The RiverPlex Launches Exergaming Room for Kids Designed by Exergame Fitness USA

Peoria, Illinois
An all-new state of the art Exergame Fitness facility has now opened at the RiverPlex Recreation and Wellness Center in Peoria, Illinois complete with the world’s top tested and medically proven exergaming products. Kids, teens and adults from the Peoria area now have an exciting new exergaming room that delivers programs that combine fitness and gaming to achieve much needed results in their community.

TAKE A VIRTUAL TOUR OF THE ROOM!

RiverPlex General Manager, Matt Freeman said:“Our objective with the XR-Game Zone is to get kids up and moving in a fun, safe and positive environment. The exergaming products we have also give us the ability to offer our Senior Members a new exercise option that not only challenges their cardiovascular fitness, strength and balance, but eye/hand coordination and brain function. Our Senior Members appreciate the socialization the XR-Game Zone offers as well. We have implemented a clinical research study which is focused on weight loss for kids ages 8-17 years old.

Each child has been referred to the program by a physician. Parental participation in the program is mandatory in order to achieve a long term change in eating habits, behavior and physical activity. The program is run by Dr. Amy Christison who represents the University of Illinois College of Medicine.

OSF Saint Francis Medical Center’s Weight Loss Management Team will also run a family lifestyle change program using The LEARN Program for Weight Management. While families are enrolled in the program, the XR-Game Zone will be the home for the program where families can be active and have fun together. OSF will provide services from a licensed dietician, exercise specialist and social worker as part of the LEARN Program.



The Peoria Park District’s C.H.O.I.C.E.S. Youth Outreach Program will use the XR-Game Zone as an incentive tool to help them in their mission to help youth make positive decisions in life. We are confident that we will see some positive results in regards to behavioral change for some of our youth. The XR-Game Zone is a fantastic reward for us to offer students who show positive behavior and maintain good grades. The XR-Game Zone is an incredible resource for us to have access to says Supervisor of Youth Outreach and Founder of C.H.O.I.C.E.S., Carl Cannon.

The XR-Game Zone is an incredibly innovative addition to what we offer our members. Our target groups are pre-teen and teenage kids, but the studio offers enjoyment for everyone. We have schools, church groups and other organizations calling us daily to rent the XR-Game Zone. This has taken our lock-in and birthday party packages to a new level as well.



We are discovering new benefits of adding the XR-Game Zone everyday. Our personal training staff loves using the studio as a variation to how they train their clients. I cannot say enough how excited we are about the reaction by our Senior Members. The XR-Game Zone provides an incredible opportunity for socialization and competition that our Seniors enjoy very much.

The team at Exergame Fitness has been an incredible partner since we purchased our exergaming equipment. With their knowledge, generosity and motivation to help kids we are able to offer our members and community more than we ever imagined. Tommy, Ed, Curt and Dave have all worked with us directly after the purchase was made. They don’t just say they stand behind their products, they really deliver. Whenever we have questions about the products, programming or new games options they are a phone call or email away. The response we get is always immediate no matter the time of day or day of the week.



The team at Exergame Fitness has given us an incredible amount of publicity on their website and created new connections for us through their networks. They will be conducting exergame workshops in our studio which will create more networking opportunities for us as well as a great deal of internet coverage. The team at Exergame Fitness has been great and we are truly excited about our new partnership with them.”

The RiverPlex Recreation and Wellness Center is a joint project between the Peoria Park District and OSF Saint Francis Medical Center. It is an 118,000 square foot facility complete with a state of the art exergaming center, fitness center, indoor aquatic park, multipurpose arena, pro shop serving freezes and smoothies, activity room, classrooms and more.

Tommy Seilheimer VP of Exergame Fitness adds, “Our joint partnership with RiverPlex and OSF Saint Francis Medical Center is something that is going to help park districts, YMCA’s, JCC’s & Schools around the United States obtain grants, educational material on the exergaming industry and a qualified hands on approach to these amazing products that are getting health based results

Installed Products:
Skywall:
The Skywall is one of the most exciting climbing walls to come around into the Exergaming market. Complete with a 10 program course the wall will challenge you from easy beginner to advance rock climber. The Skywall is the world’s only motorized climbing wall!
The wall is loaded with must needed safety features, which allow the climber to never be far off the ground or never allow them to climb too high. It sets the center of your body in the sweet spot of the wall as you climb and grip the realistic wall pegs.

The wall will also tilt back and forth giving you a "realistic simulation of climbing". For beginners the wall can angle forward helping gravity assist so they can focus on getting used to the wall. For more experienced climbers the wall can tilt backwards making this wall transform into an interface they are used to in real life.

Exerbike:
The all-new USA made Exerbike provides a fun and enjoyable cardiovascular workout by allowing the user to control their favorite racing game played through a PlayStation2®. The faster you pedal—the faster you move. Steer through the course and race against others. Designed from the ground up and built to USA commercial specifications the Exerbike bike is built to last.The Exerbike has a creative new walk-thru design. To play, simply walk up to it, sit down & ride. The adjustable seat & adjustable handlebars allow the user to maximize their workout in either the upright or racing position. The Exerbike is equipped with Hoggan Health’s Magnetic resistance technology

Motivatrix:
The MX10 Workout Master mimics existing DDR systems in design, but it manages to feature a number of internal games inside to keep your workout sessions fresh. Additionally, the machine not only recognizes fancy footwork, but built-in sensors can understand arm flailing as well, and you can even "jam out to your own music" while breaking a sweat. Most interesting, however, is the fact that it’s also an internet-enabled machine, meaning that exercise freaks across the land can compete against one another, giving even the least motivated individuals something to work for. Motivatrix Exergaming uses your entire body as a joystick to play videogames such as "Dynamic Assault," "Dash," "Dart & Swim" and "Calorie Killer."

Here's how it works. The machine's pads have built-in sensors, which will read your footwork and also arm flailing while you're busy playing interesting action-orientated games. It also records your performance and it displays the number of burned calories. Done. The machine features plenty of games, exercising and music you can choose from. You can even listen to your own music on the MX10

Dance, Dance Revolution:
DDR is a popular video dance craze that has been documented as a welcome solution to youth obesity. Users stomp, slide, spin, and dance on our platforms to various dance programs while burning calories, earn points or following a workout mode. Your DDR System is a perfect solution for group settings - with 8 or more participants. Exergame Fitness offers the largest selection of quality commercial-grade DDR Platforms.

Xavix Game Suite:
XaviX is a revolutionary way to interact with your TV set. Do your favorite sports, do exercise with Jackie Chan, stay fit and manage your lifestyle. Games include: Bowling, Boxing, Baseball, Tennis and more! The Xavix system is a proven product that is simple to use and gets amazing fitness based results for kids to seniors. Game play is considered to be very addictive and promotes increased activity levels across the board.

