(W)In Quarantine – Wii!!!

Back in the naive days of January 2020, I shared my desire to make the year I turn 40 a big deal. Little did I know. 

Well, as Mr Silver Lining, I figured I’d use the still-updating LICD blog to occasionally share some of the positive impacts being quarantined has had on my life.

Wii’re Getting In Shape

My wife Tina reached out to my nutritionist Selena and its made it easier for me to follow Selena’s advice when Tina and I are both on her plan. That, and the time we save not commuting has given us so much more time to prepare and serve vegetables, which both of our diets were missing. 

To track her progress, Tina needed to weigh herself. Makes sense. Except we don’t own a scale. Or do we? 

Remember the Nintendo Wii? You probably do. It was somewhere between the widest broadening of video game innovations and a really popular bowling simulator. One of the more famous accessories for the Wii was the Wii Fit, a modern day Nintendo Power Pad. It did to feet what the Wiimote and Nunchuk* did for hands.

*I had to look it up to make sure this wasn’t just what everyone called it. Nope, the official name of the secondary Wii controller is Nunchuk. Not even Ninchuk or something branded. 

The Wii fit has a built in scale. After Tina did her body test, I hoped on as well. I lost 1.3 lbs since I last weighed myself 900+ days ago. Not bad. A week later, with the Wii still setup, I weighed myself again. Down another couple of pounds. Now that’s still in the swing of how much a person can expect their weight to fluctuate in a day, but two weeks in a row on the weight loss side is encouraging. 

Wii’re Gaming As A Family

Tina and I are gamers, and our hope was that we’d game as a family when the girls got old enough. We play the occasional board game and I have a beginner RPG lined up for when I think my oldest can handle the rules. 

I thought having the Wii setup with batteries in all the Wiimotes would be a great opportunity to game with the girls. Introduce them to the vintage games in the Virtual Console, try some Wii Sports to burn off the cabin fever. So I was surprised how much trouble they were having. I had a Colleco and regular access to my uncle’s Vectrex when I was my older daughter’s age. When I got a Nintendo, my youngest brother was my younger daughter’s age. Why weren’t they getting it?

I drew two conclusions:

1. The Wiimote was build on the evolution of a half dozen generation of gaming consoles;
2. My daughters grew up in the age of touch screens

I started the girls off with Lego Batman, remembering it as a light game that they should be able to handle. Around the part where they had to change to Robin’s vacuum costume so he could find and collect bits and deposit them in a specific machine, I realized the game wasn’t as child-friendly as I remembered.

We tried a few other games with varying degrees of failure. I was ready to call it a loss and move on, but my older daughter asked me about a game at the bottom of the pile.

This turned out to be the Wii game that won her over. How? That’s a story for the next (W)In Quarantine.