TNA iMPACT's Kurt Angle

Everything about today's event, apart from the canaps and the shorts the ring girls are wearing, is big. There are giant banners splashed with larger than life images of Angle - and considering how large life is, that's big. There are huge plasma screens showing the game in action. There are thick packs of press releases peppered with big words like LOCKDOWN and SLAMMIVERSARY. But it's clear what, or rather who, is having the biggest impact.

According to his website, Kurt Angle is "Perhaps the greatest professional wrestler in the world today." Born in Pennsylvania in 1968, he's been involved with the sport since high school. He's the only professional wrestler with an Olympic gold medal under his title belts, having picked it up at Atlanta '96. (He's been quoted as saying he won the medal "with a broken freakin' neck", of which more later.)

Angle joined the WWF in 1998 and was still there when the name changed to WWE. He became one of its biggest stars, winning stacks of titles and, he claims, making more money than anyone else. "I was the highest paid wrestler at WWE, regardless of what you hear from other individuals or over the Internet," he tells the packed press conference.

Changing teams

This is how Kurt Angle looks in the game. And in real life, pretty much.

Then why, in August 2006, did Angle leave? At the time, it was said to be for "personal reasons". Today, Angle says it was a combination of burnout - he was working more than 300 days per year - and frustration with how the WWE was being run. "I was made to help ignite other people's careers and make them look good," he explains. "It became stagnant, it became boring. It was the same old thing every week."

Angle is grateful to WWE boss Vince McMahon for allowing him to leave even though he still had five-and-a-half years left on his contract. "Vince gave me my release because I lost it in a meeting. I told him I couldn't be there any more. He was a very good man about it."

Before there's time to wonder what it's like to be in a room with Kurt Angle when he loses it, he's launched into his Total Nonstop Action spiel: "I wanted to be a part of something special, I wanted to make history." In practical terms, Angle became by far the biggest star on the roster when he moved to TNA and was able to negotiate shorter working hours.

Nearly 18 months after the switch TNA is still trailing behind WWE in the ratings. However, Angle says, viewing figures are rising by between 40,000 and 50,000 per week. He predicts that within two years TNA will be the biggest wrestling company in the world, with WWE in second place.

I, robot

Unlike in the WWE, TNA's wrestlers fight in a six-sided ring - as you will do in the game.

Midway must be hoping he's right, and hoping the TNA game generates huge profits in the same way the WWE titles have for THQ. According to Angle, little of those profits are invested back into improving the games' quality. Discussing his own involvement in their development he recalls, "All they would do is come in and tell you to sit down and they'd scan your head. Then you'd stand up and they'd scan your body. Then they'd tell you to give a mean face, then they'd tell you to leave, and that was it. So in the game it just looked like two robots going at it."

Apparently TNA iMPACT! is being developed with a different approach. The wrestlers are dressed in body suits with sensors and asked to fight as they would in a real match. "Midway spent countless hours interviewing us, getting to know our personalities, scanning us, having us go through the wrestling moves - it was a crazy experience. WWE would never do that," claims Angle.

"I didn't even care about it. Midway made us all care, they made us realise how important the videogames industry is for our sport. WWE doesn't care, they just want to put something together, they hurry up and put it out there just to make money."

TNA and Midway have put "millions of dollars" into iMPACT!, Angle says. "God willing, we're going to get it back, but we spent a lot of money to make this the most authentic wrestling game ever. And we did it."

Sensitive subjects

Booker T is another former WWE star who's made the jump to TNA.

But it's Angle, not the videogame he's here to promote, who is the focus of the questions at the press conference. A pre-event briefing warned us to avoid asking him anything about two topics: steroids, presumably because of the addiction allegations Angle denies, and Chris Benoit. A former WWE rival of Angle's, Benoit murdered his wife and seven-year-old son before killing himself last year.

Sure enough, one journalist can't resist. He asks Angle for his best memory of Benoit. The wrestler doesn't hesitate to answer and gives a surprisingly revealing response to such a gentle question. "Chris started to lose the love of wrestling because he was overworked," he begins.

"I don't blame Vince McMahon for Chris's death. I don't blame the WWE, because as an individual you have a contract in front of you and it tells you exactly what you have to do. If you sign the contract, you need to do that; If you want out, then you need to quit."

