EA Sports Active Vs. Wii Fit Part 3

Here we are now with the last installment to my comparison article between the Nintendo Wii fitness games: EA Sports Active and Wii Fit. Up till this point I have covered each game separately, describing how the game works overall and noting/listing the aspects I enjoyed the most or thought could use some work. This will be the main comparsion part of this three part article. I will talk about what each game has that works better than the other. I will mention places that each of them fall in comparison to the other game. And I will point out parts of each game that were great ideas and should be in any fitness game.

As I stated before, the best feature about Wii Fit was its accuracy when tracking the movements and positions I was in. And as I mentioned with EA Sports Active, the tracking was off in some places. Now to be fair, there are only a few exercises that had me having to repeat the action in EA Sports Active, but it happened enough to really bug me. What also happened in some cases was that it made me hold the pose longer when working one side of my body and very short on the other. This could be looked at as the game wanting me to strengthen and use my muscles more in that particular leg but when the game never did this to my opposite side. This causes me to think that the game just didn't pick up that I had moved until a few moments later. Wii Fit always tracked me properly. This is most likely because it has a huge piece of hardware to use but even when EA Sports Active used the balance board, it still felt slow. Overall, I give the tracking and precision over to Wii Fit.

Now keeping up with your original exercise and workout plan can be hard. Many people can end up getting bored with their routines very quickly. EA Sports Active does a good job of trying to keep you coming back as much as possible. First, with the inclusion of a calendar system you can see exactly which days you are to be returning and which days you can get off. By not just relying on yourself to return and actually having the game tell you what you'll be doing the next day, returning becomes more of a priority in your life. The best part is probably that the game tells you, at the end of each days workout, what you'll be focusing on tomorrow when you come back. This not only gets you working on different muscle groups in your body, but keeps your routine moving and changing. Not only will this work your full body but it will keep you from becoming bored.

Now with Wii Fit, there is no in place routine system. EA Sports Active sets up specific routines for each day, Wii Fit just lets you pick and choose. This can be bad for several reasons. It allows you to neglect certain muscle groups and you can quit more easily. Since EA Sports Active keeps you in the workout screens and doesn't return to any menu till you're finish, it feels more put together. Wii Fit makes you return to a menu every single time you want move on. This can allow the player to stop working out more easily than if they are constantly moving on to the next workout and seeing how many they have left to do. So overall EA Sports Active is set up in a nicer way and ensures your entire body gets worked with its constantly changing routines. Wii Fit gives the player too much freedom and without enough encouragement and systems in place to keep the users attention, they may just give up.

Now along with the way each game is set up, we can look at the user interfaces. And as this may not be a big deal for someone truly dedicated to working out, someone not being able to navigate the game easily can begin to feel overwhelmed and give up early. For starts, Wii Fit is very simple, the entire game is only exercises and finding an activity to do is quick and easy. Even setting up a profile is fast since most people using it will already have a custom Mii character saved away from before. What's also nice about Wii Fit is that it shows you and tells you exactly which muscle groups you will be working in each exercise. The inclusion of pictures with highlighted areas on the virtual person make it easy to know if you're going to be working your abs, or your thighs. This can help if someone is only trying to strengthen or tone a specific muscle group in their body.

Now the EA Sports Active interface is much more complicated. Since there is so much to this game, there's a lot you need to absorb before you even begin working out. This means that you need to take some time to read and try out every little thing. What's bad about this is that not everyone going into this game wants a whole journal of activity references and surveys to look at. The majority of people purchasing a fitness game just want to do the workout and be done. Also, with no way of telling you how you did at each exercise and giving you an overall score, you never know if you're improving. Wii Fit gives you a score after each workout and even gives you the Wii Fit Age so you know if you're getting more fit. EA Sports Active just wants you to keep working.

So what does EA Sports Active have that Wii Fit doesn't? There are several things that I would recommend any fitness game use and even try to improve on. The first is the calendar system. Telling the user when to be back and what they're doing is great motivation. To add the motivation, EA Sports Active has trophies. These are a great idea that act as mini achievements and I would highly recommend them be used in any game. By rewarding the player for working harder, longer and more often is a great way to keep them coming back. Everyone likes being able to have something to work towards unlocking and I constantly wish there was more trophies. Granted there are quite a bit, the more the merrier as unlocking these is a great feeling. Lastly, EA Sports Active tells you how many calories you are burning. This is good for anyone trying to lose weight as they can determine how much longer and how much harder they need to exercise. And the fact that the calories burned meter is always on screen during your workout just motivates the person that much more.

