EA Sports Active 2 revisited

Took the weekend off since my neck was bothering me (oh, so that's why I don't usually do a lot of high impact workouts...), but today I got back into the swing of things and worked out at home. I started off with about a half hour with the Gold's Gym Cardio Dance Wii game (I still need to review that!), with my new best friend, my heart rate monitor. Great workout and it got me motivated to try EA Sports Active 2 again...

So with my heart rate monitor on (chest strap and big ol' wrist display), I strap on the EA wrist sensor (their HRM) and the leg strap and got going. I did a mix of activities and sadly, my heart rate monitor said I burned a lot less calories than the game said. I was curious about this, and did a single 10 minute step workout. I had been disappointed when I first got this game because the calorie count on the step workouts were much lower than in the first game. Well...

they're quite inflated from my heart rate monitor on this second game, which means the first game was *wildly* inaccurate on this. For the 10 minute workout, EA Sports said I burned 113 calories. My heart rate monitor said 86 calories. Both have the same weight/height/sex information, and both showed the same heart rate during the workouts. Inflating the calorie burn by over 30% is really, really disheartening. I am very disappointed in this, especially since I thought I was burning significantly more calories in this game than I really was...

EA Active 2 - Calories burned dramatically less than More Workouts

Has anyone else encountered this yet? (I'm using the Wii without the Balance Board turned on - and yes, the BB is not enabled in the settings)

I was religious about doing the step aerobics on More Workouts - and I'd burn at least 150 calories per 10 minute segment. In particular, doing any step repeater would burn almost one full calorie per step (3 kicks = almost 1 calorie).

On Active 2, I'm lucky if I burn 100 calories in a 10 minute segment. The step repeaters burn about .2 calories instead of .8-1.0. It's dramatic. Today I got frustrated and stopped moving, and the calorie counter kept on moving (slowly but still went up). I took off the heart rate monitor in case it was based on that, and the calorie counter still moved as though I was doing the exercise.

I'm so frustrated - this was my favorite component of More Workouts and it's so inaccurate in Active 2... I was elated to not be smacking myself with the cord from the nunchuk, but I am unhappy about the calorie burned issues!

EA Sports Active 2 day 2

So.... today did not go so well with the new EA Sports Active 2. I wasn't allowed to do the next day of the 9 week challenge - you can't do the next workout on a previously-designated rest day. Suck. My schedule is so unpredictable, and on the previous games, I was always allowed to skip a rest day to keep on going. Not cool at all.

I did a trainer-generated full-body workout instead, and I got very frustrated. It felt like the leg sensor just wasn't working. I was doing "foot fires" and it didn't register a SINGLE move. It's like doing a squat and then running super-fast in place. Not one bleepin' motion registered. I yelled many obscenities at the tv today, I must admit. I had to skip a bunch of exercises and felt so frustrated by the end.

So I decided to try a 10 minute step aerobics workout. I love the step on the More Workouts game - been doing it a bunch - and usually I burn 160 calories in the 10 minutes on that previous game. The new game has a bunch more moves in the step workout, which is great! Also some boxing moves in there. Aaaaand... I burned only 105 calories in the 10 minutes. Why did I burn 1/3 less calories even though I was moving SO much more? I was watching the calorie count and it just crawled so slowly, it was ridiculous.

We'll see how tomorrow goes. I was definitely reminded today how much I hate the trainer's nagging when a motion doesn't register correctly - and also why I was just doing step and boxing at the end with the previous game. ;)

Total with the 2 workouts today:
33 minutes
254 calories
0.8 km
121 average heart rate
157 max heart rate

EA Sports Active 2 - New game!

SO EXCITED!! Thanks to the wonderful folks at EA, I received a copy of the new EA Sports Active 2 game yesterday! I've posted a lot in the past about their two previous games and have been very anxious to get into this new game.

Big changes with this one - first of all, it's available for all three platforms, not just the Wii. Each version has some differences, but for me, the Wii is still very convenient (and I liked that I could import my stats from the previous two games into here).

