Interviews

October 22, 2007

TNA iMPACT! Interview 4: Midway LA’s Studio Head
By Louis Bedigian

“The first part is: does it feel cool when I pick up the controller? Is it rewarding when I do a move? How quickly can I learn the game to be rewarded?”

TNA iMPACT! isn’t your average wrestling game. Come spring 2008, we’ll get to enter the six-sided ring as one of several acrobatic superstars. If they do it in real life, you’ll do it in the game, and with faster speeds, more persistent moves, and an arcade feel that could only come from Midway.

Scot Lane, Studio Head at Midway LA, stresses the importance of creating killer gameplay before doing anything else. “The first part is: does it feel cool when I pick up the controller?” he questions. “Is it rewarding when I do a move? How quickly can I learn the game to be rewarded? Those are our priorities and we feel like we hit those pretty hard.”

Midway’s next two priorities are “let’s get all the moves right for the guys, let’s keep the consistent feel – now we know we can deliver cool and replicate it as far as we can in the gameplay. And then start getting a little wider [with game modes] once we’ve really, really nailed the gameplay.”

I was excited to see that TNA iMPACT! had a run button, so I’ve been asking everyone: how did it come into play?

Scot Lane: Well right now it’s a little broken. One, you can run away from everything.

You’re not supposed to be able to?

SL: No, no, no. The game’s not tuned yet. The game is far from tuned. We’re not even at alpha yet. We’re months from alpha. Everything in our goal right now is to get everything in there at once. The run button will be used because we think it’s cool to have it. But it’s not going to be the escape mechanism that it is now and it’s not going to be the free cheap shot that it is now. Like the running up, Mexican head scissors. You can just do it at will [in this build]. It’s not going to be that way [in the final game].

Also, right now when a guy gets knocked down you can punch him endlessly. That’s all going to be gone by the next time anyone sees the game.

And when will that be? Gamer’s Day in January?

SL: Yeah, Gamer’s Day in January.

I’ve yet to get a concrete answer on TNA iMPACT!’s game mode offering…

SL: As far as different match types, we’re sure we’re going to have Tag Team, Ultimate X… We know we’re going to have five to seven of those, maybe more. I just don’t want to commit to anything until we get ‘em in. Ultimate X is going to be a big challenge for us as you can imagine. Until we get that totally nailed I’m not in the position to commit.

Other features: online [play], story mode… So we’re going to be pretty covered.

We haven’t seen any single-player content yet.

SL: You’ll be seeing that in January. It’s going to be very competitive [but] it’s not going to destroy you. We want it to be smart and we feel like we already are.


“We’re super excited. We want to bring a 60fps, super-responsive game that the mass-market consumer can pick up and play that still has the depth for the hardcore gamers.”—Scot Lane

Tell us about the combo system.

SL: Again, it’s going to be really intuitive. You’ll be able to unlock more combos but there are going to be basic combos by doing certain button presses, [and] when you connect you can go further into the chain, usually ending with some kind of cool puppet move. Also, they’ll all have ways to reverse out or counter out of them. Which again, in wrestling you don’t see a lot of blocking. You do see some but it’s more about the counters and reversals. We gave you guys a taste of that now – that’s a big focus for us going forward.

Can you reverse moves indefinitely?

SL: On certain moves, yeah. Like on the head grab, when you’re going back and forth. The biggest chain we’ve gotten so far is nine. And we actually sit there and try. When you’re going against the AI, if you turn it on to be as smart as possible, you can get nine or somewhere in that [range].

You talked about unlocking combos. I assume you mean with the shift button and other additions?

SL: Actually what I meant was in story mode. As you earn money, one thing I can tell you, you will be able to buy moves and combos and things like that.

So there will be more than just the left button (shift move) additions?

SL: You’ll see in the game right now we have a lot of one-offs. Now we’re into the point where we’ve proven we can do things. The hard part is doing the first one. Now we know how to do ‘em so we can go back and add variation. So yeah, there’s going to be a lot more than kick-kick-kick.

Will combos be tied into grapples?

SL: Yeah, and it’ll be range-based. If you’re closer it’ll be tied into [a grapple] or if you’re further away it’ll be tied into some kind of power kick or punch.

What about weapons?

SL: We’ll have at least three weapons. I’m not going to say what they are. They’ll be cool. What do you expect, [it’s] wrestling.


“From day one we knew we weren’t going to be as wide as some of the other games. And what I mean by wide is as many features when you’re on your eighth, ninth, or tenth revision. We’re on our first. But what we did think was we could beat them inside the ring.”—Scot Lane

Can you give us an idea of how many TNA fighters you plan to put into the game?

SL: It’s [currently] 20. Hopefully more. You can kind of guess [who]. [We showed] a bunch of them today [in the preview build].

There was a hint today from one of the developers regarding the directional buttons and their possible use in the game…

SL: We have some ideas for the directionals. I don’t want to throw it out there until we really know what it is. The last thing I wanna do is say, “Hey, we’re gonna have—“ and then it doesn’t happen. We’ll look like jerks. But yeah, we have some ideas.

But the right thumbstick is out? [Note: it was not used in the preview build.]

SL: I never say out. To me the controls aren’t locked down until we’re in a box. As we get closer and let people play it, if things aren’t working or if people suggest other things, it’s possible. Also, you’ll be able to configure your controller how you want. If you’re into the right stick, set it up.

Which moves would you be able to apply to the right stick?

SL: We don’t know yet, but I would imagine you could put whatever you wanted in there [like a custom button]. It’s re-mapping the controller.

Joe just told me that you haven’t done any of the motion capturing for the women yet.

SL: Actually no, we haven’t. We’re not even sure we’re going to support the women in TNA iMPACT! 1.

Really?

SL: Well, they just announced that it wasn’t in our plans. We’ll get some women in our game, but we may not have the full women’s division. It’ll leave us something cool for TNA [iMPACT!] 2.

How might they be incorporated?

SL: Story mode. Unlockables, potentially. We have a lot of options for getting them in, it’s just a matter of what makes the most sense for the game.

How can they be in the game though without any motion capturing?

SL: At some point we will [do a motion capture session with them]. We’ll have to. It’s not scheduled yet, but if we’re going to get them in, we’ll do motion capturing.

So what made Midway decide to go back to wrestling?

SL: Not sure. The TNA execs were talking to our execs. They worked out the deal. We thought it’d be cool to do it. They thought it’d be cool if we did it. Once we heard that they were talking, we said, “We want to do it. This is a game that’s perfect for our team. We love wrestling, so let’s do it.”

Do you think this game could have the Tony Hawk effect? Honestly, I wasn’t overly aware of TNA prior to this game. The same thing happened with Tony Hawk – he didn’t become a household name till after he became the star of a game franchise. Likewise, I wasn’t a huge football fan or basketball fan, but Blitz and Jam pulled me into both genres.

SL: That would be our dream and their dream. That’s the ultimate goal for all of us. We went with TNA because we think it’s an awesome wrestling league. They went us probably because we make awesome games. It’s a good fit. The ideal that we make this game that everybody loves would be a homerun for all of us.

It is definitely on its way. Thanks for your time Scot.