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EA Active Nintendo Wii Game Review

Author Thomas | 04.06.2009 | Category Video Games

EA Sports Active is a lot of fun to play.  We awaited the game with anticipation with a lot of other people, and we’re not disappointed.  Of course there are a few things we wish were different, which are noted below, but overall, EA Active is a fantastic game to help you get in shape and tone your muscles.

Game Basics - The game comes with a resistance band (minimal assembly required just FYI), a leg holster for the nunchuck and the game.   The Nunchuck is placed in the leg wrap and it lets the game know how well you’re running, squatting, etc. You a provided a personal training who unlike the Wii Fit, is a real person you can see with video and will give you great feedback telling you to pick up the pace if you fall behind.  The game is also compatible with the Wii Balance Board.

Below are a few video demos of the EA Sports Active for the Nintendo Wii.

Obviously, if you want games to play with the Wii balance board, you need the board. The board comes with the Wii Fit game which has Aerobics, Yoga, Balance Games, and Strength Training.

Active Video Game Highlights:

Personal Trainer – The game offers you a personal training.  Video of a real person demonstrates how to perform each exercise.  Your trainer will tell you if you’re doing things right or if you need to adjust.  He or she will also offer encouragement to help keep you going.

Exercises – The great thing about the game are all the different exercises that can be combined into a workout.  The resistance band is great for increasing the difficulty of the exercises.  You can fold over the band to shorten it and make the workout more difficult.  The tennis challenge is one of my favorites.

Workouts – The game provides a 30 day challenge with varying exercises each day.  The game will alternate exercises that target different areas of your body.  If you’re not up for a certain exercise in your workout, you can de-select and skip the exercise.

Varying Difficulty - At each workout, you can choose the level of difficulty.  Your selection is made for all exercises in the workout, and is great if you’re not feeling up to a big workout, but would still like to get up and going a bit.

Tracking Progress – The game will track your progress over time as well as the calories burned through each workout.

Two Player with Friends - You can play the game side by side with someone.  Make sure to have an extra nunchuck on hand.  You can also purchase an extra resistance band and leg wrap separately on Amazon: EA Sports Active Multiplayer Pack

Improvement Points:

The game does have a few limitations that are unfortunate, but don’t affect the overall play.

Character Choice – It’d be nice if there were more variety when designing your on screen persona.

Music Choice – The music is not bad, but it’s not great.  It would be cool if you choose music from the SD card.

Love the game, and we’ve been using it every day since we got it.

EA Sports Active is available at Amazon.com.

Cardio Games for the Wii and Wii Balance Board

Author Thomas | 26.03.2009 | Category Software

We were very excited to get a Wii and Wii Balance board last year, but have been waiting for more cardio exercise games to come out for the Wii.  We’ve logged quite a few hours on the Wii Fit but are looking forward to some variety in the Balance Board Compatible Games.

Fortunately, there are now some pretty exciting games coming out soon that we’ve highlighted below.

Gold’s Gym Cardio Workout is a good game on the economical side of things.  If you’ve been using the Wii Fit, this game looks to be an enhancement of the same concept.  The game is compatible with the Wii Blanace board which is a big plus.  We’ve been waiting for some good exercise games to compliment the Wii Fit game.

EA Sports Active looks to be a very promising game.  Not yet released as of this writing, but you can catch a glimpse with the video demo.

What looks neat about this game is that you have more than just the Wii Remote and Nunchuck to toss into your television.  Seriously though, the game comes with an elastic stretch band and a leg wrap.  The Nunchuck is placed in the leg wrap and it lets the game know how well you’re running, squatting, etc.  Pretty neat idea.  The game is listed higher than the Gold’s Gym game, but with all the options and accessories, it looks to be quite good.

Below is the video demo of the EA Sports Active for the Nintendo Wii.  The Tennis exercises look pretty cool.

Obviously, if you want games to play with the Wii balance board, you need the board.  The board comes with the Wii Fit game which has Aerobics, Yoga, Balance Games, and Strength Training.  The game tracks how often you come back to use it and will give you praise if you come back often, and will also give that little nudge of guilt if you haven’t exercised in a while.  The Yoga exercises are pretty good.  We’re looking forward to more Yoga titles coming to the Wii and Wii Balance Board.

And of course, if you don’t own the Wii, you’ll need to get one.  We had a “fun” time trying to find a Wii to purchase last year.  We tried lots of different stores, tried meeting people in parking lots, etc. The best way, and the way we got the Wii, was by putting our cell phone number into the Wii listing page on Amazon.  Amazon.com then sent us a text message when the Wii was in stock.  Bingo!  We got the Wii!