Cybex Trazer:
Now there’s an exciting, new alternative for fitness enthusiasts of all ages and capabilities that dramatically improves muscle and mental agility while adding exciting new dimensions of fun and function to exercise: Cybex Trazer. Snap on the Beacon and you will experience unconstrained free movement similar to real life activities.

Cybex Trazer is a compelling fitness experience that tracks, measures and motivates with real-time interaction, feedback and positive reinforcement—unlike anything you can achieve.

The Cybex Trazer utilizes proprietary technologies to create a unique and exciting fitness experience that moves, measures and motivates you unlike anything available from conventional equipment today.

• Cardiovascular and aerobic endurance• Heightened Spatial Awareness• Improved Flexibility• Weight Management• Better Reaction Time• Increased Speed• Improved Power• Enhanced Balance• Improved Agility

Makoto Sports Arena:
The Makoto is a triangle, 8 feet from base to apex, with indestructible 6-ft. steel posts rising from each corner. Using your hands, feet, and/or staff, you respond to audio and visual prompts from each post. Your reaction time and accuracy (actually hitting the lighted area) are measured electronically, so you can compete with yourself or others. The speed of the prompts is easily adjusted for varying abilities.

Engaging, exciting, interactive, revolutionary – these are just a few of the words the media, experts, corporations and enthusiasts are using to describe a hot, new contender in the fitness and amusement industry.

Makoto is a challenging, comprehensive, and rewarding fitness and entertainment experience unlike any other. Makoto was developed to meet the need for a fun, hi-tech, and unique answer for today’s demanding applications."

You stand in the triangular arena, facing one of the three towers. The other two towers are at either side in your peripheral vision. You are in a competition of three against one! Each tower has ten targets, any one of these thirty targets could be the one to randomly activate.

You never know which one of the computerized opponents will draw your action!
The roar of a jet announces the start of your session. An explosion of lights and vibrant tones draws your attention to the active tower. As you turn toward its direction your eyes search for the location of the light on the tower. You quickly stretch to strike the target.

A second tone confirms that you scored a point. Another explosion of light and sound causes you to lunge across the arena bending to strike the lower target. As quickly as you strike one target another one activates. You are relentlessly drawn in to focusing continuously on finding and striking the targets to the exclusion of all other thoughts. Your total body moves, lunging, stretching, bending, twisting, burning calories rapidly. Until… you strike the final target and check your score.

About The RiverPlex Recreation and Wellness Center:
The RiverPlex Recreation and Wellness Center is a joint project between the Peoria Park District and OSF Saint Francis Medical Center. It is an 118,000 square foot facility complete with a state of the art exergaming center, fitness center, indoor aquatic park, multipurpose arena, pro shop serving freezes and smoothies, activity room, classrooms and more.

About Exergame Fitness:
Exergame Fitness – a Motion Fitness Company, is the world’s largest distributor & supplier of Exergaming, Exerlearning, Kids Fitness Products & Programming to YMCA’s, Schools, JCC’s. Park Districts, Health Clubs, Hospitals, Kid Zones, Family Entertainment Centers, Casinos, Government/VA and more.

Exergame Fitness provides Facility Planning & Installation, Grant & Funding Assistance, Program Design & Product Training, Turnkey Marketing Support, Free Layout Designs & Concepts, Detailed Programming Curriculums, Finance & Lease Options and more. Exergame Fitness offers the lowest prices on any of the products they carry backed by a 110% Lowest Price Guarantee.Distribution Opportunities:If interested in selling or representing the Exergame Fitness products or services please visit our website at http://www.exergamefitness.com/ or call 877.668.4664 for more information.
# # #
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Contact Person: Tommy Seilheimer
Company Name: Exergame Fitness
Telephone Number: (877) 668-4664 x1103
Fax Number: (847) 963-8966
Email Address: tommy@exergamefitness.com
Website Address: http://www.exergamefitness.com/

RiverPlex video games work more than just thumbs

PEORIA IL. USA—
Austin Schroderus spent Thursday morning playing a lively game of dodgeball with a handful of other children at the RiverPlex Recreation and Wellness Center.

"All you got to do is just make sure that little ball doesn't hit you," the 14-year-old Peorian said while waiting on the sidelines, "and if it does, then you got to get off the screen."
Screen? What screen?

Instead of ducking rubber balls hurled in a gymnasium, Schroderus enjoyed the venerable schoolyard game by dancing along a lit, interactive floor and avoiding a red orb as it slithered across the ground. The video game, called Lightspace Play, was one of several the RiverPlex is hoping will get sedentary kids moving.

The fitness center is betting that activities inspired by video games - known as exergames - are one way to get kids healthy, by offering them an arcade-like atmosphere without the snack bar. The room, which opens to RiverPlex patrons today, uses muscle-power instead of joysticks to earn points and burn calories.

"This is an opportunity to help children be excited about being healthy," said Chief Operating Officer Sue Wozniak at OSF Saint Francis Medical Center, which partnered with the RiverPlex in creating the room. "It's not just an arcade."

One game requires players to pedal and steer a stationary bike while their video-game persona plows a motocross bike through a dirt course. In others, participants don boxing gloves for virtual bouts or swing toy baseball bats at digital pitches.

Matt Freeman, general manager at the RiverPlex, said the exergame room cost $100,000 and the facility plans on renting it out occasionally for private parties or events. Freeman said organizers eventually want to involve parents in the fun.

Ed Kasanders, president of the Palatine-based company, Motion Fitness, which sold the equipment to the RiverPlex, said the market for exergames has soared over the past several years. His business use to deal with all types of exercise equipment but switched about four years ago solely to exergames.

"We can't get away from kids wanting to play games and from technology," Kasanders said. "What we are doing is we are actively making them play in a fun, exciting, engaging environment."

Medical studies, however, remained mixed on the benefits reaped from exergames. Most maintain more traditional sports and forms of exercise are still the gold standard for physical activity but find exergames to be a good workout and source of entertainment.

"It's certainly better than sitting behind a chair in front of a computer screen," said Blair Gorsuch, director of the cardiac rehabilitation program at Proctor Hospital. "Anything to get the kids up and moving, I'm all for it."

The real problem, Kasanders said, is keeping the games fresh and entertaining in a world where children are bombarded with new games, distractions and gadgets.

But spending time with his friends in the exergame room, Andrell Taylor said for the time being he would rather be on a robotic climbing wall than on the basketball court.

"I'd rather be here," Taylor, 11, of Peoria said, "because it's fun, and I like playing video games, too."

WMBD/WYZZ TV - PEORIA -- A new fitness program combines video games with exercise.

Video Games and Fitness

Reported by: Angelica Alvarez, WMBD/WYZZ TV

Thursday, Nov 13, 2008 @11:34am CST

WMBD/WYZZ TV - PEORIA -- A new fitness program combines video games with exercise.

