Monday, June 15, 2009

More fitness games drop for the Wii (and they're good, too)

Wii Fit – a truly revolutionary Nintendo add-on that provides users with a personal trainer and workouts – has led to the development of many exercise games.

Nintendo recently released “Personal Trainer Walking,” which comes with a small device you can put in your pocket or clip on your belt. The DS title comes with an “activity meter” that records how many steps you take during the day and can send the data wirelessly (or via synching) to your handheld console.

The game then converts this information into interesting facts about your activity level and invites you to increase it. Ultimately, the unit can track up to five years of performance/progress.

I hooked it up to a friend's dog for a day and found that even though he mostly lays around in the yard, he was more active than me.

“EA Sports Active” for the Wii is another “game” that takes you through traditional exercises that target different muscle groups – and has one heckuva cardio routine.

To get started, you slip the Wii nunchuk controller into a special leg strap and follow the lead of your on-screen trainer. You run, do lunges, box, and dance as your trainer – Bob Greene from “The Oprah Winfrey Show” – keeps you motivated.

Overall, the workouts on “EA Sports Active” are a little more intense than the Wii Fit's software. It definitely had me sweating.

2 comments:

andrew said...

as a Wii owner I have found the platform to have myriad weak games. perhaps an article, if not done already, on the best to the worst with those two categories being top 5 of each according to you. an added plus would be to not include the obvious good ones (mario games) and the horrible ones (movie themed games) so as to uncover those not as known. as to the games you reviewed in the article i plan on checking on the Wii (w/ leg band) game as well as the new Wii sports 2 game. as for online play Call of Duty-World at War is tops and head over heels better then MoH Heroes 2.

kontan said...

It's really great to have a game system that can involve the whole family, whole body, and get people off their tush and moving more than just their thumbs. If you are a gamer looking for amazing graphics and such, probably the Wii is not for you. If you want to engage young and old, and encourage a little more movement, the Wii is great. Thanks for a review of a new workout game.