Nintendo Wii Fit Plus Review: it it a Worthy Improvement Over the Original Wii Fit?
Just when you thought it might be time to finally get rid of that Wii Fit Balance Board that’s gathering dust in the bottom of your closet, Nintendo goes and releases a follow up to Wii Fit, the new Wii Fit Plus.
Now, before you get too excited, this isn’t a new-fangled fully-featured sequel. Wii Fit Plus simply takes what was great about the original Wii Fit, adds a few new bells and whistles, and delivers the consummate version of the workout software for your Nintendo Wii.
What’s the Same?
Wii Fit Plus contains everything you loved about the original Wii Fit. I’m not being figurative here, it literally contains the entirety of the original Wii Fit. All your favorite balance games, strength exercises, yoga poses, and aerobic activities are here.
You’ll also retain all the progress you’ve made so far. The game simply transfers your progress over from Wii Fit, allowing you to pick up right where you left off when you gave up on working out several months ago. Wii Fit Plus remembers every weigh in, your goals, even which Mii you are using. The transition is completely seamless.
What’s Different?
Wii Fit Plus adds some interesting new variations to the tried and true Wii Fit formula. No longer are you restricted to only working out alongside your adult friends. Wii Fit Plus allows you to create avatars and add your pets and children under the age of three into the mix. You can track the weight of both, but there are no BMI measurements or balance tests for either.
Weighing your pets may seem like an impossible proposition, but the Wii Fit Plus simply asks you to hold the companion animal in question and then subtracts your own weight form the total. The pet integration is kind of neat, as your dog or cat will show up to help out in certain balance games (like the Segway challenge) or as a face on a ball in the Table Tilt game. It just adds another layer of customization and makes the workout that much more personally interesting.
Check out page two for more on the new features in Wii Fit Plus, and our verdict on the game.
What’s New: Continued
The new balance games are the highlight of the game for me. Now you can steer a Segway by leaning, do addition by thrusting your hips, tilt balls into colored bins using your hands and weight to redirect platforms, do your best impression of a drum major, work on your golf swing, and more. In all, there are fifteen new balance games to choose from. Wii Fit Plus also adds three new yoga poses and three additional strength exercises, as well.
There are several new exercise routines to choose from, as well as the option to customize your workout to your liking. The full workouts are nice, but the customization is a bit frustrating at times. Why can’t I choose certain exercises for my routine when they’re present in the pre-set versions? It doesn’t make sense in a
game that makes so much of its customizability.
The game now delivers an estimate of how many calories you have burned with each activity, which is a welcome addition that honestly should have been in the original version. You can also now choose from various routines designed to target certain parts of the body.
Overall Rating (5 out of 5)
For those who already own Wii Fit and a Balance Board, this is practically a no-brainer. The major draw of the first game for me was the balance games, so the addition of 15 new activities for twenty bucks is far too awesome to pass up, especially when you consider you can trade in your old Wii Fit disk for a couple bucks as you’ll have no use for it at all.
For someone contemplating a new purchase, I whole-heartedly recommend picking up the Wii Fit Plus bundle over the original Wii Fit. The price difference is negligible and you are getting a much better experience for the money. Wii Fit Plus certainly isn’t a full-featured sequel, but at the low price, it’s definitely worth a pickup.
Another great feature? All your favorite Wii Fit accessories work just fine with Wii Fit Plus, as well.