Riverplex in Peoria introduces Exergaming, a program to get the unmotivated, motivated. Exergame Fitness uses interactive games to keep kids moving. Organizers say with the alarming rise in childhood obesity, it was imperative to find a way to pair the popularity of technology with health. Kids are so wrapped up in the game, they don't even realize they're improving their health. Exergame Fitness is the worlds largest provider for Exergaming, Exerlearning (Brain Fitness) and medically driven programming. 

Carl Cannon with CHOICES and the Park District, says, "The only exergaming room of its type in the nation, and it played in Peoria first. So if I had advice for parents this Christmas, tell them to get rid of those things you do with your hands and have them start using their legs, their hearts and their minds.

Sixth grader, Timesha Bailey, was one of the first students who got to try to program and when asked what she'll tell her classmates about it, she says, "You all need to come next time, it is so much fun! You're really in the game, fighting people, it's so fun!"

Organizers say Exergaming isn't just a great way to get in shape, but the games also improve hand-eye coordination and engages the mind and body together in active problem solving. 

Kids from the CHOICES program are among the first to be able to use the Exergaming program.

Headed for danger: Schools must help to reverse rise in diabetes, doctors say

KALAMAZOO -- It's very difficult to help a 50-year-old diabetic who needs to overcome a lifetime of bad eating and exercise habits.

Jennifer Harnish Kalamazoo GazetteStudents at Portage Central Middle School use exergaming as an alternative in gym class about twice a month. The games include Dance Dance Revolution, Wii, and Exerbikes.

A Palatine, Illinois company called Exergame Fitness is largest Exergaming product supplier and programmer of kids interactive fitness equipment in the world. They have outfitted over 500 YMCA's and hundreds of Schools with budget saving products that help fight the growing epidemic of childhood obesity.

To slow the rise in diabetes or to reverse the trend, it will be necessary to start educating people when they are much, much younger. And it will require inundating them with health information at the place where they spend the most time: school.

So argues Dr. Lee Bricker in an upcoming article on diabetes and adolescents for the medical journal State of the Art Reviews: Adolescent Medicine. Bricker co-wrote the article with Dr. Donald Greydanus, a fellow professor at Michigan State University/Kalamazoo Center for Medical Studies.

"We need to hit these kids in grade school and junior high school," said Bricker, an endocrinologist and head of the KCMS Adult Endocrine and Diabetes Clinics.
"We see all these football-shaped kids," he said. "We need to get them back into gym class, get the candy bars out of the vending machines and hit this as a major health effort."

The National Diabetes Education Program estimates that about 3,700 new cases of Type 2 diabetes are diagnosed each year among young people under age 20. With Type 2 diabetes, which can be caused by excess weight, the body develops a resistance to insulin and does not use insulin properly. As the need for insulin increases, the pancreas loses its ability to produce enough insulin to regulate blood sugar.

Some small-scale studies have indicated that Type 2 diabetes is on the rise in the under-20 age group, but there are no hard data on the trend, said Karen Hunter, a media specialist with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

But the big fear among health officials is that the kids and teens who are overweight now will end up as adults with diabetes. Between 16 and 17 percent of children between the ages of 2 and 19 are overweight -- about double the number of 20 years ago, according to recent national estimates from the National Diabetes Education Program.

"You have to break the cycle somewhere. We can do it by hitting it hard in schools," Bricker said. "It needs to be right up there with other public health issues like sex education.
"It is a part of healthy living."

Shannon Carney Oleksyk agrees. Oleksyk is a childhood overweight prevention specialist with the Michigan Department of Community Health. She helps oversee the Healthy Schools Action Tool, an interactive online method, established in 2003, to encourage schools to promote healthy choices in their curriculum and environment.

"Children spend a majority of their waking hours at school," Oleksyk said. "Schools can play an integral part in providing a healthy environment for students."

It doesn't take much to change the environment at a school, she said. It simply requires "a dedicated champion" who is passionate about health and helps the schools to prioritize healthy changes, she said.

The need is obvious, Oleksyk said. One in four adolescents is overweight, and 70 to 80 percent of overweight children become obese adults, she said. Michigan has the 11th-highest obesity rate in the country.

To address the problem, schools need to move beyond simple awareness of health issues to offering sustainable philosophical changes, she said. For example, a school that sponsors a health fair brings people to one level of understanding, but a school that develops a school food policy that includes healthy options in the cafeteria, bans teachers from using food to reward children and strictly controls what is sold in vending machines makes a fundamental shift in the school environment and the thinking of the staff and students.

Saugatuck Public Schools has made that shift over the past five years, with Karen Steiger guiding efforts as the coordinator of health services. Among the district's efforts to create healthier communities: opening the high school gym for community use on Sundays and using a grant to give elementary-school children a daily snack of a fruit or vegetable.

It is not always easy to implement change, Steiger said, but if a district or a school can form a dedicated team, it makes the process a lot smoother. "We couldn't do this without the support of the district team, the parents and the staff," she said. "We really are doing it all for the kids. We want our kids to be healthy."

Posted by Linda S. Mah Kalamazoo Gazette November 04, 2008 08:00AM

Video Games That Keep Kids Fit

Gym teachers and video games have never been a happy mix. While one side struggles to pull kids off the couch, the other holds them fast. But Kim Mason, a phys-ed director in Rogers, Ark., with 28 years of experience selling kids on the virtues of sweat, did something unlikely last year: she persuaded her public-school district to invest $35,000 in brand-new video-game equipment.

That would be more surprising if students in Rogers were the only ones plugging into interactive workouts, but they're not. Some 2,000 schools in at least 35 states have begun to set up exergaming fitness centers with motion sensors and touch-sensitive floor mats to allow kids to control the action onscreen not just with their thumbs but also with their bodies. Do enough dancing or kung-fu kicks, and you just might get the same level of exercise as from chasing a soccer ball. What's more, this is a workout kids don't try to duck. "Physical education used to be a joke," says Dr. John Ratey, an associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and author of Spark, an upcoming book about exercise. "That has changed simply because we are catching up with the gamer generation."

Finding a way to help this most sedentary age group is more important than ever. Nearly 17% of U.S. kids are considered overweight or obese, and many more are struggling. Meanwhile, as scale numbers are climbing, school budgets for P.E. are falling. As a result, fewer than 10% of elementary schools meet the National Association for Sport and Physical Education's standard of students spending 150 minutes a week in gym class.

The high-tech answer to the problem came two years ago when West Virginia University studied the health effects of an exergaming system called Dance Dance Revolution (DDR)--interactive games that instruct kids to use their feet to tap buttons on a sensor mat. After a pilot program found the games were beneficial, the state vowed to install consoles in all its public schools by next year. (It didn't hurt the study's credibility that it was funded in part by an insurance company, not by the gamemaker.) Since then, other districts have climbed aboard, helped by video-game makers like Nintendo and Sony, which are designing systems to meet the demand; small companies like Expresso Fitness that donate equipment; and federal grants and private donations that bankroll the purchase of equipment. "The old system is failing kids," says Phil Lawler, director of training and outreach at PE4life, a nonprofit based in Kansas City, Mo., that helps modernize P.E. "We are tricking them into exercising."

