Announcing 'Hidden Levels': how the videogame world has changed the world beyond videogames
Endless Thread6 Okt 2025

Announcing 'Hidden Levels': how the videogame world has changed the world beyond videogames

Have you ever jumped on something as you're moving through the real world, and heard that Mario bouncy sound in your head? Or maybe seen someone acting like an NPC when they're a real person? Maybe you know that the first real "in-app" purchase was actually a weapons store in an arcade game version of Double Dragon 3.

Wherever you go in the real world, you can find signs of the influence of videogames. But you have to know where to look. That's why Endless Thread and 99% Invisible are launching a new limited series together called Hidden Levels.

Today Roman Mars and Ben Brock Johnson kick off the series with a little preview of what's coming.

Episoder(441)

Digging Up Lily's Garden

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What it's like to be undressed by Grok without your consent

Note: This episode describes sexual situations that are non-consensual. Sharing a photo of yourself online has always carried some risk. But things got a lot scarier this year when users began using ...

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Obscure music is good and nice!

Obscure music is good and nice!

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Fresh, stale, or politics? The Melania doc's Rotten Tomatoes score, explained

Fresh, stale, or politics? The Melania doc's Rotten Tomatoes score, explained

Melania, a documentary about the first lady, has a 10 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes from critics, but a 90 percent score from audience members, an unusual discrepancy that raises the question, how ...

20 Feb 24min

Rewind: Love In Transition

Rewind: Love In Transition

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13 Feb 33min

You're Wrong About the Satanic Panic

You're Wrong About the Satanic Panic

In the 1980s, a moral panic swept across America. Parents, prosecutors, and talk show hosts became convinced that devil worshippers were hiding in plain sight, abusing children at daycares, performing...

6 Feb 23min

Hot (and not) fruit takes

Hot (and not) fruit takes

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30 Jan 20min

The Alpha Male Myth

The Alpha Male Myth

In 1970, a young biologist named David Mech published what could be the most consequential book on wolves ever written. At the time, The Wolf: The Ecology and Behavior of an Endangered Species, was th...

23 Jan 26min

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