Topic: Anyone here tried the EA sports active game? Impressions vs. Wiifit?

Maybe I'm in the minority here, but I was hoping a little for a bit of a workout with Wii Fit so I bought it early on and it was a little entertaining but really had nothing in the way of a cardio workout at all. I stuck with it for months and actually felt good about it, but I still would appreciate a good, sweaty workout as a higher impact alternative.

I looked around online a bit and saw some positive reports about EA sports active, I'm wondering if anyone here ever got it and used it much. Also next month EA is coming out with a "sports active: more workouts" which is essentially an extended version but like WiiFit plus, I don't get if it's somehow just an expansion or a complete game so maybe I should just wait for that one since it's so soon.

I know WiiFit plus is only 20 bucks, but from what I've heard it fixes it original problems but still doesn't offer much of a workout, so I'll pass on that one for now. I'm still a little dismayed that the first WiiFit was released with such a simple, fatal flaw in all the menu surfing between each 30 second workout; what a wasted opportunity; and it still sold like hotcakes!

I have the EA Active. It provides you with "out-of-the-box" workout routines which is fairly cardio-intensive. There is also a calorie counter which tells you how many calories you've burned after each work-out. It also has a trophy system which gives you a trophy-reward each time you accomplish a new goal. Excercises include lunges, presses, jogging, kick-ups, tricept extensions, and "fun" things like boxing, basketball, volleyball, baseball, skating, etc.

There is also an advance function which allows you to create custom work-out routines. You can pick and choose which excercises you'd like to include in your routine as well as the duration/intensity of each exercise.

The EA Sports Active "More Workouts" is an expansion.

I have the same dilemma...but I will probably get Wii Fit Plus.

My girl has "EA active: Personal Trainer".
It comes in a bigger box with some pink rubberband and knee-pocket for the Nunchuck.
First, you have to put the rubberband with some strings together to fasten them to your hands.
And the knee-pocket thingey is just a waste: the Nunchuck doesn't even fit in there and if you manage to get the Nunchuck in there it could easily damage the Control Stick.

Wii Fit has nice and easy two-to-five-minute workouts. Now to get through EA Active's introducing tutorial was an exhausting dilemma of repetitive running- and motion-games that the Wiimote and Nunchuck could barely recognize. This "workout" in the beginning is almost 1 hour long. I had enough of this game after 10 minutes.
The actress in the how-to-play-videos smiles like the happiest girl in the world and the in-game graphics look like N64.

This game is crap compared to clean and beautiful Wii Fit.
But if you just want to sweat, go ahead.

The "knee pocket" is actually supposed to go around your upper thigh. The shape of the pocket is designed to allow the Nunchuk to only fit in one way. I have had no difficulty in sliding the Nunchuk in and out of the little pocket.

I'm no fitness guru by any stretch of the imagination, and I still found the EA Active workout sessions to only last between 25-35 minutes. Each one burned approximately 190-250 calories (according to the calorie counter).

I own both Active and Fit. Fit is more of a recreational excercise game (although it does have Yoga) while Active is intended to set up a routine and burn calories (and get your heart rate up) consistantly.

My ONLY complaint with Active is there is very little excercise for the belly area. At least the Fit has the jack knife excercise. I've really found myself using the Active as my primary exercise "game" and I supplement it with Fit.

If you want a proper work out get EA Active, if you wanna play mini-games and do yoga and press ups get Wii-fit.They are not directly comparable as they are designed to do different things. We have EA-Active ,and it provides a very good work-out,some mini-games and you can customise your own workouts to focus on different parts of the body. The leg strap is perfectly fine once you realise how the nun-chuck fits in, it has to be a tight fit otherwise it would fall out every 2 seconds. The only advice I would give to anyone getting EA active would be to invest in a better quality resistance band as the one that comes with it is somewhat flimsy and provides little resistance. The presentation however is not as good as Wii fit and it is also not as fun.As I said it depends on what you are looking for.

I'll stick with Wii-Fit. I'm sure Active is good, but having seen a freind sweating whilst doing funky things with a massive elastic band, I was somewhat put off. Plus, it looked like bloody hard work.

It really is!! But I think that's the idea

Yeah, if you wanna work out (which I don't) then Active is the way forward. Can't wait for Wii-Fit +, I want more mini-games ergh exercises. Ahem.

