EA Sports Active 2 - Playstation 3

my daughter has the original wii fitness game and this is the latest one that has been released that i've seen.........since i like the original decided to splurge and get this so my daughter and i can workout together........we had to buy an additional set of bands that go on your legs and arms for the two of us to workout but that was ok.........there are Sooooo many different workouts that you can do......you can set it on auto and it picks the worksouts for you or you can pick and choose only the ones you want to do (upper body, lower body, core or cardio---there are TONS of different exercises).......we put it on the 90 day challenge and you pick 4 days out of the week to workout.........now that is the only thing that i've found "wrong" with this system.......i've always been under the understanding that you workout one day and rest your muscles the next......if you have to pick 4 days out of the week you can't do that........so we found ourselves always reprogramming our workouts to give us a day break in between.........no biggie but thought i'd mention that.......we put it on "easy" for the first few weeks as neither of us have worked out for quite some time......didn't want to kill myself right out of the box......the warmup was a bit boring (though when they talk to you its kinda funny--they try to motivate you).... sometimes (not too often though) the sensors won't register that you're in a position and you have to hold that spot a bit longer......when it does this you just have to play with the sensor and it'll pick your movement up it a sec....have to say the workout was fun........i dread the cardio and my daughter dreads the lower body workouts.......funny how we dread what we need the most help in.......anyway, we have some "workout steps" and a mini trampoline in our exercise equipment and used those with some of the exercises in this program......it comes with resistance bands but you can substitute dumbbells if you have them and prefer those......i've found that doing the running and some of the exercises is much easier on my joints and back when i use the trampoline instead of the floor but again that's my preference and totally optional for you depending upon whether or not you have a mini trampoline........when using the preset 90 day workout it picks alternating days to do your harder workouts on so one day your workout will be a bit easier and the next will be harder, then goes to easier then back to harder we've noticed.......kinda nice so you can sort of pick the days you want to have your "harder" workout based on your schedule......the easy workout became a bit easy (i'm in semi-good shape/50 years old) so we changed to the medium level........that is more challenging and will have you sucking air in no time.......the hard level is pretty challenging!.......all in all if you want a varied workout use this........i use this and alternate doing mini trampoline workouts and also alternate using my workout dvd's so between the three never get bored as well as my muscles dont get bored cause i'm always changing the workout......i love that you can do this in the privacy of your own home whenever you want......also (no more driving half hour or more to the gym).......OVERALL WORTH THE MONEY!!!

I loved it that the game came with EVERYTHING you need, including batteries. I was thrilled to open the box and get started with no surprises, like the need to run out and buy batteries or PS move or anything like that. The workout programs are easy to customize and you can select easy, intermediate, or difficult depending on your fitness level. You can also select which days of the week you prefer to workout, which was important to me. The pulse monitor seemed to work well and I enjoyed seeing my heart rate displayed on the screen as I exercised. I did notice that there is a slight delay between your movement and when the movement registers on the game. This made a couple exercises tricky, but I figured it out quickly. The only thing that didn't work well is the exercise band that came with the game, which was no big deal for me. It kept coming untied from the handles. Maybe I wasn't tying it tight enough, but I have my own exercise bands and free weights, so I was content to use those instead. For me, tracking my progress is key. The game tracks the time for the workout, the calories burned, the number of exercises completed, and tracks your overall progress in the program you select. There are also options for workout buddies to keep you on track. Overall, I give this an A+.