Now what does Wii Fit have that EA Sports Active doesn't? Well not much actually. As I stated before, it has a lot harder of workouts. The strength training is great and can really work even some of the more physically fit people out there. Also, each exercise will show you exactly where to be applying pressure and how to be standing. Along with this, performing well will give you a higher score and the inclusion of leader boards can be a great motivation when competing with other users of the game. And lastly, the game does a better job of showing you if you're improving. It constantly tells you your weight and body mass index (or BMI) and the Wii Fit Age is a good representation of how physically fit you are.

Now probably the most important thing we need to think about is just how well do these work your body? Let's say you're going into this as a relatively unhealthy person, you don't have much muscle and your stamina is low. For this person, which is the main audience for anything fitness related, I can't recommend Wii Fit. Sure he'll get some exercise with the yoga, aerobics and balance games, but none of those work your muscles that well. The only time you will really be getting some muscle mass is the strength training and it can be hard, especially for a somewhat unfit person. So when it comes to a workout that you can ease into, EA Sports Active wins easily. It has far more cardio workouts and doesn't start hard. However, if you are someone who is normally healthy and at a good fitness level, I wouldn't recommend EA Sports Active. The game's workouts and exercises are just too easy to give any huge muscle building benefit. I would say that you can still lose weight with it and keep your body healthy, but for any real muscle workouts you are going to want to use Wii Fit.

Overall, both games are a good option to go with and it depends on what your fitness goal is exactly. If you're trying to lose weight, build a small amount of muscle and generally keep your body fit - then I recommend EA Sports Active. It feels like a more complete game for the average person trying to lose some weight and burn today's calories. However, the exercises aren't very hard if you're already fit. Someone trying to build some muscle or just keep their body hard and tight would probably benefit from the strength training in Wii Fit. The yoga will also keep you flexible and strengthen some key muscle areas. So when it comes down to it, I can recommend both, it just completely depends on your level of physical fitness before going into these game and what you want to achieve coming out.

EA Sports Active Vs. Wii Fit Part 2

Continuing my 3 part comparison between EA Sports active and Wii Fit, we now come to my segment completely on:

EA Sports Active

EA Sports Active is a more recently released fitness game - compared to Wii Fit - for the Nintendo Wii. This game tries to act as your own personal - and virtual - fitness trainer by setting up specific workout routines and schedules.

You begin by creating a profile. This involves entering your age, weight and height. You also get to create a character to represent you and to replicate your actions when working out. After creating your profile you can start the 30 Day Challenge. In this you are given a schedule that shows which days you are to return to work and which will be for resting. Each day will be different than the last as the game sets up specific workouts each routine. Some days you will be focusing on your arms, some day will be lower body.

You also get to input your goal that you wish to reach. The goal is broken down into three categories: calories burned, time spent working out, number of workouts complete. For each, you select the amount and in how many days you want to complete it. As you progress through the 30 Day Challenge, your time, workouts and burned calories will be added up towards your goal. You are shown your progress after each daily session.

Exclusive to EA Sports Active is the leg strap and resistance band. The leg strap acts as a pocket for the Wii controller's nunchuck so that the game can monitor your right leg's movement. Along with tracking the wii remote in your right hand, the game can get a general reading of how your body is positioned. The resistance band is just what it sounds like, this will be used for arm and back exercises like bicep curls and tricep rows. The balance board can also be used in this game but it is not required, there are also only a few exercises that work with it.

Along with completing the daily session in the 30 Day Challenge, you can take nutrition and extra physical activity surveys. In the nutrition survey, you must answer a number of questions ranging from how many full fruit/vegetable portions you ate yesterday to how many hours of TV you watched yesterday. The extra activity survey is a list of other possible activities you may have done. This can be things like swimming, running or even household chores. You must enter in how long you did them for and the intensity of the work on a scale of 1-10. The game then marks these down on its calendar so that the "player" can reference back to to see how they are doing.

Doing both the surveys and the daily workout session will add to your daily work out medal. This is a percentage reading that shows how fit you were recently. The higher the percentage - the more fit your daily activities are. The workout session will add 50% to the meter (earning you bronze), while the two surveys and any other workout sessions you partake in will fill the remaining 50% (earning silver and then gold).

