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Miyamoto: "Wii Fit is a video game"
Author: Joe MartinPublished: 18th April 2008
Wii Fit may offer some fun ways to get fit, but we definitely wouldn't call it a game.
The 'game' uses a new Nintendo peripheral, the balance board, to detect movements in weight and force as the player stands on it, allowing the Nintendo Wii a whole host of new abilities - just think of the potential for a Tony Hawks game!
For the launch title though, Nintendo has gone for something a little tamer than Pro Skater, but with more of a mass appeal - a fitness program. The program guides players through fitness exercises and yoga positions after measuring height, age, weight and BMI - and if that doesn't sound like much of a fun game then you'd be right because, while the program definitely has it's place, it lacks enough explosions for us to qualify it as a game though.
Shigeru Miyamoto, Nintendo boss-man, though disagrees. In an interview with MTV, the current Lord of The Living Room said he definitely would describe Wii Fit as a game.
"Well, yes, in my mind, I would say it is a video game," said Miyamoto.
Us though? We think it's definitely more of a simulation than a game, but you can catch our full thoughts in a few days in a full review. Until then, why not head to the forums and figure out why nobody else has done something like this with consoles before?
Comments (22)Stats: 0.143 seconds
However... it will keep my wife occupied for many hours, and thus provide me with extra proper gaming time that I can put to good effect on my GAMING PC or PS3 !
Im sure it will sell millions, and the vast majority of the sales will be to women. Wii = The Official Womans Console.
try playing mario kart wii, i bet after 5 minutes you will be hooked and you'll be a girl too!! :)
Would you not call simulations like flight sim and Driving simulators games then?
You could put forward a good argument that strategy games are "war simulators" rather than games..
Why not just go for a run or to a gym if you want to get in shape? If you can find time to balance and do weird things on (And possibly with) a board and a Wii, then surely you could find time to do something else that probably doesn't include eye-strain..
But that's the cynic in me.
Wii = The Official ANYONES Console. Do you have a problem with women and children enjoying the same sonsole/games as men?
Exactly. It is a game.
on a console - check
has objectives (to get fit) - check
do it for entertainment/fun - check
what part of it is not a game?
You can call me a fanboy, that's alright. :D
I hope that people buy this because it's a fun and good way to get off the couch, but not be fooled into thinking it's an alternative to real exercise.
The beauty of the Wii is that just about anyone, male or female, old or young, technically inclined or not, can find something for them on it. (I sound like ninty marketing here, but its true)
Anyone seemingly except for the FPS junkies that think that a game without killing isn't a game at all
(Don't get me wrong, I love a good shooter, but I dare anyone to try to play monkey ball without having fun)
is DDR a game? singstar? etc
To give an example, playing WoW allows a group of people to step out of their lives and become fantasy characters which can wield swords and magic. It give you something reality lacks.
A driving or flight simulator is identical. For a start the age restriction on piloting aircraft and driving cars, also the issue of the time/money it takes to learn/own a plane/car stop a lot of people doing it.
An FPS allows me to fight in a war/hunt terrorist without any danger or firearm training.
All of these are games, they take us out of reality and place us in fantasy.
Doing step aerobics has to be the lamest fantasy i have ever heard of. Whist I feel that this will sell very well due to the gimmicky nature of the Wii and its large audience of women. I cant call it a game because at the end of the day if you replaced it with brick of the same dimensions you would have the same experience.
I don't think that's what it was designed for, though. There are lots of people who can't do 'a good workout' - such as the elderly, or people with foot or back injuries. Look at it as interactive yoga - it gets people working on their balance and range of motion, without being bored out of their minds (a common excuse for not exercising!) It's not going to take the place of a five mile run, but it can help people with very basic exercise needs get up and moving.
I'm also curious to see games developed to use this controller - Mario, anyone? Lean to make him run, jump to make him jump? That could be incredibly dorky, but somehow rather fun.
If dressing up in a penguin suit and balancing on a block of ice trying to catch fish isn't a game, then I don't know what is.
I agree with you completly, but here's my question...
If people play games in order to expierience things they wouldn't otherwise expierience, what's the attraction to the Sims, Second life, etc? :|
I agree with him and I doubt he was saying this in a negative way. It's just the 'first time' that a console gets the attention of everyone (as you said), including women (as in the example of his wife)
take it easy ;)
My question is, do you class wiisports as a game (i think i would) and if so, whats the difference between that an wiifit?
I think it class is a game, not one i might enjoy much, but still a game
I only discovered Jackie Chans version now, had anyone else seen or heard of it? http://www.xavix.com/products/j-mat.html
Alot of the products on the page are very similar to Wii Sports too.