The biggest change of all - NO MORE NUNCHUK NEEDED!!! Seriously, I cannot express how much this improves the whole experience here. I was constantly smacking myself during many of the exercises on the previous games, because you needed to have motion sensors in each hand and the only option was to use the nunchuk. This time around, they've added a separate leg sensor (replacing the old nunchuk holder) and also a heart-rate monitor (replacing the need to hold a second sensor - the nunchuk - in your left hand). I'm excited about the heart rate monitor feature of course, but simply delighted to never need that darned nunchuk again for this game. ;)

I'll be posting about this more as I get into the game more, of course. Today I started the three week "Cardio Kick Start" but frankly, it was too beginner for me (even on medium intensity). It was only 15 minutes long, and I want to do more than that. So... time to switch challenges!

I started "The 9 Week Program" on medium intensity. Since I had just finished the other workout, I skipped the stretches and jumped right in. Tons of new exercises (and much prettier backgrounds too!), and overall much quicker loading. No longer do you need to press the "A" key twice between exercises, it just starts loading the next one when you finish the current one. Nice. Unfortunately, since you can go some time without touching the remote, you can get interrupted mid-exercise because the remote shuts off. DOH. So I try to remember to just grab the remote and press "A" between each exercise anyway. ;)

I'll try to review more of the individual exercises as I get a chance. Another big improvement here is the integration with the web - I can view a lot of my stats and goals and other details on their web site! Sweet! Nice graphs show me my calorie burn and heart rate from each individual exercise, too. Very nice.

Total with the 2 workouts today:

37 minutes

280 calories

4 km

111 average heart rate

162 max heart rate

I created a workout group on their community site if you'd like to join: group name "loseit" and password "weight"

Let me know what you think!

EA Sports Active More Workouts - trophies?

Do you play the EA Sports Active More Workouts game? If so, how are you doing on the trophies? I'm so excited that I've earned all but two of them - working out with a buddy and running all the trails. I can't figure out how to get that running all the trails though - I've done two of the six week challenges (on medium and then high intensity), but still this trophy eludes me.

Got back into the swing of things with a ~38 minute workout on it this morning - 10 minutes step A, cardio boxing, 10 minutes step B, cardio boxing again, then 10 minutes step C. Lovely start to my day. ;)

EA Sports Active Six Week Challenge - High intensity complete

Fun times - just finished my second EA Sports Active "More Workouts" six week challenge - this time on the high intensity setting! Whew. Each day I worked up quite a sweat doing this workout - but man, I also kept smacking myself repeatedly with the cord while doing the paddle surfing and some of the other activities. I cannot wait for the new version coming out later this year that won't require the nunchuk, so I will not hit myself.

I'm not planning on starting up another challenge right now - going to just do my own workouts with it for awhile. I like the step activity as well as the punching, so I'll stick with those. Also need to get into some other workouts too - time to throw in some DVDs every now and again.

Keep an eye out for a contest coming soon...

EA Sports Active Six Week Challenge complete

This morning I finished my "EA Sports Active More Workouts" Six Week Challenge on my Wii! I did it on the medium intensity and finished it in the six weeks.

Overall, I like this game but it definitely annoys me each day as well. ;) My enjoyment of the game has increased since turning off the trainer's prompts. ;)

I still get irritated when my moves don't register properly - the Squash game, for example, involves lunging to the left and right, and sometimes it just doesn't register my lunge - even though I'm totally lunging!

I wonder if EA has any "bigger" folks testing their games. Frankly, my thighs move and jiggle more than a skinny person's, and I think that throws things off for me with this game. The Squash game annoys me the most with this, because you have to start back at the slow speed when you miss a shot - and I'm doing the darn lunge, I didn't miss anything! - but it didn't register because my big ol' thigh is still moving.

For those of you who are not familiar with this game, it uses a strap around your thigh where you insert the Wii's nunchuk controller. The strap is neoprene and adjustable, which is handy. But the nunchuk is not wireless, so I am CONSTANTLY smacking myself with the cord when I'm using the regular controller and the nunchuk in my hands. There's a squat-then-reach-above-your-head exercise which should be renamed "smack-yourself-in-the-face-repeatedly".

