In a new video game anthology series called Secret Level, it seems that the Armored Core franchise will receive its own segment this December.
Handled by Blur Studio, who also worked on Love, Death & Robots, and released via Prime Video, the upcoming video game anthology series Secret Level will feature an interesting roster of titles.
With those titles being that of Armored Core, Concord, Crossfire, Dungeons & Dragons, Exodus, Honor of Kings, Mega Man, New World: Aeternum, Pac-Man, Sifu, Spelunky, The Outer Worlds, Unreal Tournament and Warhammer 40,000. In addition, other PlayStation games will be included in the series.
All in all, it’s an interesting mix of various properties, some big and some small. With others, such as Armored Core, being entirely unexpected.
From the new trailer (shown below), it appears that the Armored Core segment will feature mecha that look closer to what we saw in Armored Core V and Armored Core Verdict Day. So a bit smaller and more industrial. Furthermore, the pilot looks to be potentially portrayed by none other than Keanu Reeves.
My guess is that the story will be its own thing and not related to any prior Armored Core game, as the mecha designs already look new. It’s also not typical to see the pilots in Armored Core games, so it makes sense that this would be more of a narrative approximation than anything directly connected to the Armored Core saga.
This will also mark the first time the Armored Core series will have been animated, as the previous Fort Tower Song anime was cancelled over a decade ago now.
It’s also probably the best way to test the waters and gauge interest in whether the Armored Core series can now support something like an anime. Rather than doing an all new dedicated show, just do a small snippet in another series and see how it is received.
Considering all the major video game adaptation failures in Hollywood in recent years, and yes, the recent Borderlands movie is an excellent example of this, going down the anthology route hopefully means there’s less to mess up in any given segment.
In any case, after the solid sales of Armored Core VI, and the subsequent merchandising push, it seems like the Armored Core franchise may be finally coming into its own. So as someone that’s played and finished every Armored Core game, this is all a bit weird but entirely welcomed.
Secret Level will be released via Prime Video on December 10.
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