A gaming system, which can cost up to $4,000 a pop, is more expensive than, say, a kickball, but the fact is, it may work just as well. In January the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., found that obese kids burned six times as many calories playing DDR as they did with a traditional video game. And in July the wonderfully named Alasdair Thin, a researcher of human physiology at Heroit-Watt University in Edinburgh, Scotland, found that college students burned twice as many calories playing an active video game in which they dodged and kicked for 30 minutes as they did walking on a treadmill. Studies have not yet shown how the new games measure up against a real session of, say, soccer or wind sprints.

Of course, since a child told to hustle around a track pretty much has to do it, critics argue that there's no need for video games in gym classes even if they do have some health benefits. But there's a physical difference between an hour of exercise enthusiastically pursued and one that's merely plodded through. And, Lawler says, "most kids aren't volunteering to do pull-ups after school." Develop a taste for aerobic video games, however, and you just might carry the habit home.

But can anything hold the fruit-fly attention span of kids? "Video games are not the answer," says Warren Gendel, founder of Fitwize 4 Kids, a chain of traditional children's gyms. "Kids will get bored and be back on the couch." Maybe, but that won't stop the games from coming. Fisher-Price just began selling a video-game bike for toddlers. No word yet on a version for the prewalking crowd--but don't bet against it.

Meet the inventor of "Donkey Kong." And "Mario." His hot new game: "Wii Fit."

Shigeru Miyamoto turned us all into button-mashing couch potatoes with "Donkey Kong" and "Mario." His latest creation aims to get us fit.

"Wii Fit," Miyamoto says, is more than a game. It could lead to a healthier, more active lifestyle.

Shigeru Miyamoto doesn't just work for Nintendo, one of the world's leading game makers. He is Nintendo.

The most successful game designer in the world, Miyamoto is responsible for blockbuster series like "Zelda," "Donkey Kong" and "Mario." More recently, he helped create the Wii, the sought-after game console in which players use their bodies to mimic onscreen action. His latest creation, "Wii Fit" ($89.99), out now, is a physical fitness game with nearly 40 activities, such as yoga poses, ski jumping and snowboarding. The game, which includes a scale/balance-board device, is part of a growing trend dubbed "exergaming."

While excessive weight remains a problem in America, Miyamoto says he didn't create "Wii Fit" to fight obesity: "My thinking behind it was, if weighing yourself every day and seeing the changes helps you become more aware of your body, your balance and your BMI [body mass index], that is not only going to lead people to new discoveries about themselves, it's also going to help them make better decisions about their health."

Miyamoto, 55, admits he has grown more concerned about his own health since experiencing back pain a few years ago. After noticing he had put on a few pounds, he started swimming and frequenting the gym. He says he also uses "Wii Fit" regularly. As of April, his BMI was a healthy 23.

Miyamoto lives in Japan, about a mile and a half from the Nintendo headquarters. He used to ride his bicycle to work. "Nintendo asked me not to do it," he told us, through a translator. "They thought it was too dangerous."

For someone of his fame in the digital generation (he was the first to be inducted into the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences' Hall of Fame), Miyamoto's childhood was exceptionally low-tech. He grew up in the countryside near Kyoto, in the central part of the island of Honshu. "I was always surrounded by nature as a boy," he says. "It was very peaceful." When he wasn't exploring the nearby creeks and hidden caves that inspired "Zelda" and "Mario," Miyamoto liked to draw and stage puppet shows. "Monster movies were big in those days, so many of my puppets were monsters," he says, laughing. "I seemed to make a lot of dogs, too, for some reason."

In college, Miyamoto studied industrial design and mechanical engineering. After a series of odd jobs, including playing the guitar in a bluegrass band ("which is not," he says, "a terribly popular brand of music in Japan"), he was hired by Nintendo in 1977.

At the time, Nintendo was looking for new ventures and badly overestimated the appeal of a coin-operated arcade game machine called Radarscope. The company wound up with a warehouse full of them in Redmond, Wash. "For some reason, I was assigned the task of figuring out what to do with the machines," Miyamoto recalls. He came up with a simple game featuring a character scaling a set of girders while avoiding barrels tossed by an oversize ape. That game, of course, was "Donkey Kong," and by 1982 its hero, Jumpman (later rechristened "Mario" in honor of the warehouse's portly manager), would appear on everything from cereal boxes to neck ties.

A quarter century later, Miyamoto is sometimes referred to as the video-game-world equivalent of Walt Disney. His star is on the Walk of Game in San Francisco, and last year "Time" named him one of the 100 Most Influential People. Asked if he's ever received poor service at a restaurant and said, "Don't you know who I am?" Miyamoto shakes his head and laughs like a giddy schoolboy. "No, I've never done anything like that," he says, his eyes crinkling at the corners. "While I hope that my products stand out, I personally try to blend in as much as possible."

---

The Miyamoto Timeline

He may not be a household name, but this vidgame titan was behind some of the biggest cultural phenomenons of the last 25 years.

1982: "Donkey Kong"
1983: "Mario Bros."
1987: "The Legend of Zelda"
1996: "Super Mario 64"
2001: "Pikmin"
2006: The Wii

Chicagoland based company Exergame Fitness is bringing their “FREE Exergaming Education Workshop” to Fishers, Indiana on Thursday August 14th 2008 at

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

PRLog (Press Release) – Jun 26, 2008 – Chicagoland based company Exergame Fitness is bringing their “FREE Exergaming Education Workshop” to Fishers, Indiana on Thursday August 14th 2008 at Xtreme Fun & Fitness.

This FREE Exergaming Education Workshop is specifically targeted towards YMCA’s, JCC’s, Schools, Hospitals, Park Districts and Health Clubs around the Central and Eastern United States designed to provide “Fun, Realistic & Proven Solutions that battle Childhood Obesity”

This August the workshop will be held at Xtreme Fun and Fitness in Fishers, Indiana (XFF). XFF is owned and operated by CEO Judi Cooper and is currently Indiana’s premier Exergame facility which captures a true Exergaming experience complete with programming, design and a great marketing program designed to increase business and memberships.

Judi approached Motion Fitness with a lifelong goal of opening up a kids health, wellness & Exergaming center and brought in products that she believed would help her reach her vision and budget. With much success she has been successfully up and running, been on local news outlets and is turning Indiana’s kids into “Exer-gamers”!

We asked Judi about the success of her club & she adds:

“I can’t tell you enough how rewarding it feels to see inactive/overweight kids come into the facility, and watch them have a blast working out with continuous sweat pouring off their bodies. When it comes time to leaving, the parents have such a difficult time getting the kids to leave. Then to see them return the next day with a grin from ear to ear saying “we’re back” is very rewarding personally & professionally. Finally there is a concept that works and gets results concerning kid’s health.

