Well, I’ve written previously about Wii Fit, and EA Sports Active. I’ve also written about Dance Dance Revolution and Wii Sports. Usually all these subjects come under the heading of exercise, fitness, Move It Mama Monday… That’s because all my Wii activity is related to exercise.
Until now. I bought Wii Sports Resort thinking it would be nice to have more sports type games to play while working out. I’ve been playing the Wii Sports tennis and boxing a bit in the afternoons as part of a mini-workout, both to keep me moving during the day and to help me fight off the afternoon sleepies. I thought Wii Sports Resort would be just the thing to add to my repetoire of fitness games. The ads promised sword fighting, canoeing, bicycling, etc. I was sure to get a bit of exercise in there, right?
Eh, not so much. Most of the Sports Resort games aren’t set up with physical fitness in mind, which I think is a shame. Nintendo really missed out here. I love to play games while working out. It keeps things interesting, always a big plus when exercising, and that little bit of competition spurs me to work harder. I was able to get that out of Wii Sports tennis and boxing, no problem.
But most of the Sports Resort games don’t require any physical effort to play. They’re more hand-eye coordination games. The sky diving, frisbee throwing, basket ball, and other games only need minimal movement from the player to work. I thought the bicycling would be promising, pumping both arms up and down to pedal the bike in a race had to be work, right? But Nintendo pulled the fangs out of that one by forcing players to stop if their Miis get overheated or work too hard. Huh? I thought this was a RACE!
The one on one sword fighting only lasts three rounds, max, and if you’re any good at it, those rounds are short. The speed cutting is another hand-eye game. The third sword game has potential though. You have to fight a horde of people to get across a bridge. All that swinging and knocking people out did make me breath a little hard. A few rounds of that might make me break a sweat.
Canoeing is another potential mini-workout. This time, the game doesn’t force you to stop if it thinks your Mii is working too hard. Instead, the trick is to keep the canoe going straight while you paddle from side to side. The races get longer as you get better, so this looks promising.
But over all, Wii Sports Resort is not a workout sort of game. Again, sad that this is so, because a series of workout games would be exactly what I’d like. Having said that though, I have enjoyed playing Wii Sports Resort. Hubster actually went out and bought two extra remotes with the new Motion Plus attachments Sports Resort requires, so that all four of us can play together. And we have been playing, at least a couple games a day. The kids really enjoy it. These are games they can do with little trouble. As for me, I may not work up a sweat, but I have found playing a couple rounds of table tennis will ward off the sleepies.
Final word, I’d recommend Wii Sports Resort, but not for working out. Play this one for fun, and make sure you’ve got plenty of remotes on hand so everyone can join in.