There's a new version of this game coming out in the fall - "EA Sports Active 2" - which will be on the Wii and I think also the XBOX and PS3, but I'm a Wii girl all the way. This new game is going to be expensive - $100 - but will be wireless (yay!) and include a heart-rate monitor (which I'm pretty sure will only work in this game and not when doing other non-Wii things sadly). Should be interesting to see what the feedback is on this new one.

I'm also very curious about the new "Gold’s Gym Dance Workout" game for the Wii - I do love to dance, but I hated the "Just Dance" game - it was such a letdown and I didn't feel like I was doing much that was fun. Feh. I am so apprehensive of buying exercise video games because I *hated* that stupid Jillian Michaels game (bought it the day it came out - big mistake there!) and also didn't care for Your Shape or that Just Dance either.

Any video games getting you to move more these days?

EA Sports Active More Workouts revisited

Whew, I hadn't touched the EA Sports Active More Workouts Wii game in months (it politely did not tell me *exactly* how long though). Tonight I started a new 6 week challenge, so we'll see if I can actually finish it. ;) (I'll be out of town for four nights later this month, but that's no excuse to not finish this time.)

Anyway, I was quickly reminded of some things that annoy me about this game - the FIRST exercise (after the stretching) didn't work as expected. Squats with a knee raise, and it didn't register that I was doing the squat. After re-squatting a few times, it finally registered (and all the remaining squats were without incident). Doing the "Squash" mini-game left-handed was *completely* backwards for me - literally, lunging left when it said to lunge right. When I did was it said, it didn't register - but when I did the opposite, it registered. Blargh. I can't do this game when anyone is home, because I express my discontent with the game's recognition of my movements sometime.

I did work up a nice sweat though, so that's more than I did last week on an off night. ;) I do like the stretches at the end as well. Good (sweaty) times.

More on EA Sports Active More Workouts

A week ago, I got to try a preview of EA Sports Active More Workout (and you can read my initial reaction) at a mall demo, and this weekend I ended up with a copy of the game, courtesy of EA Sports for helping out with the 5k challenge online event last month. (Disclaimer: EA Sports didn't pay me for this review nor did they require I post about it.) So I cracked into it this morning and here's some additional feedback on it.

First, it imports your profile from the original EA Sports Active game, and I was surprised by the stats it showed me. In that original game, I completed 94 workouts for a total time of 19 hours and 47 minutes, burning a total of 12,900 calories. Pretty interesting! And it looks like it'll keep track of these stats in the new game as well, but separately. You can import from the old game again, it looks like, so you can update the stats if you go back to play the old game. You'd think this would be automatic, but ah well. ;)

Speaking of stats, I do like that this game seems to be more forthcoming with them. I had a big complaint with the original that I couldn't figure out how to go back and see how many calories I burned on previous days - it looks like they've fixed that in this game. And added some cute graphs to show you calories and minutes and such per day. Should be a nice added motivator. I am a fan of this "Weekly Fitness Tracker" feature! Another minor thing - you can now weigh yourself with the Wii Balance Board for the game (I prefer to just enter my true weight from my scale, but it's nice to have that option).

Onto the game! I only did one workout this morning - I wasted too much time setting up my character and poking around the new features (I still hate the face and hairstyle options, by the way, and don't get me started on the body shape one!). I jumped into one of the built-in workouts, "Island Cardio Blast (Low Impact)". It said it would be 24 minutes and I'd burn 172 calories. When I finished, it told me I spent 28 minutes and burned 188 calories.