Things I Like

• The idea of a workout schedule is great. Showing the person which days they need to show up and which days they can rest really motivates a person. Also, by mixing the days up and not repeating the same routines over and over, the body gets a good and full workout and the player isn't left bored.
• Probably the best inclusion to this game are the trophies that you can earn. These are like achievements that will unlock as you workout longer and harder. Some can be as easy as completing your first day or earning a gold fitness medal, while others can take a while, such as burning 10 000 calories or completing a full 30 Day Challenge. Some of the more fun ones are the workout specific ones. For example, having ran 25 laps in all the running in place workouts or doing 100 squats in total. This adds another layer to make the player feel that they should try as hard as they can and workout as often as they can. This was a wonderful idea.
• The leg strap is a great idea to ensure the user is moving their entire body correctly. It would be very depressing if you went through several workout sessions just to find out you did the majority of them wrong and weren't achieving anything.
• The option to workout with a friend is good. Bringing another player into the game to workout with you can add motivation and enjoyment. Though there is no way of doing the daily 30 Day Challenge session so if you plan to workout in partners, you will have to return by yourself to do your daily segment.
• The game shows how long approximately your daily session is going to last and how many calories you will be burning. This is a great idea so people can make sure they set aside enough time to get their full workout. Along with this, the game has a timer in the corner to show how long you've been working out. It also shows how many calories you've currently lost in this one routine and it goes up each time you make a motion in the exercise. Seeing the calories burned number increase was a great idea as it adds a small reward function during the exercises.
• The inclusion of a settable goal is good and showing it after each exercise routine is great. Allowing the player to see how close their are to their goal is good to make them feel good and want to come back.
• The vast number of different exercises is great and can really get you moving and sweating. It's very much for cardio so I could definitely see someone losing some weight with this game.
  

Thing I Don't Like

• Since the game only works by tracking the controller's movements, it's not the most accurate. There were several times when I found myself having to repeat a step because I either lowered my arm to slowly or the controller wasn't moved quick enough to sense it. This is quite disappointing since it can really throw off a person's rhythm.
• The resistance band is far too flexible and not strong enough. For most of the exercises that require it, my muscles are hardly being worked because there just isn't enough resistance going against them. It also feels very cheap and there are many times that I'm thinking I could snap this thing any second.
• Many of exercises that mean to replicate an actual sport (ex: basketball or tennis) just don't end up working me at all. They feel a lot like the balance games from Wii Fit and I'd rather just not do them.
• The audio trainer that you follow doesn't give enough instructions I find. Instead of being told to do it slower or follow her pace, I'd like there to be some actual tips and more precise information. Though with the way the game tracks movement, knowing exactly what I'm doing wrong might be hard.
• The majority of the exercises are very easy. I currently have it on the hardest difficulty and always do the full session and, even though I do work a sweat up, my muscle don't feel very sore. There just isn't much in this game for muscle building.
• The user interface takes some time getting used to. This is mainly because there is just so much packed into this game; finding it all and knowing what to do can be a bit of a challenge.
  

So there is my generalized look at EA Sports Active. Now that I have talked about both Wii Fit and this game, tomorrow I will write up my comparison article between the two of them. I will mention things about each game that stand out and just work better against the other. I will also end it with my recommendation on which you should purchase.

EA Sports Active Vs. Wii Fit Part 1

EA Sports Active and Wii Fit both say that they aim to make you lose wight and live a healthier life style. After working with both for a good deal of time, I've decided to write up a comparison article on the two games. In this I will be talking about things that I liked, disliked and anything that stood out to me for each game individually. Then I will do my fine comparison on which I would choose and what I believe is the better purchase. Since this will be a somewhat long article I have decided to split it into segments. Today's part will feature:

Wii Fit

Wii Fit is a first party Nintendo game designed for the Nintendo Wii that fully utilizes the balance board add-on peripheral. Along with a simple user interface and several games to play, it can be quite enjoyable.

You start off by selecting your personalized Mii from the Wii's internal memory and begin to fill out your current age and birth day. Then the game sets up several activities that require you to balance and lean in certain ways. After this and once it has weighed you, it will present you with your "wii fit age". This age is the basis on how the game scores you and determines your progress. The lower the age, the better. It basically acts as a representation of how fit you are. Though this can sometimes be off as it scores you only on the body test games you do, which usually rely on balance as opposed to your muscle strength or personal stamina.