When I first decided to open up this type of a facility I researched the different products and pricing for several weeks. I chose to partner with Motion Fitness for several reasons. They were very accessible and I was able to drive up for a day and try everything out first hand at their Exergaming facility in Palatine, Illinois. Since they are inside of a YMCA I really got too see the kids using the products which was fun. We also went over my business plan in detail. That really gave me a focused plan on how to make a successful decision based on my ideas and programming.

As hard as I tried to find an overall lower price on the pieces I wasn’t able to. They truly offer the best prices in the market and great post-sale services and programming. In the end, they gave me more than just a price; it was a personalized service that really focused on the success of my Exergaming club. That was a big reason why I decided to go with Motion Fitness.

After a meeting with them they provided me with a quote and layout for my facility. Then I was all set to open my new location. Our working relationship quickly became more of a partnership. I was new to the Exergaming industry and they shared a lot of marketing ideas with me, knowledge, training…really offered their support and help in any way I needed it in order to see me succeed. They have been absolutely wonderful to work with.
Exergaming is a fairly new concept that I know will really take off as we spread the word and get more people involved with Exergaming. My club has been picking up in business each month as the word gets out. Some have a fairly good idea of what it’s all about, but it really hits home with them once they come in and try out the gaming pieces. I hear “WOW, this place is awesome…what a great concept. You will do very well here and you should consider turning this into a franchise.”

I believe we have an opportunity to make a positive difference in those that will be our future leaders, so we need to step up to the plate and make a commitment to work with kids/youth in lowering the obesity rate, which will in turn lower our healthcare cost.”

Motion Fitness is the world’s largest distributor & supplier of Exergaming fitness products including having over 6 International Distributors who are gaining momentum. Motion Fitness regularly holds Exergaming Education Workshops at their Palatine, Illinois headquarters located inside the Buehler YMCA which houses over 18,000+ members. Motion Fitness displays the industries top Exergaming products inside of the YMCA that can be used by any workshop attendees. Using the YMCA as their testing and research facility Motion can test new products, hold Exergaming workshops and give live demonstrations of the industry’s up and coming Exergaming products.

Ed Kasanders, CEO of Motion Fitness added:

“Our Exergaming Education Workshops offer an ideal showcase for participants because they offer hands on experience by using the industry leading products that battle obesity.

Computer based games have proven to be successful in many applications. Simply put, kids want to be entertained; they love playing games and in general do not like traditional exercise.
Our workshops have been well attended in the past and we look forward to bringing more people from the central and eastern region to this workshop to learn about this great tool to battle obesity.”


Exergaming Education Workshop Includes:
Grant & Funding Assistance
Hands-On Product Training & Testing
Health and Benefits Training
Program Curriculums for Kids, Teens, Adults. Special Needs and Seniors
Exergame Marketing Ideas and Support
Finance & Leasing Information
Return on Investment

Guest Speakers Attending:
Ed Kasanders – Motion Fitness
Gus Condezo – New Vision Leasing
Marian Shaw – Makoto USA
Gary Florindo – Lightspace
Carlos Aviles – Skywall
Phil Lawler – PE4Life

Products You Can Test!:
Lightspace Play
Exerbike
Hoggan Sprint Circuit
Dance Dance Revolution
Dancetown DDR
Cybex Trazer
Makoto Sports Arena
Xavix
Sportwall

Guest Hotel Information:
Residence Inn
9765 Crosspoint Blvd
Fishers, IN. 46038
Phone: 317-842-1111
Discounted Rate of $119 plus tax

To register for this FREE workshop, please visit the Exergaming Education Registration Page here or call 847.963.8969 x1103

Exergame Fitness is the world’s largest distributor & supplier of Exergame fitness products to YMCA’s, Schools, JCC’s, Park Districts, Health Clubs, Hospitals, Kid Zones, Family Entertainment Centers, Casinos, Government/VA and more. Exergame Fitness provides Facility Planning & Installation, Grant & Funding Assistance, Program Design & Product Training, Turnkey Marketing Support, Free Layout Designs & Concepts, Detailed Programming Curriculums, Finance & Lease Options and more. Exergame Fitness offers the lowest prices on any of the products they carry backed by a 110% Lowest Price Guarantee.

# # #

Games People (and Researchers) Play in Pursuit of Health

"Health is worth more than learning."

-Thomas Jefferson in a letter to cousin John Garland Jefferson, June 11, 1790

A strong argument could be made that health and learning are dependent on each other. Jefferson, in the letter cited above, was urging his cousin to set aside time every afternoon for exercise and recreation, arguing that such pursuits are vital to a person's overall well-being.

When you throw a third element into the equation -- fun -- another strong argument could be made that health and learning are enhanced.

"I'm a very strong believer that learning is fun," said Debra Lieberman, the "modern mother" of using interactive games to improve health.

"So much of getting and staying healthy involves learning; it's a very logical step to connect the two. And if you can make that connection fun and make it something people want to do, you're more likely to achieve your goals in both areas," Lieberman said.

Health researchers and gamers all over the country are moving toward their goals with a little more spring in their step this month after receiving money in the first round of grants from the national Health Games Research program directed by Lieberman.

"There's no doubt that well-designed interactive games can significantly improve players' health-related knowledge and outcomes," Lieberman said, adding, "Now we're trying to figure out how best to use the games we already have and how to design new ones with specific health goals in mind."

Dozen Grantees From 112 Applications

Health Games Research, based at the University of California-Santa Barbara, received 112 applications for grants involving games and health. A dozen winners were picked to receive up to $200,000 each in the program's first wave of research grants. A total of $2 million was awarded.

Health Games research is funded by an $8.25 million grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's Pioneer Portfolio, which supports innovative projects seeking breakthrough improvements in health care. Lieberman, widely acknowledged as a pioneer in the gaming-for-health field, is a lecturer in UC-Santa Barbara's Department of Communication and a researcher in the university's Institute for Social, Behavioral and Economic Research.

"The 12 new studies will give us deeper insights into how and why certain game designs are compelling, fun and effective, and for which types of people," Lieberman said.

"These projects -- and they're pretty diverse in both intent and audience -- will give us a good, broad spectrum of principles that game designers will be able to use to enhance the effectiveness of future health games and game technologies," Lieberman said.

'Wii-habilitation'

"I guess Wii-habilitation is as good a way as any to get across the idea," said Stacy Fritz, director of a project using Wii games with stroke victims at the University of South Carolina Research Foundation.

One of the 12 grantees, Fritz's study will compare the effects of two video game systems -- Wii and Playstation 2's EyeToy -- on players' mobility, balance and fear of falling.

"My interest is in people suffering [from] chronic problems from stroke-related injuries. I'm not a gamer by any means," Fritz said, "but I have to admit, I'm getting hooked. These things can be addictive ... and I mean that in a good way."

