Essay #2 Final

Garth Deangelis once said “Our vision is to enable gamers to connect even further with avatars like Cloud by stepping into their shoes and reaping the physical benefits.” Who knew that his vision would become true? Today’s video gaming industry top selling system is based solely around that exact idea. The Nintendo Wii which introduces active motion as a source of control over the characters on the screen is the revolutionary new way to play today’s most popular video games. The Wii system is set up with a small program known as the Mii World. The player before doing anything else is forced to create an avatar, a cartoon gaming look-a-like, for their control and saving abilities on the console. As for stepping into the shoes and experiencing physical benefits of games nothing comes closer than the Wii Fit. The game does exactly that step aerobics and physical activates to benefit the user in ways that games have never been able to do before.

The concept of the game is fairly unique to the gaming world. Most games are played using a controller that was a set number of buttons and a joystick or D-pad. The Wii Fit on the other hand uses a balancing board and the Wii controller to simulate game play. The game is basically a workout program and outdoor activity simulator that can also evaluate a person’s BMI and center of balance. The idea came from Nintendo’s Wii developer Shigeru Miyamoto. He had always wanted to release the game before the Wii console was even thought up. He was having problems with figuring out how a scale to read movements. He even tried to integrate the Wii remote with a scale but to no success. In Japan sumo wrestlers are too heavy for one scale alone so they use two scales to weight them in; this was the inspiration that solved the problem. Not only could Miyamoto receive a better reading but he could also detect movement from one pad to the other. This is now the balancing board for the Wii Fit knows exactly what foot you are moving and at what exact pressure of weight you are applying (Romano). The Wii Fit can also detect your BMI (Body Mass Index) and will give you a daily planner of how you are doing once you set a goal. If you are shy about your BMI the game will let you set up a privacy setting so no other Mii can see your ranking or level. The game doesn’t come fully complete out of the package though. The game tracks how long you play and how consistently you play as well as your usual routine. The longer you play and the more you play while doing different activities almost each time the game will start to unlock more mini-games for users to participate in together (Kato, 100).

Even though the game is set up for and advertised as an exercise utility it comes with more entertaining activities as well. The game focuses on four basic areas: yoga, strength, aerobics and balance. Each part of the game comes with entraining activities as well as more serious fat burning exercise moves. From what I personally have observed of the game there seem to be two modes created one which utilizes the Mii characters to do the actions which tend to be more fun than serious and the exercise mode which uses a human-shaped avatar to present movements. When the game is in the more serious fat burning mode it has an instructor to help you with each move through verbal commands and since the board is so sensitive it will actually be able to detect if you are performing the motion in correctly. The other mode which is packed full of mini-games uses the users Mii character to perform more entertaining exercises. There is even a jogging game that you don’t need the board for instead you just stick the controller in your pocket and start to follow a Mii instructor on a mile long adventure which even includes cliff-jumping. Other games include skiing, hula hooping, soccer ball heading, tightrope walking, and boxing most of which are multi-player. As far as a party game the Wii Fit is not recommended due to the inability to get an extra board and not all of the games work in multi-player (Bryan, 100). “The training portion of the software includes 15 yoga poses, 15 strength-training activities, nine aerobics activities and nine balance games. It also allows a player to continue a Wii Fit aerobics routine while watching TV. Instructions come through the speaker on the Wii remote. The software gives instruction and provides feedback -- evaluating a player's performance through the sensitivity of the balance board. It can detect weight shifts to the tens of grams, recognizing when you're flailing an arm to try to hold that tree pose.” (Romano).

The new concept of active motion gaming has put a permanent mark of the gaming industry and its consumers. With today’s market expanding into new age groups and different types of people the Wii just fits right in. More and more elderly and young children are starting to play video games but not the type that come to most people’s mind first. Women make of 38 per cent of US gamers, up from 33 per cent five years ago, and the average player is 35 years old, according to the study prepared by IbisWorld, a market research company. "The average American gamer has been playing for 12 years," says George Van Horn at IbisWorld. He also notes that almost a quarter of gamers are aged over 50 (Taylor). With the Wii Fit now being distributed throughout the world and sales of these systems constantly rising one must think exactly what is this going to do to the people involved with the game. One study has shown that the Wii Fit is almost deadly accurate at calculating a person’s heart rate. This shows that the Fit is could actually replace some outdoor activities that most health magazines advertise as a healthy choice. The results showed the Wii Fit workouts did elevate Burich's heart rate beyond its normal ambient rate of 60 beats per minute, ranging between 90-100 on the step exercise, 90-110 for the hula hoop, and up to a maximum of 130 during the running program. Comparatively, Burich's heart rate measured between 145 and 155 during her running of the Philadelphia Marathon in November 2007 (Anonymous). The Wii Fit has now proven itself to be a more useful exercise tool than a conditional gym membership. Most people who were not willing or able to work out in gyms due to the fear of being in front of other people now are able to get off the couch and get active while enjoying the comfort and privacy of their own home living rooms. These now active people a becoming more self-confident which is helping more and more people interact than ever before. Children in today’s schools are able to feel a more accepted by their peers. One success story was based on a 7 year old who was suffering from dyspraxia, also known as developmental coordination disorder, and had started out shy and was not willing to build relationships with his classmates. After using the Wii Fit and some of the group activities he was able to break out of that shell and become come involved with his new friends (Zitz).

The Nintendo Wii Fit vastly expanded the video game industry and the users allow with it. It introduced new ways to have fun gaming by getting off the couch and on the board. From the fun activities of hula hooping, heading a soccer ball, or skiing down a snowy hill to the more serious yoga training and strength build programs the Wii Fit has got it covered in a compact highly sophisticated balance board. The technology inside is so evolved that it can be used by anyone at any age to help them better understand the way their body moves to an exact pin point pressure of the foot. The game has changed how people act and react to others in public as well as how to help them boost their self-confidence through the little work out they can receive without leaving the house. With technology so advanced and a community of people becoming more diverse with each system sold the future is still a mystery to what the gaming community will include. The next step in the gaming world is virtually limitless with new technologies increasing a twice the speed each as the past five years tomorrow could just be the day the development of the newest a greatest thing to help us become more active in our video games.