The game tracks you as you do each exercise and workout through the balance board. The balance board acts as a common scale but is fitted with many sensors placed throughout it. This way the game can see where you are applying more pressure or leaning. The basis of the game is all about how much pressure and the weight you are applying to the board. For exercisers such as Lunges, you will be shown a meter that relies back how much pressure you are putting on your front foot. By showing these meters and making the "player" aware of how much force they're applying and where, the game can easily tell if you're doing the workout properly.

There are four types of "game play" modes to Wii Fit: Yoga, Strength Training, Aerobics and Balance Games. Yoga will have you do many different stretches and hold different positions in order to strengthen your muscles. Strength Training focuses on isolating specific muscle groups in order to work on them. Aerobics involves activities such as running in place and hula-hooping. Lastly, Balance Games will focus on your level of balance how fast you can shift weight from one leg to another in a series of games.

Things I Like

• The best thing about Wii Fit is how accurate it is when you preform each exercise. Since the balance board is there, you're always getting a one to one reading on the force and weight you're exerting towards the board.
• Trainer feedback. As you do each one of the Yoga exercises and Strength Training workouts, your virtual trainer (who you chose when starting) will constantly remind you how you should be standing - or lying if the situation arises. Along with regular tips and encouraging statements, the trainer is a great "companion. What I liked most about this is that my trainer would tell me specifically, or close to, exactly what I was doing wrong; whether this be leaning too far forward, or putting too much weight on one particular leg.
• I also really enjoyed the Strength Training section to the game. This is what I spent most of my time with as I - literally - felt I got the best results while working through it. What I liked so much about it is that the workouts were actually quite hard. Though the game is aimed at a more unfit audience, these workouts could be done by anyone and still feel some pain. And not only do they make you do the workout, but they make you hold them and constantly tell you how to improve and perform better.
  
• Wii Fit Credits. After completing each exercise, you will be giving a number of credits. Each credit counts as one minute of working out. The fun part of this is it tracks how many you have and how many you've collected from each game type. From here you can enter your workout graph and see which exercise modes you use the most.
• The game also gives you a score on each one of your workouts depending on how well you did. You can do well by things like doing every push up on time or keeping your pressure over the correct line in lunges. What makes this so good is that the top 10 scores will be placed on the leader board. From there, any one else who plays the game will also be shown there and you can "compete" with your fellow Wii Fit users. This helps motivate the player and make the game that much more fun.
  

Things I Don't Like

• The main focus to Wii Fit is getting out of shape people into shape. Now if you're incredibly weak, it can be very hard to complete some of the Strength Training - even on the lowest number of reps. There are many people out there who can't do six push ups with a side plank in between. The reason this isn't good is by being unable to do many of the workouts, you're missing on of a good chunk of the game. And though there are very easy activities in the Yoga, Aerobics and Balance Games sections, none of them will build as much muscle as Strength Training.
• Balance Games. I never do these, I tried each of them when I first got the game, but they do nothing for me. The only time I can see this improving anything muscle related in you, is if you're incredibly weak. If squats are very hard for you, you might be able to receive some positive results from these.
• Not enough cardio. For a game focusing on losing weight, there isn't much cardio workouts in here. The closest thing is the running in place exercises. These can range from 3 minutes all the way to 30. And even though strengthening your muscles from Yoga and the Strength Training will slim you down slightly, cardio workouts are a must for any significant change.
• No option to set up a whole routine. When you finish each exercise, you will be asked to either quit or try again. Quitting brings you back to the workout menu so if you want to move on then that's the option for you. From there you need to select your next exercise. It would have been nicer to fluently move from one to the next without such a long break.

So that's my general look at Wii Fit. Overall I enjoy it quite a bit, mainly due to the high difficulty to the strength training. Coming up either tonight or in the next day or so, I will have my general look at EA Sports Active. Then the main comparison to follow.

EA Sports Active vs. Wii Fit

Today I got hold of a copy of EA Sports Active. For the past few months I've been doing Wii Fit so I'm familiar with workout/exercise games. After a week or so of trying EA Sports Active, I'll most likely write up a comparison article on here between the two of them.