Ann Maloney, a child psychiatry researcher at Maine Medical Center Research Institute, is working on her fifth grant-aided study involving games and their health benefits for kids.

Her project will use Dance Dance Revolution, a popular dance game, to explore the effects of family-based "exergaming" on overweight children.

"Dance Dance Revolution is good for a variety of reasons," Maloney said, adding, "It's easy for a lot of kids, even uncoordinated ones; there's a wide range of songs and a wide range of speeds and ability levels."

"Since this is a family-based project trying to get parents and siblings involved, it's important to have a variety of styles of music. Parents can dance to Lawrence Welk and kids can dance to rap," Maloney said.

Patrícia da Cunha Belchior at the University of Florida in Gainesville will explore the use of action video games to improve everyday cognitive function in seniors. Her game of choice is Playstation 2's driving game Crazy Taxi.

"Interactive technology has the potential to promote health in a variety of ways," Belchior said, adding, "At the University of Florida, we conduct research on the use of interactive technology by older adults, and we have found that interactive technology has the potential to promote independence and quality of life in later years."

The 12 Winners

* Cornell University, Department of Communication (Ithaca, N.Y.) --Mindless Eating Challenge is a mobile phone game for younger adolescents that rewards good health habits and food choices.

* Indiana University, School of Health, Physical Education and Recreation (Bloomington) -- BloomingLife: The Skeleton Chase is an alternative reality game designed to promote physical activity and healthy lifestyles among college freshmen. It involves an interactive, fictional story (a mystery that takes eight weeks to solve) unfolding across a variety of media (e-mail, Web sites, phone calls from fictional characters, physiological monitoring).

* Maine Medical Center (Portland) -- Family-Based Exergaming with Dance Dance Revolution will identify impacts of the popular dance pad game on families with at least one overweight child, age nine to 17.

* Union College, Department of Psychology (Schenectady, N.Y.) -- Seniors Cyber-Cycling With a Virtual Team: Effects on Exercise Behavior, Neuropsychological Function and Physiological Outcomes is a randomized, clinical trial designed to identify individual and situational factors that influence exercise behaviors and health outcomes in community-dwelling older adults, age 50 and older.

* University of California-San Diego, School of Medicine (La Jolla) -- Behavioral Choice Theory Approach to Testing Exertainment for Adolescent Physical Activity will identify health behavior change principles used in a variety of commercially available exergames and their impact on players' physical activity levels.

* University of Central Florida, College of Medicine (Orlando) -- Practicing Relapse Prevention in Artificial-Reality Environments (PREPARE): A Game-Based Therapy Maintenance Tool will investigate role-playing games designed to enable people age 18 to 65 diagnosed with alcohol abuse or dependence to practice skills that can help them prevent real-world relapses.

* University of Florida, College of Public Health and Health Professions (Gainesville) -- Action Video Games to Improve Everyday Cognitive Function in Older Adults will explore the effects of an action-adventure driving video game (Playstation 2's "Crazy Taxi") on the visual attention skills of a group of community-dwelling adults, age 65 and older.

* University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, School of Public Health (Chapel Hill) -- Presence: Predicting Sensory and Control Effects of Console Video Games in Young Adults will investigate motivations to expend energy during video game play for people age 18 to 35.

* University of South Carolina Research Foundation (Columbia) -- Commercially Available Interactive Video Games for Individuals With Chronic Mobility and Balance Deficits Post-Stroke will investigate the potential of physical activity video games to serve as innovative, cost-effective ways to help people recover motor skills after experiencing a stroke.

* University of Southern California, School of Cinematic Arts (Los Angeles) -- Effectiveness of Social Mobile Networked Games in Promoting Active Lifestyles for Wellness will use cell phones and the Web to deliver "Wellness Partners," a character-driven social mobile networked game, to children and adults age 12 to 44.

* University of Vermont, School of Medicine (Burlington) -- Breath Biofeedback Video Game for Children With Cystic Fibrosis will explore whether a breath biofeedback video game can improve cystic fibrosis patients' self-administration of inhaled medicines, engagement in respiratory exercises and awareness of their respiratory status.

* University of Washington, School of Medicine (Seattle) -- Video Games for Dietary Behavior Change and Improved Glycemic Control in Diabetes will investigate health impacts of online mobile mini-games for people with type 2 diabetes, age 18 and older.

MORE ON THE WEB

• Health Game Research
• Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
• "Foundation Offers $2M To Study Video Games' Effect on Health Care," iHealthBeat, 5/30

Exergaming: Fun and games for your health

If you think video games are just for fun, some folks beg to differ: more than 300 of them, to be exact, who gathered in Baltimore recently for the 2008 Games for Health conference. Sponsored in part by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the conference explored how cutting-edge video-game technology can be applied to health and health care. This can range from “exergaming,” or video games used for exercise (think Dance Dance Revolution or Nintendo Wii’s version of tennis), to games used to reduce stress or pain, aid in rehabilitation, or cut the risk of getting sexually transmitted diseases.

Among the most exciting advances are those that have the potential to help people with serious medical conditions. A few examples we heard about in a teleconference our reporter attended last week and in an accompanying press release:

• Guitar Hero for amputees. A new, one-armed version of the popular video game, unveiled in prototype form at the conference, is designed to aid in the rehabilitation of people who’ve had an arm amputated.
• Wii for Parkinson's. A specially designed version of the Wii—called PDWii, for Parkinson’s Disease, and currently under development in California—would be used to aid balance and mobility and help track progress in Parkinson's patients. Similar technology could also help people recovering from strokes.
• Ditto for young burn victims. A virtual-reality device designed to control pain and stress among young patients undergoing burn and orthopedic procedures.

For more on the burgeoning applications of video games in the health arena, check out the web site of the Games for Health Project, www.gamesforhealth.org. And stay tuned for our evaluation of the much-anticipated Wii Fit, which is to debut in the United States May 19.

—Jamie Hirsh, associate editor

Exergames Gain Momentum!

As seen on: Be Fit With Biray
Original Article Here: http://befitwithbiray.com/2008/06/06/exergames-gain-momentum/

The field of exergaming and ‘games for health’ continue to grow. The momentum is strong and the scientists, programmers and health/fitness professionals have been rapidly pushing its research, development, and application. I’ve been following and even participating in some of these discussions, and I thought I’d share some highlights from the past few weeks!

Last month’s Games For Health Conference brought interesting topics to the table in the area of exergaming. Although I was unable to attend the conference this year, most of the powerpoint presentations have been made available on SlideShare for viewing. Check out the Inland Empire Health Plan (IEHP) presentation which discusses how exergames and healthcare combine (they have been working together with Ernie Medina, Jr and XRTainment Zone). Another interesting note: Hope Lab’s motto “Lead with Fun, Health Will Follow” seems to be the attitude to have when developing games. Check out their presentation which also features the results of their mega-gaming contest Ruckus Nation. Also, although we hear about kids being the focus of most exergamming programs, DanceTown has designed an interesting game for ‘Gray Gamers’ (elder population). This is just the tip of the iceberg, 33+ other slideshows from the conference that have also been uploaded.

