So, has anyone picked up EA Active? I'll allow for the fact that QT3's search is terrible, but I'm surprised I don't see a thread on it yet.
In any case, here are some quick first impressions.
This game appears to be what I wanted out of Wii Fit. That is, it is a game that involves exercise. In particular, the 30 day challenge - a mode where you commit to 30 days of workouts of gradually rising intensity - is the gaping hole in Wii Fit's feature list.
The 30 day challenge on high intensity felt like real exercise. I was sweating and everything.
The resistance bands are really, really weak. They need a version with manly resistance bands, made of skulls.
Why can't this thing measure my weight? How can I track progress without a weight graph?
I've only seen a small sample of the exercises but they seem to do a much better job of tracking your motion than I expected. Imagine that? Using the Wiimote and Nunchuck to track movement.
I already like the kick boxing exercise, complete with knee and kicks tracked using the Wii Board better than anything on Wii Fit.
The inline skating exercise with jumps is pain and I used to do a hell of a lot of inline skating.
I wonder how EA is doing with this thing. It certainly has potential. It's much better than Wii Fit. How do you let soccer moms (outside of my wife) know about this thing?
I'm not necessarily looking forward to day 2 of my 30 days. It must be doing something right.
I'm considering picking this up for my girlfriend. The few reviews I've read have been positive, including Dana's over at GreenPixels. Is it possible to use dumb bells instead of resistance bands, or does one have to hold the Wiimote and nunchuk for those exercises?
I've had my eye on this one, but I'm surprised there is nothing for abdominal workouts.
I know, I know, I'm an EA employee. So take my impressions with the requisite grain of salt.
I've done 2 workouts so far with this thing, and, yeah, they are real workouts. In particular, I've been sore for 3 days now because of the lunges and squats, which apparently use muscles that I've avoided using for 40+ years until now.
The resistance band *does* seem flimsy, but so far it's worked fine for me. I can definitely see a scenario in which it rips/breaks. I imagine this could be easily upgraded with some kinda third-party band. But it would be nice if in the future it came with a stronger band. On the other hand, the leg strap and nunchuk holder is sturdy and well built.
The movement tracking is pretty amazing. Every time I tried to "cheat" by slowing down or not quite doing what they asked, the game called me on it, much to my daughter's amusement.
I love the fact that they have complete workout programs with a variety of exercises, linked together. It really DOES feel like the kind of workout you'd normally pay someone to give you.
The biggest negative for me has been that in some cases, my movements were failing to register at all. I think I just need to go back in and tweak the settings or something. But things like the bicep curls were just not working at all, so I had to end up skipping the exercises entirely.
Weight: I dunno how it would possibly track this, Fuzzy. Maybe with the Wii Balance Board?? In any case, it relies on player honesty, which is great for me, since I can just tell it I lost 20 pounds and bask in their unwarranted praise! Yay! :)
So for me: Thumbs up. First thing I've EVER brought home related to gaming that my wife actually now wants to try, after watching me get seriously exhausted.
I will now quietly await my bonus from EA for publicly pimping this product.
I hope she doesn't read this forum.Originally Posted by MSUSteve
If this came out on the 360 or PS3 I would seriously consider picking it up.
I bought this game and so far have done two workouts. It will definitely make you sweat more than Wii Fit. It also seems more demanding in the workout. About 15 minutes into my 20 minute medium intensity workout, I was ready to call it quits. However, I could find no place to actually quit the session and save my progress. Unlike the Wii Fit time bank, this one seems to be of the opinion that one MUST complete the whole workout (much like a true personal trainer).
Also, I found the motion tracking and balance board a bit off, but then watched the videos again and noticed how particular they were in some of the exercises about pointing the wiimote to the ground or parallel. Also, the nunchuk must be put in upside down in the leg strap to register correctly.
Overall, anyone who would like to use their console to track progress and help them exercise, I definitely recommend the game. But, like any others, it is not a miracle worker and it still requires a true investment from the user to use the system.
Ha ha! No, I already asked her if she would be interested in it. She does lots of workout DVDs, but they get boring after awhile. I thought this might be a nice change of pace.
My girlfriend expressed interest in this title, so we picked it up on Memorial Day. We are now on day three (a day of rest) and my legs are extremely sore. The workout routines are great, and something Wii Fit definitely should have had. Unfortunately, the resistance band that came prepackaged offers no resistance. I ended up ordering some off amazon, hopefully that will improve arm oriented exercises.
I'll write further impressions once I have progressed more.
How well does this work without the balance board? I tried Wii Fit and wasn't impressed enough to buy it, but I am considering getting this. However, I don't want to miss out on 50% of the game by not having a balance board.
I am enjoying this "game" but does having a balance board make a big difference? I've seen mostly negative reviews about the balance board and I'm not really interested in other Wii games that support it.
From what I've read, the balance board isn't needed at all. EA Active supports it, but doesn't require it in any way.
Ha, I was going to make a thread on this myself a few days ago, but figured if there was enough interest someone would have done it already.
I picked this up (or rather, received it from Amazon) as soon as it came out and started the 30 Day challenge right away. I should point out that I already go to the gym every weekday (lost 34 pounds so far, still a long ways to go!) so that may skew my results a little, but here are my thoughts:
The 30 Day Challenge is awesome. I love that it builds rest days into the schedule, because after the first two days my legs were killing me! I don't have enough time at the gym to incorporate lower body exercises (squats, etc.), so I was definitely caught off-guard by all of the things it hit me with in the beginning. A week in , I don't feel the long-term soreness that I did, but I can still feel the burn when actually doing the exercises. I'm definitely looking forward to getting into the later days of the challenge, as the game gradually ramps up the intensity of the schedule. And after this is done, it's on to a 30 Day Challenge at the highest setting.
