Even though everyone from President Obama to health experts are warning us about the dangers of gaming too much, the industry for interactive games like Wii Fit is heating up. According to Reuters, attendees at the recent Games for Health Conference tripled, and not all of them were industry players. Health experts spoke out about the many uses of video games, from helping kids deal with the effects of cancer (see PlaySavvy's previous coverage of the game Re-Mission) to getting us all busting a move in Dance Dance Revolution. The same people behind Re-Mission have also developed technology to help virtually train nurses at Duke Medical Center.
Health experts at the Games for Health Conference called for government programs to research the positive uses of video games for kids and health professionals alike.
According to Reuters, Dr. Debra Lieberman, director of Health Games Research for The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, said, "States' governors should direct their school technology officers to look at innovations like "Dance Dance Revolution" and "Wii Fit" as a way to extend the reach of physical education and comprehensive health education."
Some schools already use games like Dance Dance Revolution as part of their physical education classes for kids. In 2007, MTV reported that one school in West Virginia reported positive results from getting a number of students to DDR on a regular basis.
"The study enlisted 85 children deemed to be overweight or obese, and half were tasked with playing DDR at home 30 minutes a day, five days a week, over a 12-week period. They wore pedometers to keep them honest, got weekly checkup calls and took fitness tests. During a second 12-week period, all 85 children had to play."
According to Dr. Linda Carson, one of the leads on the study and a professor at WVU's School of Physical Education, "While the obese children did not lose enough weight for us to call it significant, the significant finding is they did not gain any weight."
And that was before the Wii, whose body-sensing technology is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the possibilities of combing exercise and gaming. Microsoft's Project Natal promises an even more revolutionary take on gaming, in that there's no controller involved except your own body. More and more games that promote health are on the way to store shelves, like the DSi's anti-smoking "Butt Kicker" and the Wii's karate game "Karate Bears," as well as the currently available Wii Fit and EA Active.
Are you already on the Wii Fit bandwagon or thinking about investing in a Wii so the kids can play and you can get fitter as well? Let us know in the comments!