I had little faith that this would actually be something I would end up using even semi-regularly, but I have been pleasantly surprised. Mind you, I bought it in October and only did a handful of workouts on it between then and January, but that's only due to motivation, not the game itself. The game works pretty darn well, using two arm and one leg band to communicate with the console, so keep in mind this isn't a "MOVE" thing. What I like is that I do get a good workout, circuit style. And, if desired, you can pause and do more reps of anything. And, if you go by the workouts they prepare for you, they're mixed up pretty well, so there's not too much repetition in terms of getting bored. It's likely as close to having a personal trainer as possible electronically. Too, I can be pretty much anywhere in my room and it works. I'm in a strangely laid-out apartment so I find that my best space is behind my sofa, and even with that blocking me from the console, the system picks up 98% of my moves. The only issues I've had - and which I've worked past - are: - Some moves don't register well, such as the side-arm plank. However, I finally found the position that works; and, you can always "Skip" the exercise and then pause the game and do them on your own. - The heart rate monitor arm band seems to lose contact about 10 minutes into my workouts. So, if you want it to track you as best as possible, you will need to pay attention to the on-screen display and adjust the band if you have what you're certain is an incorrect reading. For example, I will see a display of 100bpm when I've been running my arse off for a minute and feel like my heart will pop out of my chest. If I adjust it, net thing I know is I actually have a BPM of 185, which is definitely more correct. (I'm still not sure how trustworthy the thing is regardless.) - Wish you could change your location. The desert theme is nice, but still. - The rubber stretch band is useless. If you're going to do the weight-training exercises, get some dumbbells. (You can set this up in the settings too, so that your characters are using dumbbells, even though all the tutorials use the band). - They've recently added a stupid "opt-in" thing for sharing your data with god-knows-who. It comes up twice in a session, each time telling you you can change your option from the settings menu if you'd like. YET - it should turn off once your make a selection. Every time I do a workout, it comes up in the startup, and then again after the program when you're looking through your results. You'll get what you are motivated to get out of this. I'm just doing it so I can get my body moving at least 30-minutes a day, not really to lose weight.

I've only been using this a bit more then a week so I can't say much about weight lost yet but I'm sure I'll be able to soon! It really makes you work up a sweat and keeps you moving. It has a wide range of activities to keep you entertained. I've been looking for an alternative to going to a gym, I really hate working out around other people, and I think that after much trial and error I have finally found one! The motion sensors are great, although I have noticed some inaccuracy on occasion with them. It automatically sets goals for you once you choose a program which I love and you can add to a journal daily to track progress. I love the workout reviews it gives you after every workout, it shows you line graphs of your calories burned and where your heart rate was the whole time, it makes me feel really accomplished when I see those! Overall I am very happy with my purchase and would recommend this to anyone! I can't wait to start seeing results. BTW, until owning this I hate to admit that I was a very lazy person. I spend all my time studying-I'm an engineering student-and after a long day of smashing my head against my textbooks the only thing I ever felt like doing was crawling into bed with a late night snack. I put on a ton of weight since starting college 3 years ago and I woke up one morning, looked in the mirror and dedicated myself to a change. So you don't have to already be a fitness guru to use this product. TRUST ME, I know it's cliche' to say, but if I can do it, anyone can.

Just finished the 9 week program on medium difficulty. In short, I had a great experience with EA Sports Active 2. I read a lot of these reviews prior to my purchase, and during the program I kept in mind some of the things (hopefully some unique) that would be good in include. 1) I got in shape! I am a 24 year old male. I am 5'9" and started at 159 lbs and about 18% body fat, and ended at 157 lbs and 14% body fat. My biggest area of improvement was in my legs and behind. My arms and shoulders have shown moderate improvement, not much bigger but more toned. And my midsection showed the least improvement, but my chest got a little bigger and my belly a tad smaller. I am not surprised, as in the program leg exercises are everywhere, and by the end each session maxed out with just 4-5 core exercises. 2) I got motivated! Not keeping up with a exercise regimen in years, this was the first time since starting college that I kept up with a workout schedule. I hated seeing a red "X" on a missed workout, so every missed session I made up later! Not to mention I am a gamer, and getting trophies for my PS3 kept me pretty happy. (Though some trophies are impossible! e.g. 1000km of mountain boarding?) 3) The sensors were not a problem. Sure, there would be hiccups where it didn't track me, but by the end of the first phase I had worked out the kinks. I turned up the volume on the sound effects so that I can hear the "ding" when I hit the proper range of motion, and I kept to the pace of the game. The thing I could never get right: Running Kickups. My avatar would oscillate between really fast and super slow, so I just "ran" to overcome my inability to hit the perfect pace. As another reviewer mentioned, moving your arms while "running" is very important. When in doubt, try to perfectly mimic the avatar, even the body parts that you wouldn't think that mattered, and you'll see improvement in your response. 4) Start the program with spare batteries and a different exercise band. Halfway through the 9 weeks my heartrate band was dead, and by the end all the sensors had their batteries replaced. Of course the new band is optional, but I went to a heavy one pretty quickly. I just wish I could set different bands to different exercises. (e.g. super heavy for biceps and squats, med/heavy for triceps) But come to think of it, what do I care if the game knows I'm using one or the other? It'll just be a few calories off... 5) Thoughts on music. I went halfway through the 9 weeks until I loaded my own playlist. My only gripe is the limited functionality. You select the playlist in the game, and it will play it at a random starting point in your track list on shuffle. But from workout to workout, it pretty much started on the same track and followed the same random track pattern. To fix this I had to go to the playstation menu and shuffle my list and delete the songs I heard too many times. If EA could simply assign a controller button to skip tracks I would love that. Additionally, halfway through my 9 weeks EA released an update to not play your playlist for step aerobics, which was very helpful for keeping up with the trainer! Very good update! 6) Would I do it again? The 9 week program was fantastic for getting me motivated to exercise, especially during these cold months. I really wish I could adjust the 4 times a week for 9 weeks to 3 times a week for 12 weeks. Luckily, I can individually select the workouts without starting a new program. From now on, I'll be selecting some "hard" workouts outside of starting another program. The only functionality lost would be the food/exercise journal I gave up on anyway.