As for his favourite memory - the cage match which left Angle with a damaged knee and out of action for six weeks, while Benoit injured his neck and was unable to wrestle for a year. Who knows what his worst memory must be like.

One-on-one

The press conference over, Angle is hustled off to begin posing for photos, signing posters and taking part in interviews. By the time it's my turn the event is running late and I'm told I have just seven minutes with Angle - reduced to six after a TV crew insists he gives them an ident first. "This is Kurt Angle, Olympic gold medallist and TNA world heavyweight champion," he tells the camera. "Oh, it's real. It's damn real."

With the clock ticking and my long list of questions looking increasingly optimistic, that seems like a good place to start. Is Angle suggesting TNA wrestling is more realistic than WWE? "Yeah, TNA is more real," he says, confirming the saying is a direct reference to one of his old catchphrases.

"In WWE I was a bad guy. I would go to a city and say something bad about it, and they would boo me, but it would be true. So I would say, 'Oh, it's true, it's damn true'. I turned that phrase into 'It's real' for TNA because I believe TNA is more realistic.

"WWE is a little less hardcore. It's more about entertainment, bathroom humour-type TV," Angle continues. "We're more of an action-packed wrestling show. That's what separates us. The fans like it better because it looks more real."

Angle shows a rival just how "real" the floor is.

But what's going to separate TNA iMPACT! from the many WWE games already lining the shelves? Again, says Angle, it comes down to realism. "TNA and Midway have spent so much time and money on making this the most authentic game. As matches go on you can see wrestlers sweating more, breathing heavily, getting tired. When they're getting beat up you can tell they're hurt; when they're angry you can see it in their face.

"It's actually like watching the real television show. It's as close as it's ever been. They've taken a giant leap over all other wrestling games ever."

It's a hard knock life

I ask Angle if he has any rock'n'roll stories of life as a wrestler on the road, but it all sounds a bit dull. "We don't have any time off; we go 52 weeks a year, so we can't have crazy nights. We have to be on every single day and be ready for each match, and we're very responsible about showing up on time, being the character and wrestling as hard as we can. We wake up early and we try to get our rest."

Of course, however well wrestlers take care of themselves, injuries still happen. One of Angle's worst was incurred during the trials for the '96 Olympics. "I got thrown on my head and I broke four vertebrae and I had two discs in my neck that slipped and stabbed into my spinal cord, so I had trouble moving my neck and I was in a lot of pain," he recalls.

Angle was unaware he had actually broken his neck, and wasn't willing to have surgery or give up time to recuperation with the Olympics just months away. So he continued to train and went on to win his medal with medical help.

Did you know: videogame journalists were banned from writing captions about "sweaty men in lycra" in 2002.

"I had a doctor travel with me to the Olympics and five minutes before each match, he would stick me in the neck with 12 shots of novocaine. Then I'd run back out and wrestle my match... It didn't really affect my performance because I couldn't feel it."

The six minutes is up already; just time to squeeze one more question. Mr Angle, you are a giant of a man and a world famous professional wrestler with an Olympic gold medal you won whilst suffering from a broken neck and hocked up on prescription anaesthetics. I am a small woman from Lewisham. Who would win in a fight?

He laughs, and then says, "You know what? You're scaring me right now by asking me." I should think so. "I would say me, but I'd say it would be a good fight." There's just time to agree with Angle ("Yes, I do a lot of yoga") before being hustled out so he can tell a TV camera which is his favourite Spanish videogames programme.

The real question is who will win the fight between TNA iMPACT! and the WWE games. It's a hard one to answer at this stage. The demo on show at today's event crashes frequently and the controls feel sloppy and unfinished. The visuals look good, but not good enough to back up Angle's claim it's like watching wrestling on TV. According to the Midway rep, the code is months old and many significant improvements have since been made.

That will be key if the game is to topple the might of SmackDown vs. Raw, just as TNA and Kurt Angle are hoping to topple the WWE. Right now, iMPACT! looks like it could do with a dozen shots of novocaine. And as for the wrestler's claim it'll be the biggest hit videogame ever? Let's just say having seen him in the flesh, he's not a man you'd want to start a row with.