This workout, like all of the built-in workouts, starts with a warm-up segment and ends with a cool-down stretching segment. I do appreciate that the clock and calorie counter keep running during these segments, which helps motivate you to actually do these segments instead of skipping them. ;)

The warm-up clearly was a good thing, as I heard many cracks and pops in my shoulders and knees! Apparently I'm getting old. ;) After the warm-up, jumped into a squat and reach combo exercise (which was fine), and then a balance board exercise with punching, kicking and kneeing - a better boxing-style exercise than in the original game. "Follow the Leader" followed that exercise, where I had to do what my trainer did, which were the same running exercises from the first game - run, high knees and kick-ups. I fail at kick-ups, by the way. ;) After that, more squats - this time with a knee raise after each one. Then another balance board game - water skiing, which was more squats and leaning (reminiscent of the roller skating event in the previous game). More squat and reach and the boxing event again. Then "Island Outrun", which has you light jogging until you come up to another runner, and then you need to sprint to pass them. A cute way to get in some intervals! Back to squats (with knee raise), and then another balance board game, paddle surfing. It basically alternated lunges (with your arms doing the paddling) with more squats. Not too bad. Then the water skiing event, follow the leader and squat to knee raises. And then the cool down segment. The stretches were nice - just wish I had more room to work out at home so I could've really stretched well!

I didn't set up a challenge yet (this game has a 6 week challenge instead of the 30 day challenge in the original) because the folks on twitter are starting it on the 20th.

I really, really miss the tennis and baseball events from the original game. Squash is part of the new one, so hopefully it will be good. I also enjoyed the basketball and tennis, and those are all gone too. This new one comes with four ab exercises, and more step aerobics too. All things to explore in the coming weeks! ;)

Overall... I'm intrigued. ;) The name and price I think are what threw me off at first. This isn't really a "more workouts" game - with that name, I compare it to the "Wii Fit Plus", which incorporates all the original exercises and adds new events too. And it's only $20. EA Sports Active More Workouts really should be called "EA Sports Active Personal Trainer 2010" - it's a new game, stand-alone, and you don't get to incorporate those past exercises. I don't like that it's so close to the cost of the original game, either - $40 compared to $60. The original comes with the resistance band and leg strap (which cost $20 to buy separately).

I'll post another update after I've played this game more - but so far, it's definitely intriguing - and of course it kicks my butt! My thighs are sore from the squats and I worked up quite a sweat!

EA Sports Active - More Workouts preview

I got to try out the new EA Sports Active "More Workouts" game yesterday - EA was doing a mall event that we stumbled upon, and I noticed that this game was pictures on the banners. It wasn't being demonstrated though, so I asked one of the guys working the booth if they had it so I could try it. It took awhile for him to find it - and he ended up ripping into a new sealed package to get the game out.

The package is a wider box, but it comes only with the game and some little pamphlet of some sort. No additional leg strap or plastic band or anything.

Anyway, he pops the game in and I started poking around. Now instead of a 30 day challenge, there's a 45 day version. And there are a bunch of new exercises - but sadly, all of your old favorites from the original game are *not* included here. This is a HUGE oversight that I'll talk about later on.

I noticed a variety of step aerobics exercises in here - a couple different 10 minute routines. I didn't get to try them out (they didn't have a balance board), but I like this idea. ;)

I did try several of the new exercises. I don't remember the exact titles, but I tried a new boxing one where you're working out with a trainer instead of just a punching bag. New to this game is a "hook" punch instead of just the straight-forward punches in the original. I liked having this variety. You also need to "duck" in this one too in order to avoid getting punched. ;) And yes, my arms are sore in a new place after trying this one out yesterday! Woo!

I also tried a water-skiing game, which seems a lot like the roller-blading-with-jumps from the original game - squat and jump! It was okay.

I did an obstacle course event as well, where you run a short distance and then do a mini-exercise, etc. Interesting. It seemed like a bunch of the mini-exercises were jumping-based, and I have to limit jumping around due to an ol' neck issue.

The last thing I tried was one of the abdominal exercises - it involved doing a crunch and then punching across your waist. I couldn't lay on the floor to do this, but it was interesting to see one of these new abs exercises.

So... when we left, I was thinking, "wow, I will totally pick this up!", but then I got home and checked out the price (the people at the booth didn't know the exact price or release date! I don't understand who they hire to work these things, but most of the staffers hadn't even tried out the game themselves and were watching me and commenting about it the whole time).... anyway, so the price. It's $40. And it doesn't give you access to the full set of exercises from the original game. So if you like those, you'll need to switch out games (and I don't know if they will talk to each other so my efforts in one game count for the goals in both). This is a huge flaw.

