Guide for TNA iMPACT! - Story walkthrough

If you're following the walkthrough, the online will have given you a taste of the controls. If you need a refresher or find yourself looking here because you've found yourself stuck, then take a look at the hints and tips page for a method that will mostly wipe the floor with the AI. It's not foolproof however, the AI sometimes manage to not be hit even though the strike animation clearly went right thorough your opponent, or can pull of moves instantly, it will see you through with minimal fuss.

It's worth noting that if you can't manage the entire story in a single sitting, it might take 4-6 hours from start to finish. You should be aware that I noticed that this game saves weirdly. Once a match is complete, if you choose 'return to menu' from there thinking you can pick up later, it has a 50/50 chance that it will ignore the fact you just won a match, and restart you later at the beginning of the match you just won. So it's always worth starting the next match, THEN quitting out if you need to take a break for whatever reason.

During the story mode, you'll be doing various moves, especially if following the outlined move set in the Hints and Tips page. This will include a drop of some kind, doing this move popped an achievement for me, though the achievement says you need to do 50 moves off the top rope, or the turnbuckle, the achievement popped (twice, my main and my dummy) for me. Both times during story mode, as I was doing a simple elbow drop, while the opponent was laying on the mat. I was standing over him, nothing to do with the turnbuckle at all. That being said, this achievement should pop naturally during the story, so keep this in mind, and if you ever find an opportunity to climb the turnbuckle and use a move, go for it until this one has popped. Note this can include, any move off the turnbuckles, any running attack (clothesline, running punch, running dropkick etc) or simply using the Irish Whip (away + + ) to put the opponent into the turnbuckle, then any move while they're leaning there. If you don't get this during the Story mode run, I've included this in the Exhibition mode mop up, so don't worry.

Now, to start.

So here's how the story goes: You are Suicide, a TNA wrestler that has been beaten everyone that has gotten in your way, demolishing every opponent they put in front of you. Your run has gotten so good that you've been given a shot at the TNA World Heavyweight Championship. However, before the match, you're confronted by the Latin American Exchange, saying the 'big man' needs Suicide to take a dive and lose this title shot. Suicide doesn't do this and becomes the champion, however the LAX aren't too happy about this and they attack you backstage, Next thing you know, you wake up in a Mexican hospital in a complete body cast, being told you're lucky to be alive, but you don't remember a thing about where you are, or why you're there. You've been told that half your bones were broken and your face was busted up beyond recognition, however those doctors are plastic surgeons who can fix you up to whatever you want. To make a long story short, you gotta start from scratch by rebuilding yourself. I'm already spotting plot-holes here...

So, this is where you come in. The first thing you have to do is create your wrestler. You can make your guy to be whatever you want him to be, however there is an achievement for making an all flame attire. The quickest way to do this is to set your character, under 'Clothing' to wear Shirt #10 with decal #2. If you want to create your own guy for the story, that's fine, you can create another wrestler using that attire under 'Create A Player', however if you do this either way, you'll unlock the 'He's on Fire!!' achievement. Either way, you'll get your first story-based achievement for just creating your new look. It can be changed after to whatever you like though via the next menu screen.

Match 1,2 and 3: The first match you'll be in will be a gauntlet match. To win this, you have to defeat three different wrestlers back to back. When you beat all three, you'll win the gauntlet match and the 'Lucha Libre' achievement. Fortunately, this isn't a true gauntlet, it's more like 3 single matches. You are fully healed between opponents. You can also try and max out the Impact Meter in the first few matches, and use the finisher move (+, then ). The finisher here is pretty much a guaranteed win, plus it will net you a bonus achievement in the shape of "send them home happy". You can ofcourse do this at any point of the story, or any mode, you may have even popped it while doing the Online.

Match 4 and 5: So now, you're the 'King of the Gauntlet' and get a chance to wrestle back in the States. Once you arrive at the Military base, you'll see two clown-like face-painted wrestlers who arn't taking you seriously, you'll be facing one of those in your next match. Once you win that, James Storm will come up and challenge you. If you beat him, you'll get a chance to audition to be apart of TNA Wrestling. More importantly for us, when you beat him, you get your next achievement.