I also had a chance last month to meet with exergame physiologist Alasdair Thin, PhD. All the way from Scotland, his 3-week American tour included the Games For Health Conference in Baltimore and visits with fellow exergamers across the nation, with stops into Florida, California, and Canada. I was delighted to host the Phoenix leg of his trip. We spent the day talking about the G4H conference (check out his presentation on Designing Body-Movement Controlled Video Games to Maximize Energy Expenditure) and discussing various topics in gaming, technology, health education/promotion. (Our conversations were also inspired by the 2-hour hike up Squaw Peak Mountain - breathtaking!) Alasdair’s visit coincided with the US launch of the Wii-Fit (which was launched in the UK months earlier, so he already had one). One key question he left me with to ponder: “What makes a perfect exergame?”

I connected with the world’s first Exergaming Personal Trainer! Luke Pyper (from the UK) actually trains clients from their homes using various exergames! He has a group on Facebook “Keeping Fit with Video Game Consoles” and also writes various articles for GamePeople where he tackles various games and does exhaustive reviews of them - check out his verdict on Dance Dance Revolution.

And fellow group fitness instructor/trainer Raina Casarez (aka Penda), the Goddess of Virtual Fitness, launched a “Let’s Get Moving Community Fitness Day” in Atlanta located at ‘Welcome All Park & Facilities’. Group exercise instructors, personal trainers, yoga and dancers instructors gathered to showcase their innovative fitness classes to the community (for free!). Penda, of course, demonstrated her Wii and Dance Dance Revolution classes! Many instructors had not been exposed to video games, and for some, it was their first experience with these games. Although the event was to get the community moving, Penda’s goal was to get fellow fitness professionals excited about exergaming! Listen to her radio show episode that discusses details of the event here!

Innovation is everywhere, as you can clearly see! Exergames have arrived and are being incorporated into all aspects of health and fitness. This will advance our industry in ways we’ve never imagined and change the way we teach and train people around the world!

Exergaming Your Way to Fitness

NPR RADIO - by Allison Aubrey

Listen Now [4 min 39 sec] add to playlist

Are those mail-order kickboxing tapes gathering dust on top of your VCR? Before you pop them in, consider some of the advantages and disadvantages of sweating in the privacy of your own home.

The Pros of Home Workouts

• It's Cheap
  Many exercises can be done at home for free or for the price of a few sets of dumbbells. Workout videos are another option, generally only $10 to $20—significantly less than a monthly gym membership. But for home fitness requiring more pricey equipment (including Wii Fit at $89.99), think about whether you're sure you'll stick with it before splurging.
• It's Easy
  It's hard enough to find time to work out without having to trek back and forth to the gym. Home workouts can be easier to fit into a busy schedule. Only have 15 minutes? Want to work out at 2 a.m.? Much like those yoga instructors on television, home fitness is flexible.
• Your Eyes Only
  For people who are just beginning a regular exercise routine or who are self conscious about exercising in front of others, home workouts can provide a more comfortable space.

The Cons of Home Workouts

• You Gotta Have Friends
  Staying committed to exercise is easier if you do it with a friend, and the gym is a great place to meet like-minded and like-scheduled workout buddies. Of course, you can always invite a friend over for a joint home yoga session, but that leads to the next point...
• A Tight Squeeze
  It requires some creativity to adapt a living room to a workout space. And it means sacrificing a gym's variety of equipment, powerful air circulation and tailored facilities.
• Sticking With It
  The routine of going to the gym—and the fact that you're paying for it—can motivate people to go regularly. And sometimes getting out of the house can help clear the mind of daily stresses, making workouts seem relaxing rather than a chore.
• Don't Try This at Home
  If you're going to be doing demanding exercises, it's important to do them correctly so you don't hurt yourself. Although video and TV instructors are great for motivation, they can't check your form and correct your technique like gym trainers can.

How Fit Are You?

Heidi Glenn, NPR

NPR science editor David Malakoff takes the President's Challenge in NPR's very tiny gym, with correspondent Brenda Wilson counting his sit-ups.

Before you start the home workouts, you can find out how fit you are with a new test from the President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports.

It's an adult version of the test kids take in school, complete with push-ups, sit-ups and a flexibility test. At www.adultfitnesstest.org, you can find instructions on the President's Challenge Adult Fitness Test, and enter in your results for an online evaluation.

• Listen: Can you pass the President's Adult Fitness Test?
  add

Video games designed to provide a workout are becoming big business.

As proof, look no further than last week's Games for Health national conference at which health researchers and game-makers showed off their latest innovations. Specialized games about protein folding and nutrition shared a venue with Nintendo's new mass-marketed exercise game Wii Fit, set to hit U.S. stores on Monday.

The Wii fit is the latest entry in a string of exercise video games, or "exergames." Nintendo's Power Pad, released in the 1980s, traded hand-held controllers for a floor mat that users jumped on. But the first exergame to make a real splash was Dance Dance Revolution after it was introduced in Japanese arcades in 1998. When schools in West Virginia documented that DDR helped kids dance their way to fitness, researchers and game-makers took note.

David Monk was one such game-maker. He works with Xergames Technology, which began making a similar game once it saw DDR's potential. "DDR kind of started it all, but it's going places that we don't even know yet," Monk says.

The buzz around active gaming has propelled the popularity of the Wii gaming console, which became a huge hit when Nintendo unleashed it in 2006. There's a lot of chatter that Wii games motivate old folks and families to get up and move around. Now, with its new Wii Fit, Nintendo steps up the competition.

The Wii Fit utilizes a balance board and features games specifically designed to boost areas such as balance and strength. One new game involves a hula-hoop challenge, which exercise researcher Alastair Thin demonstrated at the conference in Baltimore. Thin played a Japanese version of the game, on display by the group Gaming4Health.com.

Standing on the Wii's motion-sensitive board, Thin drew a crowd as he dipped and turned to catch on his head virtual hoops being tossed at him.

The game has obvious amusement value. Thin says that at first glance, the Wii Fit might not appear to have exercise value. "I know what exercise is. I can measure exercise on a bike or treadmill," he says.

But when Thin hopped off the board a few minutes later, he put his finger to his wrist to take his pulse: 156 beats per minute, definitely in the range of aerobic activity.

Getting Video Games Down to a Science

Thin teaches exercise physiology in the much colder climate of Edinburgh, Scotland, at Heriot Watt University. For students there, the weather can be an obstacle to outdoor exercise for months out of the year.

So when Wii Fit first hit store shelves in Great Britain last month, Thin was ready in his exercise lab to test it out. He bought two game consoles and recruited 11 students to try the games. Each wore a heart rate band so he could measure the workout's intensity.