If you do any sort of weight lifting at all, throw the included resistance band out and get a medium or heavy resistance band. I found I wasn't getting a good workout with the included band even after folding it over itself, so I sprung for a medium resistance band on Amazon and find it much more suitable.
I don't have the issues that other people are with it not detecting my motions. It does occasionally yell at me when I'm doing a side lunge on my left leg since my right leg, and thus the nunchuck, have a tendency to shake a bit, but other than that everything's been fine once I got the motions down.
Speaking of nunchucks, I picked up a wireless one specifically for this. The wire is a nuisance for some of the exercises, like standing knee raises with crunches (I don't remember the exact name, it's where you raise your knee and bring down both your arms), where I found myself slipping the cable completely underneath my foot. I imagine boxing with the heavy bag would be similarly annoying, but I had my wireless nunchuck before I encountered that exerises.
I think if you supplemented this with some form of cardio and ate well, you could easily shape up. I'm very interested in seeing what kind of results people who use this as their primary workout method get, so hopefully this thread stays alive!
Lastly, to respond to some of the thoughts I saw here:
fuzzyslug: EA has been marketing the hell out of this thing, if you haven't seen the advertisements, that's because there are on shows like Ellen. :) Personally, I use the Wii Fit channel to keep track of my weight, I do wish EASA had built-in weight measurement for those that own a Balance Board, but those same people should also have the Wii Fit channel at the very least so not too big of a deal.
MSUSteve: Yes, you do need to use the Wiimote and nunchuck for curls.
Jeff Green: I had problems getting my curls to register it at first, as well. The issue for me was that the game expected the Wiimote to be in the opposite position that it started in, ie: you start the exercise with the Wiimote facing away from you with one side parallel to the ground, when you bring your arm up the side that was facing down should now be parallel to the ceiling.
Edit:
skyride / Vesper: If you don't have one, I wouldn't bother picking one up. I do own one but don't use it in the exercises, though I might try it out on a free day.
Last edited by Douglas on QTT; 05-27-2009 at 08:41 PM.
It is somewhat intresting that we are all having the same experiences with EA Activity. Lunges kicked my ass too.
I'd say in-line skating beat my legs up the hardest, and continues to do so every time I encounter it. Let us not speak of the days where it's scheduled twice in my 30 Day Challenge...
Douglas, were you able to use your new band with the handles that come with EA Active, or did you have to get new handles as well?
Douglas (or anyone who's tried it), did you find the lack of abdominals to be very noticeable? How did you handle it?
Yep! This is the specific band I got, in case anyone's interested.
Exactly what I was looking at. Thanks!
No, but as I said, I also go to the gym and can make up for anything that EASA lacks there. Looking at a list of abdominal exercises, I also think it'd be a pain in the ass to detect a lot of this stuff given the constraints of the hardware. Something else to keep in mind is that while there are no dedicated ab exercises, you can definitely integrate your core muscles into the existing ones.
I think my brain repressed the memory of that exercise.
This was known as day one for me.
Is there a difference in inline skating without the balance board? I didn't find that one so challenging with the balance board as all you do is either lift one leg or the other to avoid the obstacles. I was wondering though if it made you jump or something without the balance board.
You're basically doing a squat, and then jumping.
Rather than retreading what has already been said. I also snagged it at launch and have been using it and agree with most of what has been said. I do find it complements Wii Fit rather well rather than outright replacing it. Wii Fit I've found to actually provide a nice variety of low-intensive exercises such as Yoga that can slot rather well into the more intensive EA Active daily routine. (Plus having the Wii Fit channel provides a daily weight check without the need for disc swap!)
But yes, it is nice to have a piece of software that actually acts as a workout program, compared to the un-motivational 'a la carte' design that is Wii Fit.
I do find myself less inclined to use the balance board with Active though, only because of the pain it is to keep sliding it in and out of the workout space while I am sweating buckets.
Thanks, BDGE and Douglas. I was actually wondering specifically how Active would pair with Fit but forgot to ask. I'm still curious how one would regularly integrate abdominal excercizes into an Active routine, since (for now) those are a priority for both myself and my 12-yr-old. I don't mind that the Wii won't actually babysit me to make sure I do them correctly, but I'd like to at least be able to tell it that I just did thirty situps and get credited for that somehow, for example. (Edit: Dana Jongewaard refers to this kind of thing in the linked article above, but I'm not sure how that works).
My metabolism is finally starting to slow. That coupled with absolutely no exercise, other than grass mowing, means I will start gaining weight like a bastard if I am not careful. Once you guys mentioned it was decent and gives agood workout, maybe I will try it. It is hard to fit going to them gym into my schedule between work and spending time with the kiddies.
This is next on my list. I picked up a set of wrist weights to use with Gold's Gym (also a serious cardio workout, especially the advanced and special sets), since I don't trust those flimsy bands. I'm alternating 1 day of free weights, 1 day of Wii, abs are coming along baby!
Dana was referring to the journal, which allows you to input other activities you did. These are very generic (Walking, Running, Biking, Swimming, Yard Work, etc. -- there's also an "Other Activity") and only allow you to input the time spent and intensity.
The journal is pretty arbitrary. I'm not quite sure how effective its use is for anyone, especially when assigning some number-rating to how intense your daily walking/gardening/movement count is.
I walk on average 4 miles to work daily, and after assigning a score of 8/10 to the 'intensity', the journal gave me a total active score of 530 or some such nonsense. Good enough to earn a gold medal and an achievement I guess. But seriously....WHAT?!
It's clearly EA's version of the Wii Fit Age.
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