The Impact! line lasted long enough for one round of Annuals. As was the custom at the time, pioneered by such beloved storylines as Atlantis Attacks! and Bloodlines, all six annuals were part of a larger, overarching storyline called "Earth Quest."
As outlined in the first of the annuals (The Web Annual), a villain called the Templar wanted to bring about ecological catastrophe in his belief that would prompt the emergence of "the Grail", actually an alien device that could restore the entire world. The Templar hoped it could do the same for him, since he was a large dude who looked like a 2-armed version of Goro from Mortal Kombat.
The other annuals only sort of stuck to this. For the Shield, the "ecological catastrophe" is in the background, as it's snowing in Arizona when it's supposed to be 60 degrees out. Isn't that winter in Arizona? (Yes, I know they get snow in the mountains, I've been to Flagstaff. Lowell Observatory, represent!)
The "grail" part comes in as Joe wrecks some robot Vikings meant to be part of some big sci-fi/fantasy convention thing and has to help out to pay off the damage. The son of the guy behind it was a techno-villain in The Comet, and someone sent him a "grailquest" program to add, which unfortunately, is a rapidly evolving artificial intelligence that thinks it really is supposed to kill the "intruders" (read:convention-goers.)
The Annuals also shared secondary stories, as there's one with an academic discussing the history of The Black Hood as a notable figure through the ages, and another about the legacy of the Shield in the years between the original and Joe Higgins. Although the Shield's own Annual doesn't have a chapter of that history, oddly enough, instead using an adventure of the Web set in 1965, revolving around a space capsule falling out of control. I wonder if that was a mistake and the chapters got switched, or they didn't want to overload either book with past adventures of the lead heroes?
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