Fire Pro Wrestling World – Beginner’s Guide

by Falagar / Articles, Fire Pro Wrestling World / 18 Jul 2017

One of the most important things to understand about Fire Pro is that it’s one of those games that’s “easy to play but difficult to master.” The actual inputs you need to execute are usually 2 button combinations, it’s a lot easier than a fighting game. It’s also easier than a WWE 2K game because it’s not 3D and you don’t have to worry about broken animations and physics.

BUT…

This stuff is only easier once you figure out grapple timing.

The “Secret” To Perfect Grapples

To do your moves, you need to initiate a grapple by simply moving your character into the enemy. The game will have you lock up and if you time your input correctly, you pull off a move.

The secret here is to pay attention to the audio. As soon as you hear your foot stomp on the ground during a grapple, do your move by pressing one of the 3 attacks and a direction.

The timing window is hella tight but once you do it you’ll notice just how fluid this system is. It’ll start feeling “natural” over time and you won’t even need to rely on the audio.

You can also try paying attention to the actual stomp animation as well, although I find the audio to be more reliable. I’m not sure if this is a personal preference or if the audio is more accurate in online matches that don’t have perfect connections.

LIke I said, the timing on the grapple is insanely tight, you might even struggle against a level 1 CPU at first. To practice, simply do mission 1 over and over or just play against a level 1 CPU until you get comfortable with it. It might take you 10 minutes, it might take you 2 hours, but once you nail down the timing, the rest of the game is waiting for you with open arms.

Start With Small Moves

Fire Pro has a massive amount of calculations going on under the hood, and they’re all designed to simulate a real wrestling experience as much as possible. This means that you can’t bust out brainbusters or piledrivers right off the bat. Have you ever seen Taker tombstone a guy like Austin or HHH in the first minute of a match? If the answer is yes, either it was a one off thing or a goofy house show spot.

If you try using your medium and big moves at the start, they’ll get automatically reversed, and you’ll feel more embarrassed than when you watched the Eugene gimmick, week in week out.

So in the opening minutes of your matches, focus on your light moves which are mapped to A on XBOX or X on PlayStation. Cycle through them, and definitely try to land all of them. You’ll soon notice that your enemy is breathing heavily (watch that upper body), which is a sign you might be able to bring out your medium moves.

It depends on how the characters are built and situational factors, but usually you can move on to medium moves after 4 – 8 light moves.

However, this brings us to our next point…

Micro Manage Your Stamina From The Start

You can use LB/L1 to breathe and regain stamina which helps you perform better. Use this whenever possible.

Don’t waste your wrestler on submissions and fancy mat moves at the start of a match. You’ll do a basic body slam and you’ll notice the enemy will get up in just a second or two. Use this time to simply breathe for a second. If you’re doing well, the early breathing from the get go will help you greatly over time if you keep it up.

How To Win The Strong Style Strike Battles

When the same inputs from both wrestlers connect, you get into a minigame in which you strike each other silly. Mash the face buttons. I’m not sure if your stats in the background also affect it. I’ve yet to lose one of these when mashing though.

How To Actually Kick Out Of Pins And Submissions

There’s a lot of confusion here, and even I was confused at first.

As page 51 of the manual points out (actual 51, not pdf page), mash the medium strike button to get out of a pin. It’s A on XBOX and X on PlayStation.

I’ve definitely kicked out of pins by just holding it instead of mashing, but I’ve also definitely lost more when holding. It is believed that mashing it recovers some of your background stats and that’s why it’s a better kick out.

As for submissions, you can keep moving the dpad/analog stick to attempt to get closer to the ropes/break the submission. I’m not sure if mashing the face button does anything, the manual doesn’t mention it.

The Most Important Thing For New Players (apart from figuring out grapple timing)

Punching and kicking is damn hard in Fire Pro. You could even say it’s the hardest thing. Harder than Vince’s boner for Roman Reigns. It takes a long time to figure out the hitboxes and to figure out the timing and alignments.

So, just ignore it!

Worry about the striking later on when you’re comfy at the game. Unless you’re playing some of the more niche match types, you don’t need to focus on them.

Figuring out the grapple timing and doing your moves is much more important.

Falagar

He is the founder and editor of Magic Game World. He loved gaming from the moment he got a PlayStation 1 with Gran Turismo on his 7th birthday.
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