Monday 11 July 2011

VIDEO GAME REVIEW: UFC Personal Trainer - THQ

Release Date: 01/07/11

SYNOPSIS:

Set personal goals and achieve real results with an unparalleled mixed martial arts (MMA) fitness program designed by leading MMA training experts and certified by UFC and the National Academy of Sports Medicine (NASM).

UFC Personal Trainer provides players with an extensive assortment of effective and challenging MMA-inspired exercises, in both pre-set and customizable routines, to build strength, increase endurance, burn calories and get results.

Personalized instruction and tips from the MMA trainers guide players to stay motivated, get fit and track their goals with a helpful in-game journal.

In addition, the game's Ultimate Training Mode enables players to participate in high impact agility drills, with opportunities to earn rewards and have fun with friends in a competitive, multiplayer environment.

Authentic UFC Fitness Experience - Certified by UFC and the National Academy of Sports Medicine (NASM), UFC Personal Trainer is designed by leading MMA training experts Mark DellaGrotte, Greg Jackson and Javier Mendez to deliver a challenging and motivating UFC fitness experience that includes the best and most effective exercises utilized by today's renowned UFC fighters


Intense Mixed Martial Arts Exercises - Learn over 70 MMA and NASM certified exercises, including moves from disciplines such as wrestling, kickboxing and Muay Thai, that are designed to improve strength, endurance and conditioning through use in a variety of routines. Each in-game routine is specialized to target specific muscle groups, as well as factor individual skill levels and fitness goals


Customisable Workeout Routines - Focus on specific fitness objectives by building personalized routines with up to 12 different exercises. Each custom routine can also be modified to increase or decrease intensity of the game's pre-set pace, enabling players to fully max


REVIEW:

For years if you wanted to work out you had pretty much two choice:
1) You’d have to go to a gym and face ridicule at being out of shape.
2) You’d have to hopefully find a Fitness Video or DVD that suited you.

As a guy, your options were restricted even further and your choice was restricted to one, Sugar Ray Leonards Boxout. Yet with all visual work outs you have one major problem, that you are not doing it correctly despite your best efforts and risk injury that can occur at any point, so much so that when you do injure yourself it’s a hell of a lot harder to start up again after a period of recovery.

Thankfully recent developments in the gaming market have come to peoples rescue and whilst it was the Wii that started the whole work out craze one of the major problems was that the equipment wasn’t designed or built for people over a certain weight to utilise. Here for the first time, is an interactive work out piece of software (note I don’t call it a game) that is designed to give you a thorough work out utilising floor space and your Kinect. You don’t need any fancy equipment, you don’t need to buy additional hardware and you don’t need to worry about doing it correctly as the programme monitors what you do at each point and corrects you as it goes along.

Back that up with customisable settings so that you get the work out you want and it’s a real dream. Yes you’ve got to undergo a fitness test to begin with but that’s so it can set the difficulty for you and yes it may not be for everyone but for a guy to have something to help them get fitter that doesn’t involve dancing is a minor miracle in itself and let’s face it, it’s not just guys that don’t want to dance about my other half can attest to during her UFC workout.

All in, for me, this was a cracking concept and one that I look forward to doing each day, yes it’s going to take time to get the results I want but I’ve got no one shouting or looking over my shoulder demanding to use the equipment or laughing at my physique and when you add it to a healthy lifestyle things can only go up. This is a great idea, beautifully executed and one that the user will see positive results from, a plus point in all directions.

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