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AFTERNOON THOUGHTS: LATEST DETAILS AND THOUGHTS ON THE FORTHCOMING TNA VIDEO GAME, IMPACT

On Saturday evening, I attended a Midway Games media presentation to promote the upcoming TNA Impact! video game, which will be released next month.  The game, which I've written about before here on the site, will be available in every major gaming platform.

The media event on Saturday was Midway's first chance to unveil the storyline mode of the game, which will allow players to don the hooded mantle of a mysterious character, Suicide.  Suicide (seen above), already a TNA star, is beaten to a pulp by LAX and left for dead in Tijuana, Mexico.  With no memory and no money, he's forced to fight his way out of Mexico, through the independents in the United States and back to TNA to try and discover who he is and to regain his identity, facing TNA wrestlers and characters designed specifically for the storyline alike.

The plan is to tie the storyline into TNA's product using viral marketing and possibly even bringing the Suicide masked persona into TNA's storylines.  A viral website for the storyline mode was secretly launched at www.whoissuicide.com recently, leading you to the character's Myspace webpage.

 

Of course, the core of any game is whether it's fun and one of the most important aspects of a professional wrestling game is capturing the atmosphere and feel of the product without sacrificing the game's core.  To this end, the game succeeds.  Having played TNA Impact at three different points in its evolution over the last year, without being a hardcore gamer, all I can say is that the game indeed captures the look and feel of the TNA Wrestling product. 

 

All of the TNA characters perform their signature maneuvers - AJ Styles (seen above) hits the Pele Kick while Samoa Joe hits his running enziguiri, etc.  However, it's not a case of each wrestler hits the same maneuvers.  Every character has their own branded moves that are unique to each of them, right down to combination moves and finishers, just like their TNA namesakes.

Beyond just the look and feel of the game, TNA has paid strict close attention to locales and even crowds.  Venues set up in national guard armories or overseas will see little touches that will remind fans of arenas they've seen on DVD or even places they've been.  One armory is specifically designed to look like an actual venue one of the TNA stars worked in on the indy scene, although Midway has taken creative liberty by adding tanks and things of that nature to the background.   The crowd, like any wrestling show, looks vibrant and unique with fans reacting to the action.  Midway's attention to detail comes into play here as well, right down to shadows of performers and lighting in the building falling over the audience.  The only thing missing is the goofy fans you see at every show, no matter where it's promoted.

TNA Impact remains fun with multiple plays as well, partially because Midway was smart enough to create games within the game to keep it from breaking down into patterned gameplay.  While wrestling, if a player puts his opponent into a submission hold, a sequences of randomly generated buttons appear on the screen.  The first player to complete the sequence wins, allowing him to squeeze more energy out of his opponent or escape the move, depending on who wins. 

In the Ultimate X match, the key to winning isn't just getting to the center of the ring to grab the "X" but to work towards pulling the X off.  To do so, you have to work at loosening the X, but you only get so many attempts before you have to back up the wires before you get another attempt at victory - the entire time while other players/opponents are trying to stop you and bring you back into the ring.

Sadly, one game you won't find in TNA Impact is six-sided thumb wrestling, although Samoa Joe and Jay Lethal did compete in a series of bloody battles, as seen below:                                                                                       

With Midway Games already working on the second TNA video game, there's always hope!

Photos by Billy Krotchsen

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Mike Johnson can be reached at Mike@PWInsider.com.

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