I picked up the Wii Fit Plus - and it's only $20 - and it does give me access to everything from the original.

I'm really torn here. I like some of those new exercises, but $40 to not be able to use 'em all, and the hassle of having to switch games all the time... I doubt I'll be racing out to buy this one when it comes out next week. Very sad. :(

Wii Fit Plus

You know me and my Wii games ;)  Tonight I picked up the brand new Wii Fit Plus game. It's an expansion of the original Wii Fit game that came out last year, using the fun Wii Balance Board.  It looks like the folks at Nintendo listened to all the feedback on the original game.

So, the handy thing is that it has all of the original games and exercises, and it imports all of your data from the original game.  Handy!  

Amongst the bonuses of this expansion:

-- a bunch more games, including some insane balance-oriented games that kicked my butt

-- a handful extra yoga and strength moves

-- the ability to string together a bunch of yoga and strength moves - you can tell it how much time you have and it will put a workout together for you, or you can build your own

-- along the workout route, there are also more built-in workouts, based on what your goals are - things like form or lifestyle.  Work on your arms, or your shoulders, or relax.  Interesting!

-- it counts calories!  A nice move here, but done a little oddly - you can set a calorie goal, but it's based on food.  So, burn off a cup of whole milk, or a bag of chips or a chocolate bar (with calories displayed).  I'd prefer to just say I'd like to burn 200 calories and not equate it with food.  Silly.

More feedback to come, but so far, it's *definitely* worth the $20 for the expansion!

Wii: EA Sports Active

I love my Wii, I really do. I ran out and bought Wii Fit the day it came out (and yes, I did go into work late that morning because I *had* to set it up and play it once first!). Wii Fit is a cute game, but it's more about the stretching and not enough about the cardio for me. It's got some strength building in there too, but after over a year of it, I've gotten tired of it.

I bought that Jillian Michaels' game for the Wii Balance Board the day it came out, too - and it was horrible. Awful. I was elated when someone agreed to swap for it on swaptree.com and finally got it out of my house. Ugh.

So when EA Sports announced their new Active game, I was a little hesitant until I saw the trailers online. Woo, adding a thigh strap to attach the nunchuk and also resistance bands? Cool. So again, bought it the day it came out (but this time I was sensible and waited until after work to set it up).

Overall, I really like the game. It's made up of a ton of segments, most about 1-3 minutes long. There's cardio segments, strength segments, upper body/lower body, etc. They've set up a "30 day challenge" that guides you through 20 days of pre-set exercises (with rest days built in every third day). You can choose easy, medium or hard intensity, and you can use the balance board some days if you'd like. You can completely do this game without it as well. The difference in the intensities seems to be the number of reps/laps that you have to do for each exercise.

I was really psyched about these 30 day challenges, because the ads made it sound like they were customized to you and would be all personal and stuff. Well, they're not. They're set up ahead of time, and they don't change based on how well or how poorly you do with a particular exercise. The good news is that at the beginning of a workout, it displays the exercises that you're going to do, and you can un-check any that you hate. I really can't do high-impact things, so I bail on a few of these (jump squats, fast kick-ups). It gives you the total time for the workout and an estimate of calories burned.

Speaking of calories, I do like that it shows you a running total of the calories you've burned during that workout. It does not appear to allow you to go back and see how many calories you've burned on previous days though, and that's an oversight. There's also no weight loss component here - even though you can use the balance board, the game asks you to enter in your weight manually (to do the calorie calculations).

The "trainer" that does each workout with you can get annoying, but luckily you can turn off that audio pretty easily (he/she does still introduce each exercise to you though). You can also customize the music that plays during the workout.

The resistence band that comes with the game is pretty light, and I wish they included a second heavier band with it. I have other bands, but none with handles, which really come in handy when trying to hold both the band and the Wiimote/nunchuk.

And that nunchuk... I need to get a wireless one. I am constantly smacking myself in the head/belly/thigh when using this game. Ow. I was causing serious pain when doing volleyball before I learned to wrap all of the excess cord into my hand before trying to bump. Ow again. This game is designed for right-handed folks, but you can do almost everything left-handed, even if your virtual you doesn't do it that way. I tend to switch hands while playing tennis and basketball to keep things interesting.

