The streaming provider Amazon Prime Video wants to take us into the world of video games. Only differently than we are used to.
Normally, we control our video game heroes ourselves and explore the colorful fictional worlds with the help of a keyboard, mouse or controller.In Secret Level, however, we have to keep our feet still, because the new series shows us little stories from our favorite universes. Our help is not needed, because the protagonists solve their problems (mostly) on their own.
Since December 10, 2024you can watch the first eight episodes on Amazon Prime Video. The remaining seven episodes will follow on December 17, 2024. Attention! The following lines may contain spoilers from other universes!
Peter, Franzi, and Tristan were allowed to watch the series in advance. Just in time for the release, the three of them tell you which episodes are their personal highlights.
New World: The Once and Future King (Episode 3)
I haven’t played New World: Aeternum, but I still like this episode the best. I’m transported to a little video game sitcom that tells a small story about friendship with a lot of wit and charm.
The island on which the characters are stranded looks like any other sand oasis that we already know from various video games. Nevertheless, the series manages to make you feel that something is different or even unusual. Of course, I can’t tell you in detail what exactly it is. But if you watch the episode, you might understand what I mean.
Another big plus is, of course, the slightly arrogant and dim-witted main character, to whom action legend Arnold Schwarzenegger lends his voice and even muscles.
So here it’s simply a matter of switching off your brain, leaning back and enjoying the show.
PAC-MAN: Circle (eps. 6)
If you had asked me before which episode of Secret Level I was looking forward to the most, the answer would definitely not have been the one about Pac-Man. Honestly, at first I even thought that the protagonist had jumped directly from the Oddworld series onto the screen. But after just a few seconds, I was glued to the screen.
The storytelling is fantastic, the images are impressive, the plot remains mysterious until the very end. The unusual hero’s journey, the focus on eating or being eaten, the wonderful allusions to the ghosts – and then that ending. “Shiiiiiiit,” I exclaimed in true The Wire style at the shocking scenes, which I won’t spoil here, of course. But if you’ve seen Secret Level, you know what I mean. Shiiiiiiit.
The Pac-Man episode takes a template that couldn’t be more abstract and uses it to tell a profound story full of action and surprises that had me on the edge of my seat more than any other episode of Secret Level.
The Outer Worlds: The Company We Keep (Episode 9)
When I watched the episode for The Outer Worlds, one of my all-time favorite games, I was seriously heartbroken. But not because the short film was bad. Quite the opposite. I was just so carried away by the tragic love story. And that rarely happens to me in anthology series.
It didn’t take 60 seconds for me to take the protagonist into my heart. He finds out purely by chance about a new job that gives him the chance to see a past girlfriend again. But to do so, he has to serve as a test subject for the morally flexible pharmaceutical company Auntie Cleo, putting his life at risk.
Beyond that, the episode offers everything I could have wished for in an Outer Worlds adaptation: offbeat humor, a touch of brutality, over-the-top characters, and criticism of the system and capitalism. Simply great!
Warhammer 40,000 is also getting its own episode, which even continues the story from Space Marine 2.
Are you going to watch Secret Level? Which episode are you looking forward to the most? Let us know in the comments – we’re curious to hear your opinions!
