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So, by now everyone on the planet knows about the Wii. It’s Nintendo’s heralded return to the console scene, and if the NPD numbers have anything to say about it, Nintendo didn’t just conquer the current video game market, it created a new market for itself.
One of the Wii’s biggest and most important contributions to the interactive entertainment space is the controller, the “Wiimote” a motion sensitive controller that really changed the way people perceived video games. The “ooh, aah” appeal of the Wii was even more apparent when Nintendo unleashed Wii Fit. Wii Fit, is basically a set of mini games strung together with some rudimentary stat tracking – it’s nothing we haven’t seen before, but the perfect storm of Wii hype, an overweight America, and the appeal of Yoga somehow brough the Wii Fit and its balance board into the mainstream.
On the subject of the balance board, it’s a pretty simple concept – a device that measures your weight on a location-specific basis on the pad. With that information, you can do a lot of number crunching behind the scenes to create some neat results. For relatively cheap (well, at least cheap compared to some of the weighing systems you see employed at universities), you can have your own personal scale with four pressure points – using information from those four points, you can pretty much pinpoint the pressure and weight that you’re putting on any point of the board (you’ve got your coordinate plane right there!)
However, the remarkable hardware comes bundled with some pretty lame software. This can be fixed though, as a few simple changes in the exercise database, competitive tracking system, and social media functionality can turn this into a “Soccer Mom’s” toy to a serious fitness machine.
I’m going to also mention that this post was inspired by the Podcast, Keith and the Girl – where currently one individual is attempting a “fitness challenge” with another, the catch is that the first person is using a typical fitness technique and the second is using Wii Fit – the results for the latter aren’t all that encouraging yet.
NOTE: Before I go a little further, let me just go over a fitness pet peeve that I’ve had about it – I’m by no means an expert in fitness, but I will say this – no matter how many fitness ads you see, how many “BODY MAX PLUS” drugs you see at GNC, or how many home gyms you buy – there is no silver bullet to fitness (this, interestingly enough, is explored a bit in the documentary Bigger, Stronger, Faster – which I wrote about before). There’s no silver bullet, and Wii Fit 2.0 will not solve your fitness needs.
The first part of Wii Fit that needs to be upgraded is the Exercise Database. Pushups, situps, and other calisthenics are great, but like anything, there’s going to be a point where you’ll need more – and Wii Fit can handle it. The first step is through plyometrics. Plyometrics are essentially types of exercises that enhance the nervous system and improve functional strength through rapid loading and contraction (thanks, Wikipedia). It’s the equivalent of pulling and releasing a slingshot over and over again as fast as you can. Since you’re exerting so much energy in such a low time interval (sounds a bit like HIIT to me!), you’ll get a great workout in pretty fast – and something tells me that fits right into Wii Fit’s demographic of people who don’t quite have the time to go to the gym and back or hit the pavement for a jog. Wii Fit will give you some extra incentive – including an on screen timer, a measurement indicator of how hard you’re working (try going on a rowing machine and working to minimize your pace), and some typical encouraging Japanese cutesy-happy sounds. You would even be able to use the pressure sensors to determine if you’re putting equal force on both arms (like with a plyometric push up), as opposed to directing it towards your dominant arm.
If plyometrics aren’t your thing, why not just do more “hardcore” variants of existing exercises, like diamond pushups, one-legged squats, or vertical jumps (you could measure the height of your jump by assessing the time it takes for you to hit the board).
I’d also like to see an enhanced focus on flexibility – a lot of people don’t realize that flexibility is a pillar of great fitness, and getting the exposure out there for Dynamic Stretches can only make things better.
Finally, as a pipe dream, I’d love to see some power lifting exercises – the balance board’s pressure system can provide some really great pressure vs. time information, which, if used properly, could even evaluate good technique as well as track your progress.
All of the above exercises could be made even better when you’ve got multiplayer. “Everything’s better with cooperative play”, and I will say that being able to conquer your friend in a “plank off” could maybe be as rewarding as getting scoring 99% on Expert. But, all these fitness exercises would be relatively ineffective without a much improved tracking and goalsetting system.
One of the most important aspects of any fitness regime is the tracking that you do with it. Although Wii Fit provides a rudimentary tracking system with a calendar that provides weight, BMI, and daily exercise logs, Nintendo could do so much more with it. Part of the tracking upgrades include simple things, like maintaining streaks, automatically suggesting exercises based off of muscles that you haven’t worked in awhile, and even some cool looking plots that will allow you to visualize your progress and show your friends how well you did.
Also, why not include some diet tracking too? ‘I’m sure nintendo could roll out something that syncs up with Personal Trainer Cooking, and give us something that we come back to everyday (can someone say engagement?), much like what websites like Traineo.com have been doing.
Finally, the Wii Fit “calendar” view should implement some kind of call to action through activities that your friends are performing, in addition to activities that you’re performing. How much more motivated would you be if it told you that your pal Tony was able to crank 30 pushups out in a minute and your current record was 27? Yeah, you’d give it a shot!
We’re getting to the point where this post is starting to be really long (by internet standards, at least), so I’ll bring up the final point right now – Social Media. Everyone’s heard of twitter, facebook, and any other service that allows for microblogging and presence updates, so why can’t Nintendo just sack up and give us a darn RSS feed? With that simple thing – we’d be able to have Wii Fit updates in twitter, Wii Fit badges on blogs, and even Wii updatees on facebook (ok, you may not really want all of that, but let’s just pretend we do).
With that social media extension – let’s give Wii Fit some achievements too? Humans like goals, humans like lists – why not give them a list of goals for them to complete? It gives you incentive and when you tie it social media in the form of leaderboards, it gives your friends incentive too.
I think I’ve pretty much said everything that I would ever want to say about this subject, if you like Wii Fit – great, but I hope developers can see the potential behind the balance board and really bring it to the next level.
