Wii Fit review

[tamarinne]

 

I’ve been using the Wii Fit for about two weeks now, and I have (mostly) nothing but love for it.

The Basics:

The Wii Fit operates around the Wii Balance Board. It is not, as one of my friends feared, one of those wobbly-bottomed balance boards like you see in sadistic aerobics classes. It’s more like a very big scale. The first time you log on (and every day thereafter), WF has you step on the balance board to check your weight/BMI, posture, and general balance.  WF graphs your progress, cheering you when you lose weight, and gently chiding you when you gain weight.

 

The Good:

There are four types of exercises – yoga, strength training, aerobics, and balance games. As you work out, you unlock new exercises and harder versions of existing exercises. The yoga and strength training are pretty straightforward – you pick a trainer who then walks you through your exercises. Using feedback from the balance board and the Wii Remote, the trainer is able to gauge your form and balance. I’ve been pretty happy with those. The balance games are pure fun. There are skiing games, rolling marbles across tables by shifting your balance, driving a soap bubble through a canyon without popping it… fun stuff.

 

The Bad:

The aerobics aren’t very aerobic. The hula hoop game usually has me working up a sweat, and I like the boxing game, but the step aerobics are more of a dexterity challenge than an aerobic challenge.  Running in place – heck, I can go outside and just run if that’s what I want to do.   

Also, I don't care for the fact that when you finish an exercise, you have to go back to the menu to start a new exercise.  I would like to be able to string exercises together and have it just do the whole sequence, rather than having to stop to select each one.

 

The Ugly (or Funny, depending on your tastes):

The Wii has you create an avatar for yourself, called a Mii. The Mii does all the exercises with you in the various exercises and games. The first time I weighed in, though… Her eyes got really big with this sort of “Oh No!” look, and she inflated like a balloon. Now… I thought this was freakin’ hilarious. I could not stop laughing, and I had to call melebeth to tell her about it. However, I can see how someone who was less comfortable with their size might be hurt by this. There have been other occasions, although I’m having trouble recalling them now, where the game was ever so slightly harsher than I would have expected – I don’t know if that’s an artifact of it being a Japanese game, or just a weird kind of encouragement.

And it doesn’t have a lot of patience with people who aren’t checking in regularly. rickthefightguy weighed in over a week ago, and hasn’t had the time to weigh in since. Now when I start up the game, both of our Mii’s jog onto the screen. Mine starts exercising in place. His… slumps over and goes to sleep.   Heh.

Overall, I’m really happy that I got this. The exercises mostly challenge me, the graphs and daily weigh-ins are good encouragements, and it changes up enough that it’s still keeping me interested. I’m not sure if I will continue liking it as much after I’ve unlocked all the exercises – but I’ll burn that bridge when I get to it.

ETA: 10.2 as of today!  Woo!