I own and use both EA Sports Active Personal: Trainer and Wii Fit. For a better "sweaty workout" EA Active is definitely a better choice. Much more aerobic and cardio intensive. The game comes with a strap for your leg and resistance band for arm and shoulder workouts. It comes with a lot of preprogrammed routines and it has three levels of intensity that change the number of reps in the exercises. You can also make your own routines. It does a good job of working up a sweat for me, and even things as simple as jumping left and right can be pretty tiring. I found the resistance band that comes with the game is pretty weak, but you can buy a better one cheap from about anywhere.

It does have issues of it's own, the biggest for me if the game tends to stop completely if thinks you're doing something wrong. Like if you're doing bicep curls and you don't have the remote or nunchuck twisted just the right way, the game stops your right there and keeps pestering you until it's angled the way it's wanted. This can really slow your workout down, and it's really annoy for tougher things like jump lunges for it to berate you constantly because maybe you were a little shakey on your land, or jumped too earlier and it wants you to go back. I'd really rather it just keep going and score you lower like WiiFit does, but you can't have everything. It's made more annoying that the trainer's voice is the only audio you can't mute individually. It also doesn't have weight tracking like WiiFit, you just input your weight and change it whenever you feel you need too.

Also like someone else mentioned it has next to nothing for abdominal exercises. Lot of leg variety and upper body though. Also it doesn't use the balance board in any creative ways. Most just step left or right. The nunchuk wire is also pretty annoying sometimes, especially because it seems like just the Wii Remote would be just fine in many situations but the game demands both are present for every exercise. It seems like it would have been a better idea you make the Wii Remote go in the leg strap and only ask for the nunchuk when needed, but oh well.

Overall it's a good if somewhat flawed piece of exercise software. If it wasn't such a nitpick about certain things I'd love it, but having to stop and figure out what I'm doing "wrong" for every time I have my arms are a little off from what the game wants. It's worth mentioning there's an upgraded (or merely expanded) version of EA Sports Active: Personal Trainer is coming out in mid November called EA Sports Active: More Workouts. Not sure if it'll fix any major issues, but it might be worth waiting for.

While I don't have Wii Fit or its upgrade, I do have EA Sports Active and think it's a great piece of software. It is definitely flawed on certain exercises, so my compromise has been to design workouts which emphasize the cardio with sports activities and warm-ups or "breaks" in the middle of all the cardio. I hate the exercise band and I found that the strength training exercises tend to have the most problems registering your movements. Because of this I do my strength training outside of the program, though I'm only really just starting so I'm just trying to improve my push-ups and squats right now. I've always preferred doing the "big" exercises which work multiple muscles at once.

The other thing I don't like is the other peripheral: the leg strap. I've found a workaround for the cardio exercises I do, though. For running it registers fine if I just hold both the remote and the nunchuck in my hands and run. Similarly, if I swing my arms during high-knees, it registers fine. Finally, if I hold the nunchuck in the down position while doing kick-ups, it registers fine--though if I don't hold it right, it will register that I did several of them very quickly.

Although the program can't get all the credit since I am a teacher and walk around my classroom constantly during the day, I've lost 16 pounds since I started with EA Sports Active at the end of the summer. In contrast, I lost 12 pounds over the course of the entire school year last year from walking around my classroom.

Thanks for all the advice folks.
I think I'm going to compromise and wait to get "EA Sports: More Workouts" when it comes out, for the most thorough workout and just drag out my Wii Fit for a couple weeks until then. You all seemed to confirm everything I've heard along the way. I already have the Basic Wii Fit, and I kind of gave up on it some time ago, since it took over an hour every time to get what amounts to 10 minutes of actual work out. I love the comments from people who just wanted a game and praise Wii Fit; Very funny indeed. But seriously, though, I'm looking for some actual cardio that will save me on a Gym membership and keep me going through winter months when I'm not biking everywhere. I can always use the WiiFit channel to track progress no matter what I use, anyway.
Thanks for the input.

Just so you know, More Workouts doesn't come with the leg strap and resistance band, even though the box says you need them to play the game. You can get them seperately as an add-on.

I've played both, and of the two I'd go with Wii Fit. Really though, you should just put that money into joining a gym.

I have EA Active and it´s an excellent trainer by 20-30 min each day. I get very tired and i left to continue the rutines but i feel legs more resistent and more marked.

The new expantion is the same game? for buying it and sell the normal version.