Match 6, 7 and 8: You will now be entering another gauntlet match, two jobbers will be the first two you need to dispatch, then the third opponent. You're 8th match in story mode will be against a fellow named Jay Lethal, a Macho Man Randy Savage (RIP) wannabe. He will go down with minimal effort too, and once defeated will gift you the next achievement and also Unlock Jay Lethal as a character in Exhibition Mode.

This will see your character becoming one of the ranks of TNA officially. You'll meet a mentor in the likes of Kevin Nash. He'll be your new best friend. Three more matches now separate you and the next achievement. The difficulty will increase slightly, but if you're following the moveset outlined previously, then you should have mastered the process by now, and nothing except bad game hitboxes will ruin your run. That brings me to another thing to note. It seems to be about this point in the game where the AI will start running out of the ring to grab a chair. Chairs can be picked up with the action button and have 4 uses in them before they are destroyed. They can serve well to stun an opponent or just weaken their body if you're trying to win matches through more varied wrestling moves. If the AI goes and gets a chair, the best thing you can do is to move away from where they will climb back into the ring. Once they are back in, perform a running move on them, towards them with either or . You want to time it so you connect just after the standing up animation has finished so they don't have time to swing the chair. This will strike them and they will drop the chair. DO NOT try and just punch them, you will almost always (somehow) miss, even if the animation hits them. They will then hit you with the chair, 4 times, and it does hurt! It can be a match loser if you're not careful, so just be on the defensive. By all means, claim the chair for yourself and go to town on them, then get a free strike or two on the head when the AI is stunned, speed things up a bit.

Match 9: The next match is a simple 1v1 again, seeing you beat down a guy called Robert Roode. After a win here, it's story time once more, Mucho Libre will introduce your face to a steel pole in the name of sports entertainment, and Nash will get protective. He will force a new friend upon you for your 'protection'. The irony of this will only ever grow as this tale goes on, but for now meet Eric Young, you're new Tag Team Partner. This is a section of annoying matches where the normal moveset requires a little luck now as the AI's partner will stop your submissions 90% of the time. There will be a new control to learn for the next 9 matches. During all the goings on, an achievement will pop too!

Tag Team Matches

To tag your partner, stand next to them at the rope and press +. SIMPLES!

The differences here between solo and tag, is obviously, the AI will tag out ofter taking so much damage. You can try and stop them, but they're hard to intercept once they decide to tag. Once the animation has started, they are invulnerable until it's complete. Also that when you attempt a Pin/Submission, there's a very good chance that the AI partner will storm the ring and try and stop you, and a chance (a much lesser one) that your partner will try and stop the AI partner. There is an even slimmer chance that they will succeed. So it's best to attempt the submission or Pin as close to your partner as possible, not only does it give them a better chance to stop the AI, but it gives the AI a little more distance to cover when running at you. Using a ground submission is safer, as sometimes the AI complete misses hitting you, and leaves you free to complete all 3 rounds of the button minigame, where as a standing submission will leave you dropkicked and vulnerable.

Match 10: Your first tag match versus Mucho Libre (Beardy McGee) and Burnsyde is straightforward enough, aslong as you beware the AI helping tactics above. Completing this will unlock Eric Young as a playable wrestler.

Match 11: another Tag against more jobbers, another straight forward even to burn through, being aware of the AI partner again. A win here will now net you some more Gamerscore.

Match 12: This tag team will hit alot harder than what you've encounted until now, Brother Ray and Brother Devon aren't jobbers, they're pros and they can hit and take a bit more of a beating. The tactics can stay the same, just will take a little longer to whittle them down to a state where they will tap out. Defeating the pair will unlock Brother Ray in exhibition mode and then lead to a creepy interview in a cutscene, I won't spoil that too much, it's worth a watch, even for this dull story campaign.

Match 13, 14 and 15: A trio more tag matches, 13 and 14 see you against paired jobbers, and the 15 will match you up against AJ Styles and Tomko, the last pair again will hit a shade harder and take that extra few hits to knock down, but shouldn't pose too much of a threat. Their defeat will award you with Tomko as a playable wrestler, and some deja Va in a cutscene with your old friends LAX throwing their weight around once again. Nash will send you to Japan for a few more Tag Matches after.

Match 16 and 17: More Jobber tag teams I'm afraid, two more matches to rinse and repeat the way through. Before another cutscene of our favourite comedy doubleact doing their hardman routine, LAX is back for more smacktallk, except this time...