This year I am totally dependent on PS3 for my workouts. This game along with The Fight: Lights Out, is the main workout I do. So far I am only doing the 3 weeks program. It last about 20 mins per day/ 4 days per week. It is very good workout... includes warm up, stretches and cool down (I never do these in a gym). It has shown some new exercises which I would have never learned on my own in a gym. It works almost every muscle in my body with different exercises. Over all workout program is amazing. Watching you heart rate is also awesome. Keeping track of how hard you are working is awesome. Tracking my movements seems flawless to me. A few negatives... not big ones... putting on sensors can be a little annoying. I mean if I am looking for a quick workout... it is much easier to grab move controller and play Fight/or dance game then putting on 3 different sensors. Program at medium difficulty doesn't seems to push me too much. I will try hard setting soon but for now after finishing the daily workout with this game, I play fight/or dance game for another 20 or 30 minutes. My recommendation is to get this game, Fight: Lights Out (This will work your shoulders like hell) and Everybody Dance. Between these 3 games not only you will have so many different way to workout but you will really enjoy and have fun. I am always looking forward to go home and workout/ play video games now.

I really wanted to give this title a shot, in an effort to make my exercising a little more fun. The workouts are decent, they will get you sweating and the "gameplay" mechanics may distract you a little from the fact that you are actually working out. However, the tracking system can be SO poor at times, that it makes you want to throw the game out of a window. This happens in particular on exercises that require you to lower your body, such as squats. I have tried everything, from recalibrating the sensors to placing my PS3 console as high as I could in an attempt to make it recognize I was actually squatting, to little success. All in all, it has happened to me at least twice that I end up injuring myself for trying an exercise too hard, in pure desperation for the game to track it. Another downside for me is that the calorie burn vs. workout activity seems a little low. A 45-minute workout involving cardio and core exercises supposedly tracks around a 200 calorie burn. A 45-minute core workout of P90X has tracked for me around 350 calories, and I am not physically active by far. Also, the monitor straps around your amrs may get to be itchy and uncomfortable for some people. They become a little uncomfortable for me once I start sweating. I would suggest that if you want to try an exercising game just for the fun or giving your workouts a twist, you either: a) Try this title for Xbox (you will only require one monitor, instead of three). That is if you really care about the heart monitoring functionality. (I have not tried it myself, but body tracking may be a little better). b) Try Your Shape Fitness Evolved instead. This one is an Xbox exclusive and, although it does not monitor heart rate, it tracks another stats like body weight and measures. No monitors are required to be worn during exercising (requires Kinect). Otherwise, if what you are really looking for is to get a good workout and maximize calorie-burn, I'd say you better but a separate heart rate monitor and do P90X Extreme Home Fitness Workout Program - 13 DVDs, Nutrition Guide, Exercise Planner . Its fun, its effective and comes with a great meal plan.