According to the game, I've burned over 10,000 calories while playing it. (You can earn trophies for various accomplishments, and that's the highest calorie trophy on there.) I wish it had a bit more trophies to help keep you motivated for longer. ;)

Overall, I recommend this game. It's got some faults, but every day, I can work up a sweat in the game. I'm near the end of my 3rd 30 day challenge (on hard this time) and I've got a bunch of custom workouts that I've saved as well. I look forward to the expansion game that's coming out this winter (and would love to beta test it if you're looking for help, EA!) :)

More on the Jillian game

So I played it again, this time not using the Balance Board. It sucked less this time - I wasn't thrown off as much by the game not responding to my movements on the Balance Board. However, this really defeats the purpose of the game to me - I wanted another fitness-oriented game that uses the board. It's still not accurate in its responses all of the time - in the game where you have to kick, I had to do it several times when kicking on the left side. Grrr.

Happy to see the Amazon reviews get more balanced, but disappointed that they apparently rejected my review (despite not mentioning this blog at all) - lame!

Jillian Michaels Fitness Ultimatum 2009

Jillian Michaels Fitness Ultimatum 2009

I've been looking forward to this game for awhile - even though I enjoy the concept of the Wii Fit, it frustrates me that I don't get to link their mini-games together. After every one, you go back out to the menu and have to choose another one. Fooey.

So I went out and bought this game the day it came out. I've played it awhile tonight and I'm pretty darned disappointed.

First, you set up your character - choosing a male or female, and then you can choose between two items for your shirts, pants and shoes - ooh. A few different colors, too. Very, very minimal customization here.

If you've got the Wii Balance Board, you can use it to enter your weight, and then use it for all the games too. Onto the games...

There are 11 games total, and you can link them together to do one right after the other (two minutes minimum on each) and also choose light, medium or hard intensity. The games are:

• Paint Grenade Toss: pick up paint grenades and throw them - basically, squat and then throw. Easy and very repetitive and dull.
• Cannon Attack: load cannon balls and aim and shoot the cannon. More squats and then lean to aim. Boring.
• Handcar pump: squat repeatedly and pump your arms up and down to move the handcar down the track. Yet more squats and you need to flick your wrists sharply to get it to register.
• Tire trail: run through a set of tires. Lean on the balance board and then flick your wrists to one side or the other. Not much of a workout, just flicking.
• Rowing: row a kayak by sitting on your balance board and moving the controllers to each side. Again, flicking is the key here. Painful because you keep hitting yourself with the cord between the controllers...
  
• Monkey bars: climb the monkey bars by leaning to the sides and putting your arms above your head and move them back and forth. Not too hard, but CONSTANTLY hitting your head with the cord between the controllers. Glargh.
• Log jump: jump from log to log by doing yet more squats
• Log walk: hold your arms out to the side (as much as the controller cord lets you) and balance while walking on a log. Dull.
• Boxing: need to jog essentially to "work up" to throwing a punch or kick as instructed. Really annoying because it did not register many of my kicks. Grrr.
• Punching bag dodge: run and then dodge as instructed. Again, didn't register most of my jogging or dodges, so this was a pain.
• Running: run, duh. But the character doesn't respond to the pace I was keeping, and sometimes it just plain didn't register.
  

Overall, I'm really disappointed - this had potential but the game just plain doesn't register everything you do and that's deeply annoying. I don't see myself playing this a lot, and that's extra disappointing because it was $40!

Wii fit fun

Bought the Wii Fit last week - today is day 8 with it. I love it! It's got four main components: aerobics, strength training, balance and yoga. The aerobics has things like step, hula hooping and boxing. Strength training includes push ups and other things. Balance has some wacky games where you tilt all over the place. Yoga is straight-forward and difficult.

It seems to be a bit off from my scale, but within a pound. I wish it didn't have such an emphasis on BMI & weight, but otherwise it's a blast. More to come...