Oh my goodness, I haven't posted since August. Positively shameful.
Today I feel like posting about my new exercise routine on the Wii Fit. I really like it so far, but I have definite issues. First, my dislikes.
1. It weighs you at the beginning of the workout, but after you're done it doesn't tell you how many calories you've burned during your workout time. I would think that this could be easily calculated.
2. I seem to spend a significant amount of my time navigating menus. I don't CARE right now that I broke a new record in hula hooping, just let me finish my work out, then tell me. I really hate being constantly interrupted when I'm trying to get a good work out.
3. My biggest pet peeve --why can't I do "advanced step" for more than 5 minutes? The only other option is to just step on and off (at a pretty low speed) for as long as I want. This is not a work out for me, even when I speed it up as fast as it can go. I want a 30 or 60 minute option with advanced step moves to music. Preferably one with more step moves/options, different music, and one that randomly changes so I can't memorize what's coming next.
4. I hate having to hold the wiimote in my hand during the workout. Aside from running and boxing (its necessary for those games), I shouldn't have to hold the remote in my hand all the time. I should be able to use the balance board to navigate the menus throughout the game.
5. I am not a fan of the opaque blue and white "trainers". I think we should get more options to choose from. Also, I think they take a really long time to explain the simplest stretches and yoga poses. It makes me often want to skip the yoga and strength training sections altogether.
6. For some reason, I'm really bad at the hula hoop part. I can never seem to catch the new rings that the characters throw at me. This is my own fault, and not the game's, but it is still something I dislike about my wii fit experience.
Likes
1. Love the virtual world you run through. Love the tunnels (with a footstep echo), love that you run with your other created miis, love that they wave at you, love the little doggies, love that occasionally miis fall while running, love the alternate energy windmills cameo, love the bridges.
2. The "guilt factor". When I got on to exercise yesterday after missing the day before, the wii fit said "too busy to exercise yesterday, eh Molly?" Over the holidays I went a week without doing it and it said "Do you realize it's been 7 days since you've been here? Remember, your goal is in two weeks!" or something similar. Little jabs like that make me not want to miss a day!
3. I am a big fan of the balance games! Most of them are really fun. (Except for the Lotus Balance one. Although that's probably because my ass is too big to sit on the board!)
4. I love the way your mii takes on the appearance of your BMI - stick thin if underweight, normal if normal, chubby if overweight, and downright fat if you fall into the obese category. It is weirdly motivational for me.
5. It makes you identify why you gain weight. It gives you options to choose from such as: eating late, overeating, snacking, not exercising, etc. You can only choose one, but often for me its more than one factor. This features makes you aware of behaviors that are causing your weight gain so that hopefully you can curb them.
Am Ambivalent About
1. The "Real Age" feature. Every day it is different for me, so I don't really rely on it at all.
2. The whole yoga part. I'm not really into yoga at all though.
This was fun to write. I really wish my changes could really be implemented. I would enjoy the experience much more. I guess now I have to hope that someone will come out with some sort of DDR-like game for the wii balance board so that I can exercise to good music at a good rate of speed. I can see the running and advanced step (the only exercises I really do) becoming boring quickly. I will definitely keep using the wii fit for tracking my weight and BMI though, I think it does a great job of that.