Match 18: A tag match against Homicide and Hernandez of LAX. Like previous trios of Tag matches, these guys will pack more of a wallop than you have been experiencing thus far. The are very defeatable with the throw/stun/head attack/submission technique all the same. Once they go down, not only do you become Tag Team champions, you also get a shiny achievement!

You also get beaten up again instantly. You're OK, but Eric is put in the hospital. This means you'll never have to tag again... ((shame ))

Another trio of matches stand between you and the next checkpoint of this journey. Fortunately we're back to 1v1 matches again, which should be a breeze again now.

Match 19: 1v1 vs El Grosso and Match 20: 1v1 vs Byrnside are nothing special. More game filling matches that don't add anything to the story aside from some filler. Much like this sentence. Match 21: 1v1 vs Sonjay Duett on the other hand does have more purpose. The fight is just as easy as the rest of the single matches so far. Dispatching Sonjay will not only unlock him as a playable Exhibition character, but also grant you the next few GS.

This follows a cutscene about locker room politics and another trip to the East to fight the same guys you would fight back home, go figure! The bonus here is, you're now over halfway through this story mode!

You're now back in Japan again. This time though without a tag team setting, so you'll have a trio of solo matches to burn through. Again, really simple matches against jobbers, filler matches to drag out the storymode really, you should have no trouble putting them down.

Match: 20: 1v1 vs The Bulgarian, Match 21: 1v1 vs Savage B ((i couldn't read my own notes there and though for a second he was called Sausage B))

Match: 22: 1v1 vs The Red Devil.

You'll now be treated to another cutscene where a delightful chap will get all shirty and probably call you names, but you get to beat him up afterwards, so win win!

Match 23: 1v1 vs A J Styles. The game jumped up a notch here, AJ is alot faster than what we've gone through thus far, he moves quicker, gets up quicker, recovers quicker. He's the first wrestler you'll fight where the difference is actually noticeable. So just be prepared, though he's easy with the throw/stun/head/submission moveset, but here's the point in the game where if you were using standing grapples to go into a head submission hold you need to be cautious. Be careful of using them from here on out. AJ and the rest of the wrestlers will start countering those alot more now. AJ's defeat will also land you you're next achievement.

Ultimate X Matches

The game changes the rules now. It will introduce a new type of Match, The "Ultimate X" match. The aim is to basically snag a giant red X suspended above the middle of the ring. This is easier than it sounds and there's only 4 matches, and only three of them you'll have to do anything in. More on that later, but lets cover some controls and strategies here.

Firstly, how to get to the X to begin with. This is done in a few steps. Firstly, you need to climb on one of the four turnbuckles that has a red rope over it. From the camera angle they would be the closest two and the furthest two. The left and right corners aren't the ones you'll need. Simply move into them and hit the action button and you'll climb up. By default it will think you want to jump at your opponent, so hitting the wrong buttons here will end up in an attack, which we don't want. The buttons you do want are +B, this will make your wrestler jump up and then you can use the left stick to move him towards the middle, it'll take a few seconds and you will be vulnerable to be pulled down, so try and make sure the AI is either down, or far enough away to get to the X without issue. Once you get to the middle, hit once more, and this will then pull your legs up around the X and a minigame will start on your HUD. It's a simple arrow moving left and right over a green spot, you need to press when the arrow is over the green to get some progress, every success will fill a bar slightly and will make the next stage of the minigame a little faster, a fail will make the wrestler drop his legs down so you'll need to start over. Fortunately, any successes do bank, so you only have to get 7 wins over time, not in a row.

Ofcourse, the opponent doesn't want you to succeed, so will try and stop you, by either pulling you down as you shimmy towards the X, or by climbing up and kicking you down. You need to be defensive while working at this, you can't defend the pulldown so you need to time the run to avoid that, but when your opponent climbs up too, you can kick them down before they do it to you. While hanging, hit to kick, but it only has limited range, so you need to time it to connect, then just keep spamming it until he falls down, i'll take 2-3 hits to knock someone off, then you can get back to trying to get the X. If you are already working on the X, hit to lower yourself and then face towards the oncoming attacker so you can defend yourself before carrying on with the X. Similarly, if the opponent beats you to the X, climb up and just kick them off, they will fail the minigame a fair amount of times, but be as quick as you can.

