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 It is common for Nintendo to go against the norm. The thought of a gaming experience that combines fitness, health, a workout and good posture goes against everything that BLIP (not so uprightly) stands for. So instead he enlists the services of a guinea pig to test Nintendo's latest fitness peripheral: the BALANCE BOARD and Wii FIT, and discovers that bringing together such polar opposites as fitness and gaming is a welcome one.
Imagine having a personal trainer forever in your house? It would get slightly annoying. Sweaty socks everywhere, having to smell that rank combination of bad aftershave and BO all day, and motivational jargon being spat at you while you try to have your morning bowl of cereal. Yep that would get frustrating.
The WiiFit is a personal trainer. Combining strength building exercises, cardio workouts, yoga techniques and balance games, it will monitor and track your progress, offer advice, be honest (sometimes a little too honest), but the best part is, it slides under the couch and won’t cost the earth.
This is how Wii do it?
The Wii Fit Balance Board works on the same motion sensitivity principals as the WiiMote. By gathering information about the user’s center of gravity, it also calculates BMI (Body Mass Index), meaning that the board is similar to say a set of bathroom scales with a WiiMote taped to it. Slightly more advanced, but equally hard to get the courage to stand on.
The Wii Fit requires a certain amount of patience, persistence, honesty and forgiveness, so when my guinea pig first started the initial test (Blip, you coward), it involved some difficult questions and the results pulled no punches. This is what WiiFit excels at – its honesty. It treats the user as if it was their first time working out, which, considering the many cases of extremely bad posture that most gamers have, it will be. The WiiFit takes the user and their Mii character by the hand and shows them how to navigate the title, instructing them how to workout correctly, but also how to maximise the WiiFit activities in the areas that the user requires improvement.
Let’s Get Physical
The Wii Fit involves activities in four distinct categories: Yoga, strength training, aerobics and balance games – plus around 40 separate activities that are unlockable as the user progresses. Everything from beginners to advanced level Yoga classes, light aerobic exercises like Hula Hoop and even using the WiiMote like a pedometer while you jog on the spot to full-blown dance/aerobic boxing routines used to improve rhythm and posture.
At first the Wii Fit Balance Board takes some getting familiar with. It may feel like walking for the first time, but even within your initial set-up and workout session there will be a clear sign of improvement, which is always beneficially for those wanting to see results straight away.
Everything in the Wii Fit regime is simple and as you attempt each activity the WiiFit Balance Board, which shows incredible accuracy – far better than that of the WiiMotes – will offer advice when the user’s center of gravity starts to shift or just general advice about stance. Along with instructing the user, the WiiFit is also a motivational sparring partner, letting you know how well you are doing.
The Wii Fit Balance Board itself is incredibly versatile. The exercises and activities are quite ingeniously broken down into the left and right side of balance. From doing the simplest of exercises – including the old faithful pushup, done by using your hands to lift yourself off the Balance Board – to the far more advanced Yoga poses and aerobics routines.
As advanced as the activities may get, the idea is never lost. The activities and exercises and the Wii Fit itself are basically designed for those at the novice level, families wanting to change their routine, or for those who just can’t make it to a gym. It is a fitness, toning and good health apparatus, and not for those looking to over-exert themselves or for bodybuilding.
Unfortunately one thing missing from the Wii Fit is the possibility to set-up your own personalised training session, especially considering the amount of time that is constantly consumed by selecting new activities. Plus an hour-long session of physical exercise will take up to an hour fifteen due to the in-depth tutorial sections.
It’s not all serious though…
There is quite a lot of fun to be had with the Wii Fit. In fact at times it felt as if my stomach was toning just from laughter thanks to watching the continuous mistakes during dance routines or any of the balance ‘party’ games, including the cute Penguin Slide and sport mini games such snowboarding and boxing.
The Wii Fit Future
The Wii Fit’s most beneficial area is that keeps an in-depth health log of the user’s progress. Not only taking into account every single push up and meter jogged but also acts as a health diary for all of your outside training. Whether that is playing sports, strenuous activities like moving furniture or simply just keeping a log of any and all physical activity. The Wii Fit stores this information along with your calorie intake in an easy to access and understand graph illustrating your loss from day to day, week to week, and so on. This is beneficial in showing the times of the week where the user improves or shows a spike or drop off in physical exercise and overeating. Honesty and persistence really is key with the Wii Fit. The more correct information that the Wii Fit can gather, the more beneficial it will be.
The technology that is displayed with the Wii Fit and the Balance Board will no doubt revolutionise the next wave of WiiSports titles and we may just see the end to bad gaming and couch posture by the end of the 2010.
The Verdict
****
The NINTENDO Wii FIT was completely sold out within its first few weeks of release in Australia, but new stock is now currently available at all good gaming retailers … but for how long?
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