The Bottom Line
This is an excellent idea with great potential and may be especially appealing to beginners, with ready-made workouts that are matched to your fitness level and goals. More advanced exercisers may find this a little boring and, at times, frustrating since you have no control over the workouts or the exercises included. This review is for the PC version and does not include a review of the meal plans (which are also available with this game).
Pros
- An exciting way to workout at home with a virtual personal trainer
- Cardio, flexibility and core workouts are interesting and innovative
- Changing difficulty levels and goals allows for a variety of workouts
Cons
- Inability to rewind, fast forward or skip sections can be irritating
- Routines can be monotonous, as they often include the same exercises for each workout
- A warm up is included with all workouts, which is irritating if you're combining workouts
Description
- A fitness game for PC and X-Box offering Maya, a virtual personal trainer
- Enter your vital statitstics and take fitness tests to determine your level of difficulty and goals
- Maya sets up a program with cardio, strength, core and flexibility workouts based on your goals
- After choosing a schedule of workouts, you'll log in to complete the workout of your choice
- For each workout, you can change the difficulty but you can't skip sections or rewind
- The lower body routines (especially advanced version) contain tons of lunges and little variety
- The exercise ball isn't used very much, at least in the workouts I've completed
Guide Review - Yourself Fitness
Yourself Fitness is a fitness game for your PC or X-Box. Maya, your 'trainer', has you enter vital stats (like height, weight, etc.) and then takes you through basic fitness tests (jumping jacks, pushups, crunches and squats) so that Maya can choose a goal for you--which you can change at any time. The goals are weight loss, cardio, upper body, lower body, core strength or flexibility and what you choose will determine your workouts (e.g., if you choose cardio, all workouts will contain some cardio). Maya recommends workout days and duration, though she doesn't choose your workouts-you choose them when you log in. For each workout, you choose: workout location (e.g., an 'Urban Oasis' or the 'Empress' Dojo'), music (80's, hip-hop, etc.) and what equipment you have (heart monitor, step, ball and weights). Maya leads the workouts while the exercises scroll across the bottom, showing the moves and equipment you'll need. There's no instruction, but there's a tutorial for each exercise if you need it. For each workout you can change the music and difficulty...other than that, you have no control over the exercises or the workout (which might be frustrating for advanced users). You can't skip sections or rewind, which I find annoying and the workouts are a bit monotonous, though you can change them (a little) by changing the difficulty. Overall, this is an interesting game that will appeal to beginners. Advanced exercisers may find it frustrating and boring.
