Having played WiiFit for about 5 days now I can safely say I have never had a similar experience with a video game before. Sure Dance Dance Revolution gave me a good work out, and WiiSports made me get up off the couch to play, but neither ever predicted my death and established itself as my only hope before.

If you are unfamiliar with WiiFit it is a game packed in with the Wii Balance Board which is essentially a white step-stool looking thing that operates as everything from a scale to a balance measurement system. It’s the basic controller you use to play 90% of the “games” on WiiFit.

 I use the word “games” lightly, while it does have a large bank of fun game-like experiences like skiing, tightrope walking and the hula hoop, it also has a huge list of straight up exercises it tries to trick you into playing. I was “playing” WiiFitfor about 15 minutes yesterday before I stopped and realized “I’m doing push-ups. This is just push-ups. The Wii tricked me into push-ups”. Yoga, Aerobics, Strength Training, the WiiFit manages to get you to do all sorts of out-of-character things.

The worst is the promise of unlockables. I am a sucker for two things in this world, blind packaging and unlockables. I get on and find half the game locked out. WiiFit promises me I can unlock these things by playing it’s games. Based on time spent on WiiFit and scores achieved you can unlock a variety of bonus games, modes and trinkets.

I’ll stare at a locked Yoga position and work out for hours to unlock it. But caught in the grip of the “game” I fail to realize the only reward I’m getting for this Yoga is more Yoga! That the bonus I get for my many push ups is more complicated push-ups. But I buy it hook line and sinker every time.

But the meat on WiiFit is the progress tracker and body tests. When you boot it up for the first time, the little WiiFitcharacter gives you a diagnostic. The happy little character that guides you through is the balance board itself, that’s right the peripheral you are working out on also bounces around like an early Pixar character on screen to serve as your little guide to this experience. It’s like watching a little animated remote control guide you through you television set-up.

Getting on the board I knew I wasn’t going to come out great, I mean I know I’m no American Gladiator here, but what I didn’t expect was for this little cartoon board to predict my doom. 

Up on the screen you see your Mii (a Wii representation of yourself) It took my stats and plugged in a BMI and set me next to a status bar. I watched as the measurement flew way past normal, through overweight to settle right under obese. My Mii on screen, typically a skinny fellow, ballooned up to match how WiiFitsaw me, which is apparently as the Stay Puft Marshmallow man’s tiny sidekick. The WiiFit character then began to shake and tell me how because of how I live that I am at all kinds of risk for health complications. While a soothsayer, it is at least politely vague.

It now tells me to set a goal, and I choose to say I want to be in the “normal” range within two months. WiiFit then goes on to warn me that if I hit normal in two months I have lost an unhealthy amount of weight in an unhealthy amount of time. This is a subtle dig that even if I go all out, I’ll still be overweight for the foreseeable future.

It then puts up a calender and has me stamp it with a little symbol as some sort of 3rd-grade reward for weighing myself (If it starts handing out gold stars, I’m out). So now I am setting out to impress this machine, to prove to my Wii that I have a long life ahead of me, that it shouldn’t have to tremble in fear when it reads my weight fortune.

The problem for me is that as I hunger for unlockables and validation, I’m tempted to cheat at this game. The main problem with that being unlike a game like Smash Bros. where cheating is a matter of technical bugs and internet research, I’m pretty sure the only way to cheat at WiiFit is to develop an eating disorder.

But all in all it’s a neat little gadget that can effectivley trick me into exercise and a healthy lifestyle. I actually checked the nutrition facts on a snack I was going to have today (A Dale and Thomas Chocolate Covered Popcorn Bar) thinking “Well I could eat this, but I really don’t want that WiiFit guy scolding me today”

But If that’s what it takes to get me healthy and get me active, a video game that tricks me into exercise and a little cute avatar who’s criticism I fear, then so be it.

 -Kevin

Tags: Dale and Thomas, Exercise, Video Games, WiiFit

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 29th, 2008 at 12:01 am and is filed under News Posts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.