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Does it make me a bad person that I found it funny that the border agents wouldn't let Disco Inferno into Canada due to his criminal record? And really, can you blame them?
Eric Sturrock reporting. ... There was a problem with the PPV feed on Time Warner Cable in Kingston, NY last night. In between rounds the first and second rounds during the AJ Styles/Frank Trigg match, the screen went fuzz, then to black. A few minutes later the screen returned, featuring two naked girls in a love scene. Then, it went to an OnDemand Commecial for the TNA PPV, and finally back to Styles/Trigg match as Styles leaving the ring following the bout and Trigg laid out. I called cable company and they gave us the show for free and said, "We are looking into the issue". The replay had no problems.
Tom Kettwig reporting. ... Kurt Angle was on TSN's Off the Record on Friday. The link is to the show's page where you can click on the show and play it.
Ian Hamilton reporting. ... After talking about the game with Adam Firestorm a lot on the 2-hour, 1 year anniversary show of Ringside Live (plug: www.theringsidelive.com), I got around to posting a full review of the Impact game:
http://www.wrestling-online.com/news/TNA/TNA_iMPACT_Xbox_360_video_game_review.shtml.
For years, wrestling fans have been waiting for a mainstream challenger to SmackDown vs. Raw’s crown as the 'best wrestling game'. When Midway announced over two years ago that they would be producing a game for TNA, you’d have been forgiven for thinking that this would be the game to take on THQ’s titan.
With ECW Anarchy Rulz and WCW Backstage Assault (okay, we’ll be generous - WCW Mayhem) being the last mainstream games to hit video game systems, it’s been almost eight years since wrestling fans have had a chance to sink their teeth into a non-WWE video game that features wrestlers they’ve heard of. Okay, that’s probably because TNA was the only alternative... but now, gaming wrestling fans now have an option. Or do they?
When a game’s taken this long to produce, you’d be forgiven for having high expectations - I warn you now, it is probably best to not come into this with those expectations... or to play TNA iMPACT! with any mind to comparing it to the SmackDown series. Or even No Mercy, the game that had supposedly been used as a template to this game.
Anyway, enough of the warnings and preamble: what is iMPACT! like to play? Well, it pretty much succeeds in the whole 'pick up and play' aspect, which was one of the main goals that Midway had wanted to beat. With wrestlers such as AJ Styles, Jay Lethal and Samoa Joe putting in their two cents into development, the whole aim of iMPACT! was to be 'easy to play, but hard to master'. Unlike in SmackDown, you can just about get away with playing the game using just the one analogue stick. As you’d expect, the left stick moves your wrestler about, while in conjunction with a direction the X and A buttons perform striking attacks, and Y launches a grapple. The left shoulder button makes any of those moves 'strong' (differentiating between, say hip tosses and suplexes), while all blocks and reversals are performed with the right shoulder button.
When you’re playing another human, there’s little problem... playing against the CPU, however, is a different story, as you face some AI that can sway from stupidly easy, to stupidly hard, to just plain stupid in the same match! Case in point: in one match, I found myself able to lay out my CPU opponent with any move, punch, dive and chair shot (yes, there are chairs in the game, and every bout in iMPACT! is a no-DQ affair)... then after running outside the ring, I ended up tripping over the ring steps, quickly followed by the CPU (who did the same) before I was beaten by... A PUNCH?!
Be prepared for several encounters like that in iMPACT! Especially if you wander into the story mode - which, if you want to unlock any wrestlers, you will have to do. Out of the box, only 17 wrestlers are playable, with mostly big names (Samoa Joe, AJ Styles, Kurt Angle, Christian Cage) available, while the likes of Brother Ray (Devon is available from the start), Tomko, Abyss and Kevin Nash have to be unlocked.
So, what is the story mode? Well, on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions, you watch a long introductory video that sees a wrestler called Suicide get asked to throw a title match by LAX. Suicide chooses to ignore them, and wins the TNA title in the process. Afterwards, Suicide gets beaten up so badly 'almost every bone in his body' is broken, prompting some all-over plastic surgery, which sees you give Suicide a new look and a new moniker.
If you’ve been spoiled by the SmackDown series of games, and their expansive range of Create a Wrestler options, you’ll hate the CAW mode in iMPACT! that sees you choose from a limited range of parts... and the moveset is even more limited. Your 'new and improved Suicide' starts with a default move set, including Chris Sabin’s Cradle Shock as a finisher. After creating your guy, you face a series of generic jobbers, who also share your moveset... can you smell the parity? If you want to unlock more moves, you have to score style points throughout matches, but unless you take your time and perform every single move in your arsenal, be prepared to play several matches with your limited maneuvers. Funnily enough, Midway had captured over 2,000 animations (and moves) for this game, only for time restrictions to prevent all but a fraction of these from making the final cut. Hopefully (if they make one), the remainder will be in the sequel...
Once you beat the first few jobbers, you end up facing James Storm in a bout to 'earn a try-out with TNA'', which sees you face two more jobbers, then Jay Lethal (at this point still with your basic set of moves). Beyond there you’ll face more frustration with a series of tag team matches, Ultimate X matches before regaining the TNA title. That is, if you can last long enough through the endless CPU opponents who never seem to suffer any damage and can reverse every single move at your disposal.
Away from story mode, the only other reason to play the game is its online mode, which is limited to plain one-on-one matches - either 'normal' or Ultimate X. In the end, iMPACT!’s lack of options is one of the things that really kills this game, and it’s all down to the 'time restrictions' Midway faced, despite a two-plus year development time.
As WWE’s SmackDown series boasts the expansive CAW mode (plus create a title, and this year’s create a finisher mode), along with dozens of match options, iMPACT!’s list of singles, tags and Ultimate X matches looks somewhat anemic.
Despite all of the criticism this game has received, TNA iMPACT! is a good start for Midway to build off of for any sequels. The grapple system, while simplistic, is solid, and only a few slight tweaks of the AI (at least for singles mode) would have made this game even better. Unfortunately, the bug-riddled tag team matches, and the annoyingly limited create-a-wrestler modes hold this game back. Ultimately, iMPACT! is the sort of wrestling game that looks beautiful, has potential, but the various bugs will annoy anyone who was still hoping for a No Mercy beater.
In short, iMPACT! the game is like iMPACT! the show - plenty of promise, but simple flaws threaten to ruin it.
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