So you will face a trio of matches in this mode. The first, Match 24: U-X vs Captain America Fernandez. Aslong as you remember the above, you'll be fine. I find the best start, to buy time to climb up is to throw your opponent over the ropes. just use the away and when near the ropes when your back is against them and it'll send the guy right over the top to the floor below, and as a bonus, stun them for a few seconds. If that doesn't work out, ((sometimes it just won't work,)) then a chair to the head works just as well! Repeat this twice more;

Match 25: U-X vs The Jackal and Match 26: U-X vs Savage B. Completing these three matches will net possibly the most ironically titled achievement in Xbox History.

As a reward, you'll get to enjoy a quality, story driving cutscene. You'll be entered into a 2v1 Ultimate X matchup against Fallen Angel and Samoa Joe. This may seem daunting. A 2v1 Match would surely be a tough match indeed, trying to fend off two AIs while your chair attacks manage to miss even though the animations put the chair literally through their head and into their lungs...

Fear Not! A cutscene will gift you a win! Turns out Joe is a friend of Nash! This gifts you the Title belt, the anger of 'The Big Guy' and most importantly the end of this annoying mode for now. We will have to revisit Ultimate X in Exhibition mode, but that's another story. For now, we're moving back on to single matches. These are in the Heavyweight league, and these guys really do hit hard. Just a few hits and counters will have your health in the yellow, this is where the throw/stun/head/submission will really come into it's own, and if you're not using it, I wish you luck!

You'll carry on through some story driving cutscene, where Joe and Nash want to celebrate. You though want to go check on Eric in the hospital, and have to go to the locker room for something. It's at this point the 'Big Man' is revealed as Jeff Jarrett. He's waiting for you with his henchmen, LAX. After a little chat, he'll reveal they've infact kidnapped Eric Young and will kill him if you don't carry out a dastardly plan. In a nutshell, become champion and then throw the fight so the Big Man can beat you. Also, no telling your friends. So we press on, knowing that if you lose, LAX will kill Eric! Oh No!

Match 27: 1v1 vs Rhino, not much more to add bar the name is apt, he hits like one and can take a beating himself, but his defeat, the first of a run in the Heavyweight part of the Story will net you some nice Gamerscore!

A series more of these harder matches follows. There really isn't alot of variation, no more jobbers though. These are names you will most likely be aware of, even if you weren't super heavy into wrestling, or just played some WWF/E games. There is alot of crossover between the franchises it seems, not something I know alot about. So just get your way through the next batch of matches. The usual method works really well, just takes a little longer against these opponents.

Match 28: 1v1 vs Booker T

Match 29: 1v1 vs Sting (Not Andy Summers! or the Police)

Match 30: 1v1 vs Abyss. This win will unlock Abyss in Exhibition mode

Match 31: 1v1 vs Christian Cage

The Final Stretch!

These final matches are more rewarding in terms of unlocks than what we've had, as the storyline comes to a head and things work themselves out. A few cutscenes would have popped up in the last rounds and one now, spelling out a storyline that was predictably always going to get to this match With all the locker room politics, and the forced backstabbing, this next match was inevitable since the start really.

Match 32: 1v1 vs Nash, this win will unlock Nash in Exhibition mode and also give you:

With Nash taking his defeat, and still obviously being angry about the whole betrayal, he'll throw his right hand man at you. Samoa Joe, who won't be so cutscene friendly this time and will actually fight you, so be ready for more of the same.

Match 33: 1v1 vs Samoa Joe, this win will grant you another achievement.

With your friends beaten, it leaves only one thing between you and Jeff Jarrett's plan. the current title holder himself, he's won gold medals you know! It's Kurt Angle. Again, it's really just more of the same, and winning here will grant you the TNA championship and another lovely achievement.

Ofcourse, this will make Jeff's day, his plan to become the champion himself will be done deal soon enough? Seeing as LAX are holding Eric hostage and all, you have no choice but to take a dive, or do you? It's at this point you realise that it's all happened already, and it's all just one big ol' De Javu and Jeff will realise that you are infact Suicide. So go to town on him and ruin his day for the last of the Story mode achievements.

Well done for completing the story mode. A final cutscene will tie up loose ends so it all makes sense. As far as a wrestling storyline possibly can make sense. Assuming you've done the Online by the time you finish the story, there's only a little mop up to go. Which will all be done in Exhibition mode.

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