The best and worst ‘Secret Level’ episodes, ranked

If blockbusters like Sonic the Hedgehog, Five nights at Freddie’sand The Super Mario Bros. Movie is proof that mainstream audiences are finally ready to enjoy video game adaptations, consider Secret level a sample plate. Coming from the creators of Netflix’s similar animated anthology Love, Death + Robots, Secret level offers 15 bite-size adaptations of 15 different video game franchises. The result is, charitably, a mixed bag that largely focuses on lesser-known games and rarely offers more than a straightforward take (with one deeply insane exception in Secret level‘s riff on Pac-Man).

Still, it’s an interesting experiment, and one that, if successful with viewers, could spawn future seasons that take the concept of a video game adaptation in new and unexpected directions. So what episodes of Secret level Is it really worth your time? Here they are ranked from worst to best:

In his worst moments, Secret level makes you feel like you’re voluntarily watching a commercial. But Playing time: Fulfillment might as well be a commercial in which a bike courier, played by Kevin Hart’s daughter Heaven, zips past PlayStation characters like Kratos and Sackboy while her famous father jabs in her ear. The big reveal at the end essentially comes down to “Video games are good!” — as if someone who chooses to see Secret level must be convinced.

Secret level leaning towards the grim and gritty, then an adaptation of Capcom’s beloved Mega man franchise overloaded with wacky robots could have provided a welcome burst of color. Instead, this short, bland origin story is a missed opportunity. This episode ends where it should have begun; inexplicably, the blue armor, the insanely catchy music, and pretty much everything else that’s fun about Mega man doesn’t actually come until the closing moments.

It’s safe to say no one played Unreal tournament for the story. Perhaps that’s why this adaptation of the first-person shooter series feels so numerical, as a renegade robot sparks a revolution by achieving a series of unlikely victories in a futuristic gladiatorial arena. Credit, at least, for bringing it back Unreal Tournament 3 voice actor Fred Tatasciore as speaker.

Spelunky: Tally has the poor fortune to come after no fewer than three other episodes that meditate on the cycle of life, death, and rebirth that video game protagonists are forced to endure. But even if the episode stood alone, this is a pretty thin take on the addictive roguelike game, with most of the story unfolding in a bland starting area instead of Spelunky‘s ever-changing corridors.

Keanu Reeves in a mech suit! That’s pretty much the whole pitch for this adaptation of FromSoftware’s third-person shooter franchise, which casts Reeves as a cynical pilot whose closest companion is the computer-enhanced voice in his head. It’s nothing special – and it’s hard to shake the feeling Cyberpunk 2077in which Reeves played a prominent role would have been much better suited Secret level – but it’s a decent enough introduction to an underrated video game franchise.

Don’t feel too bad if you’re not familiar Crossfire. The free-to-play shooter is a massive, massive hit in Asia, but never really caught on in the US. This episode — in which two rival squadrons of mercenaries, each insisting they’re “not the bad guy,” fight over a briefcase and the asshole who carries it — delivers serviceable action while standing out as the only Secret level episode that takes place in the real world.

You have to respect the audacity of this grim, gory adaptation of Pac-Manthat recreates the video game icon as a sword-wielding humanoid who is guided through a maze of ghosts and monsters by a floating yellow dot who insists on eating everything in his path. To be clear: Pac-Man: Circle is breathtakingly stupid in both concept and execution. But at least it is samples to do something interesting.

I’m mostly not familiar with Honor of Kings — a multiplayer online battle arena game developed by China’s Tencent Games — so I can’t speak to how well this installment adapts its source material. But these pseudo-philosophical musings about the nature of free will and fate, which wouldn’t sound particularly out of place in a stoned freshman dorm room, are at least presented with some panache as a vengeful orphan challenges the callous ruler of a crumbling town to that a game of Go.

Can you really call this a video game adaptation if the video game hasn’t even been released yet? Exodus doesn’t even come out until 2025, which makes this episode feel a little more like a commercial. But at least it’s a pretty good one—albeit one that cringes a lot Interstellar – as a father chases his wayward daughter around the galaxy as the vagaries of spacetime ensure she ages faster than he does.

This adaptation of the beat-’em-up series sticks pretty close to the source material, as a martial arts master pursues revenge using a magical talisman that revives him as an older man every time he falls in battle. But Sifu: It takes a life at least manages to find an elegant gloss on the concept by comparing its hero’s struggle to a chef’s lifelong quest to make the perfect dumplings, and the stylized animation – a welcome departure from the bland near-realism of most of Secret levels episodes — makes this one stand out from the crowd.

Awkwardly, “Concord: Tale of the Implacable” comes several months after the spectacular failure of Sony’s multiplayer shooter, which was so unpopular that it led to both the shutdown of the game and the shutdown of the studio that developed it. But even though Secret level viewers can’t just start a few rounds off Concordthis episode – a non-bad one Guardians of the Galaxy knockoff about a bickering starship crew on a mission to throw off the bonds of space capitalism — is one of the series’ more distinctive and breezy episodes. Consider it a broadcast from an alternate universe where Concord was a huge hit.

Secret level was wise to launch this edition celebrating the 50th anniversary of Dungeons & Dragons with a charming greatest-hits reel of archetypes from the beloved board game’s larger universe. A cursed prisoner, a brave paladin, a magician, and a five-headed dragon… If you were a GM looking to launch a new campaign, this episode wouldn’t be a bad starting point.

The outer worlds has largely been overshadowed by Fallout franchise, which comes from the same creators, but Secret level offers a solid primer on the game’s jaundiced tone. In an alternate universe where ruthless mega-corporations have colonized outer space in their relentless pursuit of profit, we follow Amos, an indefatigable orphan who volunteers for more than a hundred body-modifying experiments in hopes of climbing the corporate ladder and reuniting with the woman he loves. This is satire delivered with a sledgehammer, but hey, it’s not like we live in particularly subtle times.

And speaking of unsubtle: Of all the grim stories in Secret level“Warhammer 40,000” is the grimmest, and that’s exactly as it should be. Set in a far, far future where, as the opening credits explain, there is only war, it follows a group of spaceships from a strange, dogmatic religious sect as they shoot and chainsaw their way through an endless horde of sadistic aliens. It’s a hell of a good time.

In this loose adaptation of Amazon’s own massively multiplayer online role-playing game, Arnold Schwarzenegger plays a vain king who aims to conquer a distant land, but ends up humiliating himself instead. This is another episode that plays with the concept of a regenerating protagonist – on this island, we soon learn, anyone who dies is reborn unscathed on its shores – but there’s both humor and some sly grip as Schwarzenegger’s King Aelstrom loses competition after competing for the island’s own reigning monarch, before devoting himself to building a prosthetic arm for his loyal servant. “That’s what this island is. An eternity of second chances,” Aelstrom is told, his character growth through countless setbacks a welcome reminder of what video games can offer.