Wii Fit measures my apartment

by JC Fletcher { May 29th 2008 at 4:00PM }

Wii Fit's measurement capabilities are a useful tool for tracking your weight loss progress and your daily exercise habits. Just as Miyamoto predicted, I am (narcissistically) fascinated by the way the game tracks my personal stats and provides instant feedback about my performance in exercises.

As interesting as my Wii Fit age is, I wondered how other things around my apartment stacked up. The following gallery shows Wii Fit's Body Test results for four non-human Wii Fit guests, including my cat, Indiana. (I hope) it's funny, but it's also educational. By testing nonstandard participants, I learned a lot about Wii Fit.

For example, I quickly found that Wii Fit can't register anything smaller than ten pounds, and has significant trouble measuring anything that light -- I had to scramble to find heavy enough stuff to measure. I also learned other minimums, including the shortest height you can enter (1'8") and the latest year of birth (2006) -- yes, that does mean Wii Fit can test two-year-olds.

Which means that a Wii Fit Age of 2 is possible, which breaks from the Brain Age template the game follows otherwise. I entered random ages for most of these tests, since, with the exception of Indiana, they're all younger than 2, and without exception, those ages are what Wii Fit returned as the Wii Fit Age.

The most interesting thing I discovered was that the balance line continued to fluctuate even when a perfectly stationary object was standing on the board. This means that either the Balance Board is imprecise at such low weight, or that it's really precise and picked up vibrations in the floor or something. I was expecting perfect balance test scores from most of these items, and that is not what happened. Head into the gallery and see how stuff measured up!


		This way to the gallery!

Tags: exercise, wii-fit, wii-fit-age

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

perfectecho @ May 29th 2008 4:13PM

I have a 38lb 2.5 year old at home, and he tested just fine with the board.

Granted, it took quite a few tries to get him to stand still, but there was no discrepancy between his weight and reality.

After that, a few helpful hands on his hips and he's having a blast playing the soccer balance game

Scotty @ May 29th 2008 4:35PM

The cat's my favorite. He looks mortified that it called him obese.

barb dybwad @ May 30th 2008 5:00PM

completely agree, that pic is so a lolcat waiting to happen. good thing you got Wii Fit so Indiana can slim down with a solid exercise regimen.

gordon @ May 29th 2008 4:54PM

Wy not use a dumbbell? I'd be curious to see what happens when a 20 lb. weight was placed on the board, how accurate the weight, and maybe it wouldn't wobble?

JC Fletcher @ May 29th 2008 5:05PM

Interesting. I know I've got some weights around here.

Ryan Hartman @ May 29th 2008 4:47PM

Holy crap this is all scientific and junk. Are you like a scientist or something JC? I would like to commission you to build me a rocket to Mars. Then if there is time I would like to schedule some brain surgery.

If you accept I shall reward you with no less than 50 gold Spanish Doubloons, you rocket scientist, brain surgeon, you.

JC Fletcher @ May 29th 2008 5:05PM

I don't know whether to be flattered or insulted.

Eben @ Jun 12th 2008 6:59PM

Thank you, but swear less next time.

NutMac @ May 29th 2008 5:04PM

Anyone know of a way to measure the weight quickly? I know I can skip the Wii Age part, but getting my weight measured involves far too many steps than I would like.

Ghen @ May 29th 2008 6:09PM

bathroom scale, buy one at your local walmart.

Kamek @ May 29th 2008 5:15PM

That was a funny idea. too bad your cat is "obese"... he looks fine. I have some other questions: What's the maximun height and weight you can enter? Could you use several people on the balance board at once?

Dio @ May 30th 2008 1:15AM

Sadly, Guinness just might look for a world record of Heaviest Weight Achieved on a Wii Fit Balance Board with the Most People XD

Roto13 @ May 29th 2008 5:43PM

You have more PS2 games than Wii and Game Cube games combined. GTFO my Nintendo Fanboy site. ;P

Jhongerkong @ May 29th 2008 8:05PM

A friend of mine weighed a balance board on another balance board and guess what....

It resulted in a tear in the space-time continum

Donald @ May 30th 2008 1:38PM

*insert divided by zero joke here*

hypermog @ May 30th 2008 1:22AM

Did you know that the carpet is a horrible surface on which to measure things?

Saturn2888 @ May 30th 2008 5:55PM

They should actually go up to whatever year would be the end of 32-bits. What if you were born in 2009, it is the year 2013, and you wanna play Wii Fit? Now you cannot because a 5 year old doesn't exist.

Mad Phil @ May 30th 2008 10:29AM

Thank you my superior intelligence: Let me explain what we, here at the ATI university, discovered about your recent, scientific research.

- the 2006 fact: Maybe Nintendo just want people for the next 15 years to enjoy playing with the board (think future JC, think future...)

- the 10 pounds thing: It could, maybe, I'm just guessing, have something to do with the captors inside the board who have a certain range of precision... no ?

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