Exercising Journal #3: Looking for Some Variety

It’s been some time since the last journal, but, with summer activities and holidays in full swing, my exercising has fallen a little by the wayside. I haven’t completely dumped it, though, but I think my exergaming habits are going to be changing a little.

I have kept up with Fitness Boxing and Ring Fit Adventure, but, as feared in my previous journal entry, I know I’m quickly hitting the ceiling of wanting to revisit both games. I very much have a desire to exercise still, but my interest in using both games is waning fast.

Fitness Boxing is way more straightforward, and I’m getting to the point where I have nearly all of the game’s content unlocked. Playing Fitness Boxing on the high intensity is no doubt a great calorie burner, but it’s getting extremely repetitive after a couple months of moderate play.

In Fitness Boxing I finally reached the point where it introduced blocking, and I’ve found that to be the least responsive input so far. The first time I had a block exercise, it was the only time I’ve ever had a one-star rating in an exercise. I believe I’ve found a motion that makes blocking more recognizable to the game, but it doesn’t seem to really reflect a blocking motion which takes me out of the experience.

One thing that has helped, though, was in disabling the vibrations of the Joy-Cons. I noticed there were instances where the motors inside the Joy-Cons would periodically continue vibrating, which seemed to make me miss motions in the game.

I located the option to disable the vibrations and now I am frequently getting all-perfect plays on exercises. I realize the motion and getting exercises is more important than an in-game rating, but, when you’re continually told you didn’t do something when you know it did, I think that really dampers the experience.

I’m also in a point where Ring Fit Adventure is getting quite repetitive. We’re in the middle of a quest to rescue four fitness gurus and the story keeps cycling us around in our encounters with these characters. Much like in Fitness Boxing, the pool of new content and things to do is starting to dry up in Ring Fit Adventure. However, I think there is more left in the tank for this game compared to Fitness Boxing.

I’m considering some other methods of play for Ring Fit Adventure, as the story segments are fluctuating between its focus on the body. I’m at a point where I’d rather focus on core strength and arms/shoulders, but the game wants me to do leg exercises in order to effectively do the RPG-style battles.

Both games are great and have done their part in getting me closer and closer to my weight goal, but I’m just craving something new to do. I still enjoy taking walks, but those are difficult to work in when the majority of your free time is after midnight.

I’ve even started getting back into my “10 minute workouts” before my showers. When I did my last fitness push, I could do resistance band reps, 100 squats and 100 situps with very little effort. Easing back into it, I’m happy to say I can handle sets of 25 just fine.

Perhaps my biggest craving, though, is being able to get back to an arcade and jump back onto dancing video games. DanceDanceRevolution is likely the single reason I wasn’t grossly overweight in the 2000s, and I still very much enjoy that style of video game.

The closest game I have to me in arcade form is about half an hour away – the nearby Dave & Busters location has a Pump It Up XX 20th Anniversary. With this in mind I ordered an AM Pass for use on Pump It Up out of Hong Kong and finally received it in the mail. Hopefully the Pump It Up account will encourage me to visit more frequently and get some activity on the machine.

I’m back to the point to where I unfortunately have no access to DDR in northwest Ohio, so I’m looking at any opportunity I can get to travel to Auburn Hills, Michigan, where the Round One location has multiple DDR cabinets, a DanceRush Stardom and a Pump It Up XX. I was able to visit that location with my family close to the July 4 holiday. It was a blast, and it felt great to get active on those machines:

While my progress has slowed, I am still making progress toward my next milestone. I reached a new low weight for this year, and am only a few pounds away from 190. Ultimately, I want to reach 180 before deciding on where to go from there. In my last fitness push in 2014, I’d say the time between 190 and 180 was the most difficult, but I eventually did it, so I’m confident I can hit that goal once again.

It did interest me that XSEED Games announced the upcoming release of Knockout Home Fitness for the Nintendo Switch. The title will port over Marvelous’ FiNC Home Fit from Japan.

This will introduce martial arts-based workouts, which has caught my interest. The game has been scheduled for release this fall, so I’m going to follow this title and decide if it’s something I can introduce into the routines.

Very coincidentally, the Konami title Martial Beat has crossed my mind at several points this year. Martial Beat is an oft-forgotten Bemani title that uses its catalog of songs from around the DDR MAX era along with martial arts moves – Tai Bo was one of the fitness fads around this time if that explains anything. It does have a Playstation home release similar to ParaParaParadise, so, maybe a game such as that will be considered for my home fitness regiment as well!

CONTINUE TO EXERGAMING JOURNAL #4