In the step-aerobics game, similar to Dance Dance Revolution, Thin says students had trouble with coordination. Their heart rates rose to the equivalent of a moderate walking pace of 3.4 miles an hour. By comparison, Thin says, six minutes of hula-hooping brought the students to the cusp of a moderately intense cardiovascular workout.

"It's not just your hips — it's your arms, your shoulders, your legs, your ankles. Everything's working there and you're exercising really pretty hard," Thin explains.

The point of exergaming is that it's supposed to be more appealing than just walking or running on a treadmill, and Thin says his students told him the Wii Fit was fun.

What's unclear is whether they would have had the same experience without doing it in a group. Was it the camaraderie or competition that kept them going? These are the questions Thin wants to answer with additional research.

Meeting a Need

Thin says he's concerned that all the hype over virtual gaming will drown out the need for serious assessment.

"That's why I think it's very important to get ... good measurements as to just how much physical activity is involved," he says.

Studies that show a proven benefit could help push exergaming into more public spaces such as schools, gyms and recreation centers.

Nintendo isn't the only company hoping to capitalize on the games.

Brian Batease, who runs the game company Lightspace Corp. in Boston, says that if exergames get kids up and moving around, that can't be a bad thing. And he says there's a big demand. "Anything that's going to get kids off the couch ... it's going to be huge." The Lightspace Play can be found at a company called Exergame Fitness. This company is leading the industry in combining exercise and gaming for kids, teens and adults. YMCA's, Schools and JCC's are taking huge steps in making Exergaming the new form in kids health.

Exergaming Kids exercise through video games

Exergaming Kids exercise through video games

Watch the latest Exergaming Fitness Video.

Exergaming Kicks into High Gear with New Study & Exergame Fitness Products

Exergaming Kicks into High Gear with New Study & Exergame Fitness Products

In other news, a pilot study has come out of New Zealand showing that exergaming titles are just as good as casual exercise. No surprise there, but it’s nice to see the empirical data bear out common sense and provide argument ammo against doubters. Exergaming is at the leading edge of helping kids become fit and active. Exergame Fitness USA carries the largest selection of Exergaming titles that help this growing epidemic of childhood obesity. Visit their online website to get simple solutions for your facility.

The 12 week initial pilot study by Dr. Ralph Maddison over at Auckland U. worked with 21 children age 10-14, and measured energy expenditure via oxygen masks. The follow up looked at 20 new subjects, upgrading half of their PlayStations with the EyeToy. This time body mass indices were measured and advanced pedometers were used over 12 weeks.

Children in the eye toy group performed significantly more physical activity, despite spending less time overall playing video games.

“We need to look at different ways, because of the increase of obesity in New Zealand, to increase activity in children,” Dr Maddison said.

Dr Maddison’s team is now seeking a further 330 children, aged between 10 and 14, for an expanded six-month study funded by the Health Research Council of New Zealand.

Playing is playing, and exercise is exercise even in front of a video screen. I do think the idea of linking a pedometer to a virtual world is a good idea, one springing naturally from the Webkinz linkage of RL objects to the VW. Seems this could herald a bevy of new ideas linking the virtual with RL objects and activities.

References:
Borley, C. (2008, February 22). Video games good as exercise: Study. New Zealand Herald. [Online.] Retrieved February 23, 2008 from http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?
c_id=204&objectid=10493847

Exergaming gets a Wii bit technical

CALL it The Great Indoors. From May 8, Australians will be able to do ski jumping, snow boarding, even tightrope walking — indoors. With the help of a video game, of course.

Computers have often been accused of fuelling the sedentary, stay-at-home lifestyle. Nintendo's latest product, Wii Fit, will keep its users at home, to be sure, but its backers claim it is anything but sedentary. But why fork out $149.95 for Wii Fit when you can do the real-world activity, in many cases, free?

Wii Fit is an extension of Wii Sport, released in 2005, which allowed users to "play" simulated Nintendo sports while watching a computer-generated character of themselves competing. Wii Fit, by contrast, uses a wireless motion-sensitive "balance board". Stand on the board, and Wii Fit will measure Body Mass Index and centre of gravity. After that, there are 40 exercises: balance games such as ski jump and tightrope walk; yoga poses; muscle workouts; and aerobic exercises including boxing.

The Wii Fit and console are available thru an American company called Exergame Fitness. E-Fit is the leader in interactive fitness programs for kids, teens and adults in America. On their USA website they sell Exergame Fitness equipment to YMCA's, Schools, Park Districts and more.

Tom Seilheimer CEO of Exergame Fitness says "The Wii Fit and Wii gaming console is really bringing Exergaming to the forefront of the fitness industry. A rapid incline of obesity rates in America is affecting every demographic age group therefore Exergaming is a positive way to bring families & kids together by associating fitness with gaming. These 2 simple concepts combined will deliver mind blowing health benefits without the needs of traditional fitness routines. It's 2008 and kids love to play games...why not just add healthy benefits to what they are already doing?!"

All the exercises, except jogging, involve placing some body part on the balance board "so your on-screen instructor ensures you perform every exercise correctly". Wii Fit, of course, stores all the fitness data on the Nintendo's hard drive.

Wii Fit is, to use industry parlance, an example of "exergaming". But why do people need computer software to do something as basic as push-ups?

"Generation Y are technologically savvy people, they like doing stuff in front of computers. It's what they've grown up with," said Shannon Ferney, from the University of Queensland's School of Human Movement. "It's the next step, (going from) sitting in front of the computer playing the game to being the person (in the game). Me, I'd much rather go outside. I haven't spoken to anyone who says they like using (Wii)." Dr Ferney obviously hasn't been to Japan, where Wii Fit has sold nearly 2 million copies. It will be released in Europe this week, in Australia on May 8, and in the US on May 19.

Japan has notoriously little space for outdoor sports. But Australia does, so will Wii Fit take off here? "The price is a little high at $150 and a similar fitness-oriented concept from Sony and Nike a few years back called EyeToy Kinetic…was a spectacular failure," said Australian games writer Jason Hill.

However, "the Wii has been extraordinarily popular in Australia — over 340,000 sold — mainly because of the novel motion-based control scheme, so I'm sure Wii owners will also be excited by the balance board in Wii Fit".

Wii Fit and Nintendo's "Brain Training" programs were part of the company's shift from "kid's time-waster" games to "lifestyle-oriented gadgetry good for people of all ages", said Mr Hill.

"The pseudo-science behind the stated benefits is questionable, and Nintendo's design genius Shigeru Miyamoto has even said, 'I don't think Wii Fit's purpose is to make you fit,' but I don't think that matters as long as the games are fun in themselves."

At the very least, however, Wii Sport and Wii Fit are a slight improvement on traditional video games. A study in February's British Medical Journal by British researchers found that youngsters playing Wii Sport burned an extra 60 calories an hour compared to those playing sedentary games on a Microsoft Xbox.