 Review By: Siou Choy |
Developer: | Nintendo |
| Publisher: | Nintendo | |
| Genre: | Fitness | |
| ESRB: | Everyone | |
| # Of Players: | 1 | |
| Online Play: | No | |
| Accessories: | Includes wireless Wii Balance Board, Wii Fit Channel | |
| Buy Now: |   |
The Wii Fit allows up to eight Miis to be stored at a time, so there’s sufficient incentive for an entire family (and possibly a friend or two) to join in on the proceedings. The game lets you set your own individual weight loss goal, and will track your progress (or lack thereof) as you progress throughout the weeks and presumed months of usage thereafter, showing the gains and falls of each day spent with Wii Fit graphically – which again, can be rather depressing to see, particularly when one evening’s dinner out easily skyrockets one’s weight to meet, and even surpass, any losses incurred along the way.
A “body test” can be performed daily to track your progress or regression in terms of weight and presumed “age” (more on this soon). An animated version of the Wii Fit Balance Board needles you about days missed and progression towards your goal or lack thereof. It’s even disturbing at the outset of every session, when it asks you to step on the Balance Board to measure your weight, as it cries out painedly with a shocked “OOH!” as if you suddenly managed to gain an extra ton since your last session.
In addition to measuring your weight, BMI, and center of balance, the body test has you taking part in two randomly selected tests to determine your “Wii Fit age”. I urge all prospective Wii Fit gamers NOT TO TAKE THIS NUMBER SERIOUSLY. There seems to be no clear objective rationale for the wildly inaccurate numbers generated hereby, much less the insane daily fluctuations between said numbers. I mean, if they consistently came up with a number range, say 5 years older or younger than one’s actual age, then we could make a case for some measure of scientific methodology going into the calculations here. The sad fact is, however, that depending on your performance on these 2 balance tests on any given day, your calculated “age” can vary vastly – and I do mean vastly. I personally experienced more than one instance where my “Wii Fit age” was ranked at a whopping 55 one day, only to be told that same “Wii Fit age” was 22 the very next day. Now, I don’t know any test in health, fitness, or for that matter by any measure who would grade you college age one day, then qualifying for AARP the next…so again, I urge everyone to ignore this bit of irrational (and obviously quite erratic) programming, for your own sanity’s sake…you only have to wonder, just what the hell were they thinking?
You can choose between a male or a female instructor to guide you through the Yoga and Strength training modules. Mere words cannot express just how boring they are. If these were humans, they’d be newscasters, new age gurus, or perhaps child psychologists. To say that the trainers are dull and lifeless (not to mention in desperate need of sun) is an understatement, by any measure. Should I mention that the female trainer isn’t exactly what I’d classify as “in shape”, either? With her wide hips, dumpy @$$ and even a bit of a gut showing, you really have to wonder what was running through the minds of the developers. Is this supposed to be inspiring?
These virtual trainers guide you through the movements essentially by example, though there are long and tedious “demos” available. Personally, I never had the patience to sit through more than one of these. It was quite enough having them spout the same tiresome and patronizing lines of encouragement and “gentle rebuke” over and over throughout each module. Sometimes these teeth grinding hoary platitudes are delivered with line for line repetition even within the same exercise. Luckily, despite having to share my exercise time with these empty headed, pastel colored “family restaurant” dim bulbs over and over again, I found that I actually enjoyed some of the exercises, and got some measure of results from doing them over a short period of time. I can say with assurance that I definitely felt a difference in my posture and noticed that I was more flexible than usual after only a few days with Wii Fit.
Of course, there are limitations to all this – Wii Fit is less about high intensity aerobics or weightlifting than balance and flexibility, pure and simple. Nearly all of the exercises or games involve the gamer trying to maintain balance while performing the moves or activities in question, while the Balance Board measures your movements throughout the activity, showing just how badly off balance you were. In nearly every Wii Fit activity, exercise, or game, you have to attempt to keep the red circle (your “center of balance”) within the parameters of a larger yellow circle. For some activities, this isn’t even difficult, it’s actually impossible without improvising a bit. For example, there’s one Yoga exercise involving forward bends where I found the only way to maintain the “center of balance” within the yellow bar (which is at the very bottom of the screen, mind you) was to put all my weight on my heels, which were positioned so far to the rear of the Balance Board as to be partially off it. And mind you, I routinely get scores in the range of “Yoga Master”, “Weightlifter”, and “Calorie Incinerator” throughout the various modules, so it’s hardly an issue of fitness or lack of balance we’re discussing here.
Posted: 2008-12-03 18:40:40 PST