Secret Level review: Amazon's gaming series doesn't understand the assignment

Gamers around the globe have become very familiar with Blur Studio’s work over the last couple of decades. Their CGI trailers are the stuff of legend.

They first came onto this writer’s radar in 2009, with their Deceived cinematic trailer for Star Wars: The Old Republic being absolutely epic. You could actually argue that it set expectations for the game too high!

Over the years, they’ve worked on everything from Call of Duty to Dark Souls II, reliably delivering action-packed, visually stunning trailers and cut-scenes that really get your blood pumping.

It’s no surprise that, over the years, Blur Studio has repeatedly received one piece of feedback: this looks amazing, you guys should make a TV show!

In fact, Secret Level isn’t even their first stab at something like this. They’ve already made three seasons of the sci-fi anthology Love, Death and Robots for Netflix, picking up plenty of awards and acclaim along the way. They’ve also worked on the Sonic movies and their Knuckles spin-off show.

And now comes Secret Level, which seems like a perfect project for the company. With an Amazon-sized budget and an enviable roster of gaming brands lining up to be involved, this should be a slam dunk that allows Blur Studio to really flex its creative muscles.

However, this reviewer would argue that Secret Level slightly misses the point and misunderstands the assignment.

If the feedback was 'you guys should make a TV show', is an anthology series really the best way to react to that?

Secret Level is made up of 15 episodes, four of which have been available for this review process. Of those four, the longest is just shy of 18 minutes long, while the shortest one is below 15 minutes (with opening titles and end credits included).

The problem this creates is that, despite this being a TV show, every episode still feels like you’re watching a trailer for something bigger.

The first episode, geared around Warhammer 40K, genuinely feels like it could have been released as a cinematic trailer for this year’s Space Marine 2 game.

Reviewing an anthology series is tricky — how do you pass judgement on the whole project when every episode is so different? That being said, there were some recurring notes that we can pull together here.

For starters, the action is absolutely brilliant across the board, as we’ve come to expect from Blur Studio. Whether it’s armoured Warhammer characters beating up aliens, or robotic Unreal Tournament characters beating up their human captors, every fight scene looks absolutely incredible.

The voice acting is always high quality. The cast boasts some really big names like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Kevin Hart, Keanu Reeves and Gabriel Luna, so you know you’re in good hands there. Try not to get too distracted trying to tell who is who.

The visuals are also impressive. The episode geared around Concord (a recent multiplayer PlayStation game that Sony has already cancelled) is an absolute beauty, with a Guardians of the Galaxy-style colourful cosmos playing host to an eye-catching adventure bursting with personality.

It’s a shame Concord isn’t still about, because this might have made you want to download it!

Similarly, the episode themed around Dungeons & Dragons has some proper show-stopping moments in terms of action and visuals. They’ve made a very deliberate choice not to use the incredibly popular Baldur’s Gate 3 characters, but what we get instead is still very cool.

The biggest thing these episodes have in common, however, is that they leave you wanting more — and not really in a good way. It becomes frustrating when you remember that, this being an anthology, you won’t be getting any more.

The Warhammer, Concord and D&D episodes all feel like stories half-told. You’ve just started to get to know the characters when their story abruptly ends, often on a cliffhanger that leaves you wondering what happened to those characters.

In some cases, this might point people to the related game to learn more, which is quite a nice journey of discovery. But in other cases, there is no game you can play which will pick up this exact story, which just feels deflating.

The benefit of giving Blur Studio a TV show is that they should have more room to play. More time to develop characters, to make you care, to build up storytelling arcs and pay them off in satisfying ways.

Imagine a show that did all that and still had the epic action and visuals that Blur Studio is known for — it could be the best thing on TV!

What we get instead is a collection of slightly longer than usual trailers, some of which are more effective than others at building up characters and stories that can even hold your attention for 15 minutes.

The Warhammer episode I found to be too dimly lit and too light on dialogue. As a relative newcomer to the franchise, I had little idea what was meant to be going on, even though I could still appreciate most of the bone-crunching fight scenes.

The Unreal Tournament episode is probably the most self-contained, telling a story of robotic rebellion with a clear beginning, middle and end. But again, with it being so short, non-fans won’t really understand who any of the characters are or why we should care who wins.

The Concord episode was a really pleasant surprise, full of humour and set-pieces. Again, you may lose track of who all the characters are, but you’ll enjoy the ride and wish the game that it’s based on still existed.

The D&D episode feels like you’re watching a snippet of a movie. And if you could continue watching to see what happens next, you probably would commit an hour or more to finishing that adventure. But you can’t, sorry.

All in all, this feels like a collection of extended trailers pretending to be a TV show. But with 11 episodes still to watch, it’s hard to say whether or not a general audience will enjoy it.

Certainly, we’ll be logging back into Prime to see the Pac-Man, God of War and PlayStation-themed episodes. Sifu, Armored Core and The Outer Worlds should be interesting as well.

Here’s hoping, when the whole season is out, this starts to feel like a secret that was worth telling. For now, it might not be.

Secret Level arrives on Amazon Prime Video on Tuesday 10th December with two episodes dropping each week.

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