Nintendo Wii Fanboy

Can't find a Wii or Wii Fit for home workouts?? Too good to bother haunting the shops in the hope that one turns up? You can always shell out for 'em on eBay, but why give some random dude the satisfaction? If you live in Manhattan, you've got another option: drop over a hundred bucks an hour to play a little Wii Sports.

Quite a few trainers seem to be jumping on the Wii workout bandwagon, but we rarely get to see more than a vague estimate of the cost of the sessions. Dorothy Evans isn't shy about trumpeting her fees, however; if you want an hour with her, it's $110, and the NYC-based fitness maven is mixing Wii Sports (on a twenty-foot screen!) in with other activities, and she calls it a full-body workout. Maybe we should be playing harder.

[Via Kombo]

Vancouver's Studeo 55 is the latest to see the benefits of Wii Sports in action and they've decided to dedicate some space to the game -- and when we say space here, we mean it. They've set up a console in a 400 square foot theater-style room with a huge projection screen. The upscale gym, which caters to wealthier patrons willing to pay sizable membership fees each month, has been encouraging members to use Wii Sports as a warm-up or cooldown exercise, or as part of a circuit training regimen.

Former Olympic swimmer Kim Bey gave the title a try despite some early reservations. "I'm not a video game person ... So at first, it was like, 'I don't get it,'" she said. But after playing with her personal trainer, she started to understand the benefits of a game as part of an exercise regimen.

Not everyone was such an easy sell, however. Video games aren't very popular among most workout aficionados; in fact, owner Nathan Mellalieu reportedly faced a lot of criticism over the decision to include Wii Sports at first. Once patrons can be convinced to give it a try, however, reactions seem to change. Mellalieu cautions those who need to lose a lot of weight against depending solely on their Wiis, however -- a few games of Wii Sports is not enough for an overall lifestyle change, but the title can certainly be a part of that. We can't help but wonder if the addition of Wii Fit will spread the console's reputation as an exercise-helper even further. Maybe we'll start to see Wiis in gyms everywhere!

[Thanks, Alex!]