in the game was spent – as you would surmise given its name – dispatching a ragtag team of antiheroes to calls about everything from stuck cats to bomb threats, over the last few weeks we have also watched the characters and their relationships grow thanks to a range of narrative based choices and cinematics.
However, there were some more romantic scenes cut from the final release, which Shorette says on reflection the team “shouldn’t have”. Please be aware of some Dispatch spoilers below.
Speaking with Inverse, Shorette acknowledged that many Dispatch fans were especially invested in the game’s relationship and romance options, and despite there only being two to pursue, they became a “meaningful” part of the experience.
In Dispatch, players can choose to date either Blonde Blazer or Invisgal (who has a rather steamy dream about your character, Robert), though neither of these story lines is the main focus of the game. However, the team wasn’t expecting the reception to Dispatch to be as “ravenous” as it has been, and that’s “probably why we didn’t plan for more romance options”.
Shorette continued: “One of my secret shames is I think I default to romantic comedy in my writing and my whole life. I’m trying to pull out of that and make things more serious. Even in Wolf Among Us or Tales From the Borderlands, there’s some romance.”
The writer said he doesn’t “know that Dispatch is any one thing”, adding that seeing streams of the game has allowed him to see what has worked. “So if we can have people freak out at seeing a wiener on screen, laugh at a fart joke, and then somehow cry at the end of all that. I’m happy it’s working, but I also don’t think we made a ‘gooner game,’ and people know that now if they’ve played up to Episode six,” Shorette said. “It’s interesting to see the community switch up real fast, and lock in.”
And, well, we now all know that the romance parts of Dispatch definitely worked. But, alas, some of those moments didn’t make the final release. “We definitely cut some sex scenes. Which, in retrospect, we shouldn’t have,” Shorette laughed, teasing we may yet “get to see those one day”.
“There isn’t anyone on the development team that wouldn’t have a laundry list of stuff they wish they could polish more or gotten into the game. On the writing side, our team has a bunch of darlings that had to be killed along the way,” the writer closed.
“We’re still an indie studio, I think people forget that because it’s doing so well and looks so good. But because it looks good, it costs a lot per second to make this video game, and sometimes it costs things that often with these games is branching too.”
Earlier this year, AdHoc announced Dispatch had sold over 1m copies in just 10 days. Thanks to this success, the studio is now considering a second season.
For more, our Bertie has also been playing Dispatch, and this has left him quite excited about AdHoc’s involvement with the upcoming Critical Role game. “That Dispatch made me think over and over that ‘this feels like a Critical Role animated show’ is some of the highest praise I can heap upon it. That’s not because Critical Role is the be-all and end-all of everything creative – it is brilliant, and it is endearingly wholesome – but it’s because hitting those presentation heights is hard to do,” he wrote in Eurogamer’s feature Dispatch is brilliant, which is great news for Critical Role fans.
“I didn’t think a Telltale-like game was capable of it. But Dispatch has proved me wrong.”
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