Okay, it’s now more than a month after New Year’s Day, and I have a question for all of you. How many of you have kept to your resolutions? More importantly, how many of you resolved that you would lose weight and/or live healthier in 2005? What if I told you that you could achieve this by playing more video games? Okay, I’m glad you’re not here to slap me upside the head.
Seriously though, using a video game to improve your health is now a realistic possibility. No longer do you have to go into debt to a personal trainer or feel like a fat blob every time you go into the meat market of a gym by my home. (wait, I’m talking about myself here) Instead, you can simply pop Yourself Fitness into your PC, Xbox, or PS2 and work out with your virtual trainer, Maya.
Okay, enough of the infomercial for you. But I wouldn’t be endorsing this game if I hadn’t just loved using it myself. ResponDesign has really hit a breakthrough in the video game genre. Although women are starting to play video games in higher numbers, we are still definitely a minority in the gaming world. And even if we don’t play as much as our male counterparts, we still have the gaming machines in our household. So what if there was a game just for women, that worked with each of us directly, and focused on making us feel good about ourselves. That where Yourself Fitness comes in under their tag line of “games that are good for you.”
Yourself Fitness is an extremely innovative concept, the personal trainer in a box. Maya, your virtual trainer, is there to guide you through the fitness and wellness process in the comfort of your own living room. When you start the game, you go through a thirty minute fitness evaluation. Maya asks you questions about your personal health and you also go through a series of fitness tests. You can’t begin working out until you go through this evaluation. During the evaluation you also decide how often you will exercise, what type of workouts you prefer, and you will be able to design meal plans for yourself. The meal plans can be modified to the amount of calories you want and there are over 4500 recipes included in the game.
The workouts are challenging but are adjustable to your current comfortable level of activity. Frequently during the workout the screen will ask you how you are feeling and will adjust the workout based on your answer. Also during the workout, Maya will continue to push you on by saying such things as “push it” and “look at you go.” This can sometimes prove annoying but definitely keeps you going. The workout is a full routine including a warm-up, cardio, and then a cool-down/stretching. Yourself Fitness contains over 500 exercises including yoga, pilates, strength-training, flexibility, and weight-loss. The game also allows equipment integration for such home fitness tools as weights or a balance ball.
Music and environments can be changed, and you gain more environments as you continue to workout. See, even though it’s not a full-on video game, you still have to unlock levels! The game screen is constantly rotating so you can see the fitness instructor from all angles. The environments are very life-like and are set in settings such as an urban apartment and a dojo. Yourself Fitness also has an impressive graphics interface including life-like animation, shadows, lighting effects, and reflections.
I’d like to finish this review by saying, why didn’t anyone think of this sooner? Yourself Fitness is a hell of a lot cheaper than a personal trainer and you can do it in your pajamas! Plus, it has more variety than a stationary fitness video. While it will take some time for me to get used to having a pixilated personal trainer, I like the idea that it can be tailored to my needs. Yourself Fitness is an amazing concept that really carries through in the actual final product. If you’re at all interested in working out at home, I strongly suggest that you try this out. Who knows, maybe it will help you get rid of that beer belly from playing World of Warcraft or Halo! (Or whatever you kids are playing these days.)
5 out of 5 Jumping Jacks
