Comparison

JoinDispatch vs Backburn

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both games, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

JoinDispatch

Experience the thrill of managing emergency dispatches in a text-based adventure. Make critical decisions, earn stars, and unlock new opportunities as a Citizen Responder. Navigate limited resources and even rewind time to correct mistakes.

Highlights
  • Achieve 5-Star rating
  • Earn skills and unlock opportunities
  • Resource management
  • Rewind time function
  • Choice-driven narrative
  • Simplified decisions
Features
Read full description

Calls are flooding in and all that stands between life and death are your choices. Be alert. There may be something more on the line. Join Today! State-run emergency dispatch systems are overwhelmed. Privatized, crowdsourced dispatch response is the new wave in emergency services, with JoinDispatch leading the pack thanks to their Rapid Response Server. Join our amazing team of Citizen Responders today to begin your first shift from your phone or JoinDispatch Home Terminal! Your Manager will work closely with you to ensure you're on track to earn stars - and to save lives, of course! JoinDispatch is a text-based adventure game by Kyle McCullough, written by Kyle McCullough & Suki-Rose Simakis. Original Music by Morgan Z Whirledge. NOTE TO NEW RESPONDERS: Some recent employees have reported strange caller interactions and evidence of attempted hacks into the JoinDispatch OS. Though no one is quite certain why this is occurring, we can assure you - everything's fine and secure. Features: -Strive to achieve a coveted 5-Star rating. -Earn skills that will help you meet your goals and unlock new opportunities and characters. -Protect and Conserve: use your resources wisely, they are highly limited. -Rewind Time Itself: Only the JoinDispatch system offers you our patented rewind function, allowing you to undo that last mistake. -Simplified decisions and seamless navigation will have you clicking your way to great success. -Your choices will carve a new path through your shift each time you play.

About

Backburn

This offline strategy game lets you plan up to six turns ahead in wildfire scenarios. Compare different decisions, manage resources, and learn from your choices in a fictional environment. Rehearse before advancing to make every turn count.

Highlights
  • Plan six turns ahead
  • Compare strategy branches
  • Manage resources and crews
  • Offline gameplay
  • Thirty authored incidents
  • After-action reports
Features
Read full description

NEW IN 5.0: SEE THE NEXT TURN, UNDO A MISTAKE, TAKE A DAILY INCIDENT • Forecast: the map outlines every cell the fire will reach on your next Advance, and rings any structure that turn would lose. Change an order and the forecast redraws. It is exact for one turn because the game is deterministic. • Undo: step back any order placed since the last Advance, from a single line cell to a burnout. Undo never rerolls the fire. • Daily Incident: one new incident per date, generated on your device. An authored map with the wind turned 30 to 60 degrees and a fresh random sequence, the same for everyone that day. Your first finished attempt counts; practise as often as you like. Build a streak and share a plain-text result card. • Recruit, Standard or Veteran: Recruit slows the fire for learning, Standard is the campaign as you know it, Veteran spreads faster, spots more and makes engines work within two cells of their water target. • Service Record: nineteen commendations, from regime specialist to seven-day streaks, computed on your device. • Field Training that waits for you to act, briefings that introduce each new resource, iPad keyboard shortcuts, VoiceOver map summaries and high-contrast overlays. Make the next turn count. Backburn is an offline wildfire incident-command strategy game for iPhone and iPad, with thirty authored incidents and tools for trying, reviewing and learning from your decisions. COMMAND THE MAP Select and move resources, build line, place water or retardant, burn out from completed line and evacuate housing groups. Each Advance passes twenty minutes. Working crews tire; HOLD lets them recover. An authored weather schedule shows when winds shift, gust fronts arrive, inversions lift and spotting pressure rises. REHEARSE BEFORE ADVANCING Decision Desk resolves the next turn in two copies: your current orders, or crews held in place. Strategy Lab explores up to six turns of three fixed policies. Neither changes your incident or its random sequence. PICK UP WHERE YOU LEFT OFF Every campaign incident and the Daily Incident save their map, orders, weather, clock and random state. Resume from the menu, briefing or Daily screen. Completed incidents can be reopened to review the report. COMPARE YOUR ATTEMPTS A restart keeps one previous attempt per scenario. Compare both recorded timelines and their acres, structures lost and line completed at the same turn. LEARN FROM ACTUAL RESULTS After-action reports state recorded growth, losses, injuries and score, plus any commendation earned. Passing a scenario and extinguishing all fire are different outcomes. The Field Guide explains the real rules, including the forecast, difficulty and Daily Incident. Thirty incident maps across grassland, chaparral, conifer, peat and interface fuels, with seeded spread and spotting, resource rosters and housing groups. Play in landscape on iPhone or iPad. No account, advertising, subscription or in-app purchases; gameplay works offline and progress stays on your device. Backburn is a fictional strategy game with a surface-fire model adapted for play. It is not a real-world fire forecast, emergency tool or professional training. The in-game forecast predicts only this game's next turn. There is no live weather feed, online leaderboard or app-managed cloud synchronization.

Screenshots

JoinDispatch4 screens
Backburn4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: JoinDispatch at 60% against Backburn's 0%. JoinDispatch also leads on price (Free vs $0.99). Backburn's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 3). On update cadence, ads, device support and iOS requirement there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

JoinDispatch is free to download; Backburn costs $0.99 up front. JoinDispatch sells 3 one-off in-app purchases. Backburn asks for nothing beyond the download.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

JoinDispatch ships an update weekly, Backburn every 4 days. The most recent releases landed on September 29, 2026 and October 6, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
JoinDispatch versus Backburn: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterJoinDispatchBackburn
PriceFree — better$0.99
Rating4.2 (898 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews59.8% of reviews — better0.0% of reviews
Number of ratings898 — better—
Update frequencyWeeklyEvery 4 days — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchases — betterPaid
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad
Requires iOS17.017.0
Further details — not scored
Size50 MB118 MB
Age rating12+4+
DeveloperKyle McCulloughRobert Corbin

Customer experience

JoinDispatch

All ratings898 ratings
Positive78.3%
Neutral6.7%
Negative15.0%
Written reviews234 reviews
Positive59.8%
Neutral15.8%
Negative24.4%

Backburn

Written reviews1 reviews
Positive0.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative100.0%

Bugs and requests

JoinDispatch

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • Calls getting stuck on hold
  • Skills disappearing or not working as expected
  • Repeated resets of progress
  • Unresponsive UI and black screens

Requested features

4 requests
  • More episodes/shifts to continue the story
  • Ability to replay past calls/choices
  • Clearer progression and skill system
  • Offline mode or reduced battery drain

Backburn

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

3 purchases

JoinDispatch

One-time3
  • Shift One - Remove AdsFree
  • Shift Unlock$3.99
  • Season 1 Pass$9.99
None

Backburn

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is JoinDispatch free?
JoinDispatch is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Backburn free?
Backburn costs $0.99, with no in-app purchases.
Do JoinDispatch or Backburn have ads?
Neither JoinDispatch nor Backburn shows ads.
Which is updated more often, JoinDispatch or Backburn?
JoinDispatch ships an update weekly, and Backburn every 4 days. Most recently, JoinDispatch was updated on September 29, 2026 and Backburn on October 6, 2026.

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