 |
|||
|
Nintendojo.com | |
|
|
||||||||
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 |
|
||||||||||||||||||
 |
Fitness and gaming -- they go together like water and oil. At least they did until Nintendo decided that they wanted to reach out to people who usually don’t play videogames; and what better way to lure them in than to disguise gaming as an exciting physical activity? Wii Fit may have been designed with the casual gamer in mind, but don’t let that fool you. By bridging the gap between gaming and exercise, Nintendo has created a unique title that anyone from soccer mom to hardcore gamer can enjoy. You might even lose a few pounds in the process. visuals Nintendo’s casual games all have a very distinct visual aesthetic, and Wii Fit is no exception. Anyone who has played Wii Sports or Wii Play will be right at home with Wii Fit’s non-threatening presentation. It’s basic and utilitarian, but it also connects these casual titles, making it very easy for less seasoned gamers to jump from one to another. In certain portions of the game, you are guided by a trainer who shows you what to do and offers encouragement. You can choose between a male or female trainer, but it’s purely an aesthetic difference. The trainer is presented as a basic gray outline and looks somewhat like a mannequin in sports wear. Again, basic, but it fits in well with the streamlined presentation of the rest of the game. The more graphically inclined sections of Wii Fit are limited to the Balance and Aerobic exercises. The visuals are straight out of Wii Sports: a simple yet colorful world populated by random Miis. It’s nothing new, but the novelty of jogging past friends and doing aerobic step routines with famous dictators will never cease to be entertaining. audio The music in Wii Fit is the same understated but catchy background music present in Wii Sports and the various Channels on the Wii menu. It would have been nice if Wii Fit used the SD card custom soundtrack feature seen in other titles like Excite Truck. Working out to your own music can be a big motivator and it would have been a positive addition to the experience. There is limited voice work from the exercise trainers who dispense advice and encouragement over the course of a workout. Their suggestions can get a bit repetitive, but exercises are typically short enough that it doesn’t become an annoyance. gameplay It just wouldn’t be a Wii game if there wasn’t some crazy way to control it, and the included Balance Board is the craziest control scheme yet. Fortunately, it works great. It’s loaded with enough sensors to accurately read your weight and locate your center of balance, and it feels very sturdy. Nintendo has a history of building quality peripherals, and the Balance Board continues the tradition. The beginning of the Wii Fit experience is the Fitness Test. The Balance Board locates your center of balance and takes your weight. With the help of provided information like your height and age it will calculate your BMI, letting you know if your body mass is normal, skinny or overweight. By doing this test regularly, Wii Fit will create a chart of your weight loss (or gain). Next, the game will determine your Wii Fit age by administering two random tests. These range from shifting your center of balance to hit targets to simply standing on one foot for a set period of time. The idea is to gauge your center of balance and agility. When you’re done being tested, you’re dropped into Training mode. These training exercises are the main focus of the game. Each exercise is like a self-contained minigame that takes one to five minutes on average to complete. They are broken into several different categories, each offering a different form of physical activity. Yoga exercises focus on holding a pose for a set amount of time to help improve balance and muscle tone. Strength exercises are highly physical like push ups, side planks or lunges. Aerobics are designed to get the heart pumping and feature exercises like spinning hula hoops and aerobic stepping in the style of Dance Dance Revolution. The biggest interest to more traditional gamers are the balance games. Most of the exercises in this category play out like tech demos for the Balance Board, but they can be quite fun. Of particular note is a snowboarding slalom game where the Balance Board is turned sideways and the snowboard is controlled by the user’s shifting balance. It takes a little getting used to, but it works great and invites some exciting possibilities for future games taking advantage of the Balance Board. Wii Fit is a surprisingly demanding game. Unless you are in peak physical condition, you will probably find yourself sweating a little bit after a solid half hour of playtime. The game keeps track of how many minutes you play on a daily basis and rewards you with new activities based on how long you play. After a while, you will have a huge variety of exercises to choose from, lending Wii Fit a large amount of replay value. multiplayer There’s not much to offer in the way of multiplayer aside from a two player running game. However, Wii Fit heavily encourages interaction and competition with others. Each exercise has a scoreboard showing who got the most points, and in the Wii Fit Plaza you can compare everyone’s daily progress on a chart. It’s not much, but it offers a sense of community and friendly competition. overall Even for the somewhat hefty price, Wii Fit is an extremely nice package. It keeps track of progress and important stats, provides a wide variety of exercise types, and actively encourages outside physical activity and diet awareness. It doesn’t hurt that it’s actually fun, either. The balance board is a slick peripheral that works exactly as advertised, and it will be very exciting to see if other developers take advantage of it in the future (a new SSX game, please). If you’re expecting a miracle exercise plan, you may want to look elsewhere. Wii Fit is not a substitute for going to the gym or playing a sport, and it doesn’t pretend to b; but it does encourage and reward daily physical activity with a wide variety of exercises and a truly unique control method. Casual gamer, hardcore gamer, it doesn’t matter. Wii Fit is an excellent way to introduce a little physical activity into your daily routine -- if you can manage to find a copy. Good luck with that.
|
|
   |
|||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
|
||
|
||
|
||
|
