Reviews// Wii Fit

Posted 4 Dec 2007 19:00 by
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Onto the actual exercise... Heading footballs is simply an act of leaning from side to side while dodging the occasional flying boot (don’t blame Sir Alex [We won't even mention that man... Ed]), with no actual heading movement required, so it quickly becomes repetitive.

Downhill skiing (a separate challenge from the ski jump) does a decent job of simulating the arcade laughs of Namco’s Alpine Racer, but only in microcosm.

Tightrope walking is a tense balancing act where you are actually permitted to walk on the Balance Board - so as to help your Mii tiptoe from one building to another. The vertigo levels are increased by having to jump (in a ski-jumping, fake sort of motion) over roving metal Mii-munching machines as they zip from one end of the rope to the other.

The most interesting balance game is a board-controlled reinterpretation of Hudson’s excellent (but brief) Kororinpa where you have to guide Mii-emblazoned marbles on wooden boards to their hole goals. The wife finds this game most frustrating, but perhaps that’s because it’s edging into actual game territory. Time to switch to non-game type then.

3:00pm: Returning to Wii Fit after lunch, there’s no chance of being weighed again (which is just as well) because the software permits BMI testing and weighing only once a day - just as Wii Sports rations your age testing. So, we try jogging first of all, which is classed as an aerobic exercise.

To jog in Wii Fit you don’t use the Balance Board, instead you just have to put a Wii Remote in your pocket and then begin jogging in front of the TV like some crackpot who jogs in his living room.

It’s best to shut the blinds before any Wii Fit activity, I think, just to preserve a vestige of dignity and self-respect - but particularly when jogging.

The setting for jogging is lovely, mind - a peaceful park/island full of the other jogging Miis who live inside your Wii. There’s a guide jogger who you have to keep up with, and the course loops around until a goal is reached five minutes later. I find five minutes of jogging to be just a bit too long and I end up out of breath as I cross the finish line.

The missus is mocking my apparent lack of stamina (um, just to reiterate, we’re only talking about jogging here) and reckons she could complete the course without gasping once. She proceeds to do so, pulling dance moves and steps towards the end as a show of female superiority. With Wii Fit, the humiliation for male gamers might never end.
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Comments

Petter 19 Feb 2008 06:34
1/7
Great review!!
Sean 2 Mar 2008 07:18
2/7
I live in Japan and am interested in possibly getting a Wii just for Fit. But my Nihongo is pretty crap -- especially reading Kanji and that sort of thing -- forget it.

Any chance this would still be useful to me? Any thoughts or recommedations?

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Jonti 2 Mar 2008 23:33
3/7
Sean wrote:
I live in Japan and am interested in possibly getting a Wii just for Fit. But my Nihongo is pretty crap -- especially reading Kanji and that sort of thing -- forget it.

Any chance this would still be useful to me? Any thoughts or recommedations?



I think you could stumble through it, Sean. There is quite a bit of kanji in there, but most of the things you need to know are also explained by visual demonstrations.

And since you're in Japan, you could also use the Balance Board for Namco's Family Ski should you tire of Wii Fit...
AB 13 Apr 2008 16:23
4/7
Very good review! Very entertaining to read! Can't wait to get mine.
Gamesgoblin 21 Apr 2008 13:58
5/7
Nice reivew, might pick this one up... God knows why :)
kriv 25 Apr 2008 22:46
6/7
Well the board supports us porkers 150kg / 23.8 Stone.

Went on it for 30 mins and shattered, no more gym for me.
headcasephil 26 Apr 2008 21:05
7/7
i cant belive how good this is all so it has got me thinking on why 1080 has not been released yet as the Balance Board
will work so well with this type of game f**k free sky and the sixaxis i feel this will be far better
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