Summary: If it's cold outside &/or you need something to nag you into exercising, get this. B- (It feels like it's still in beta, a fairly polished beta, but still beta. Pro: It works. I've lost almost 10 lbs in 2.5 weeks, and I feel great! Con: There is at least one exercise out of the 20+ exercise set that won't register. :( I'm a 45 year old ~280 lbs 6'4" male that's pretty sedentary and a little chubby. I saw that EA Sports Active 2 (EASPA2) was on sale for $48 (MSRP $99!), so I picked it up (it being pretty chilly outside sealed the deal.) If it weren't for EA's email newsletter, I would never had heard of the product, and I surf 3 PS3 websites daily (where's the advertising EA?) So I get it and opened the box (BTW: keep the box, there's 5-7 things inside you'll want to store later.) I'm disappointed that there's a USB transmitter instead of BlueTooth (I have a PS3.) I know BT has enough bandwidth for heart rate monitors because my wife has one (not a deal breaker.) The Right Leg, Right Arm, Left Arm monitors are pretty straight forward. Be SURE that the indictor lights are at the top of your leg, & the bottom of your arms when you put these on. I wait to turn them on until the game asks for them, so I can confirm the right monitor is on the right appendage. The monitor bands are comfortable and seem durable. A stretchy band with handles is included for resistance. It's a little ghetto, but it's better than nothing. I'm going to upgrade to some 5/10 lbs hand weights (which the game allows for, nice touch EA!) The enclosed booklet is near worthless. It would've been nice if EA when into detail about each program and what it entails. As the game starts, you'll notice it's slow (get used to it.) It lags, especially when it checks in online. Hard to tell when you've hit the start button. Here's a bummer, player setup. So my wife is the primary user on our PS3 (yes, she is awesome,) and I am a secondary user. So EASPA2 assumes that I'm my wife, there is NO changing this. Come on EA, nobody who develops for PS3 sets there players up like this (even EA!) Apparently the only way to do this is to get the EASPA2 2nd user kit (for $39, really?) or buy yet another full blown $99 kit. Then it is supposed to recognize me as the second user. This sucks because all the accessory kits are out of stock. I ordered mine from EA 3 weeks ago when they were having a 50% off sale ($20 is reasonable.) Not only did my order not register online so I could track it, the EA Tech Support people weren't able to kick it in. I asked how I was going to track my order and they replied "It's on it's way (not cool EA.) So after I setup my male avatar "Lisa" ( :| ) , I was presented with two different types of trainers, two different types of workout programs, and various levels of difficulty. I selected the aggressive trainer for an easy 3 week Cario Kick Start program (3WCKSP). You start out with ~18 min. of ~20 aerobic exercises which ramp up a little every day. It also presents you with a calendar to schedule your workouts. The 3WCKSP makes you do 4 days a week, I wanted to do 7, but it won't let me. That's a bummer, but there does appear to be some form of customized workout (I just would have liked a little guidance on mine, this would have been real handy info in the booklet on how to do this.) So the workout starts, and I'm pretty happy with it. The monitors do NOT do a direct one-to-one feedback to the game. It lags big time, and I'm guessing the game is doing a lot of guesswork to make it interactive. This gets really apparent when you hit the (at least,) one exercise out of the set that will NOT register. Sometimes you can "kick" in the feedback by making overextended gestures, or doing the exercise twice, but at least half of those won't be tricked. It wouldn't be so bad if you had an option to skip or replace the exercise, but you don't. It just sits there like an idiot yelling at you to do the set & hold still. And it will continue and yell at you for at least 4-5 minutes until it gives in, does a rep, then repeats (this TOTALLY sucks.) I wish there was some onscreen feedback of your monitors, so you could determine what the game is wanting you to do, then you could adjust your movements accordingly. There's no pause and return feature either. You just have to quit & lose all your progress, or pre-cognitively check off the problem exercises. Checking them off also sucks, because the game doesn't replace them, and you only get a ~90% workout. This is SO beta, it's not even funny. SHIP A PATCH ! ! ! , this makes an A+ game a B-. The exercises that don't register (out of the ~50 I've tried): Alternate Side Lunges (the right lungess don't register well. It almost seems to learn your moves better as you go on.) Squats with Bicep Curls (you can do them twice to kick it in.) Overhead Tricep Extentions (if you over-exagerate your movements, it seems to help.) Bent Over Rows with Tricep Kickbacks (you REALLY have to swing your arms around to get this one to kick in.) Bent Over Reverse Flys (IMPOSSIBLE, nothing seems to kick this in except waiting.) Lateral Shoulder Raises (IMPOSSIBLE, nothing seems to kick this in except waiting.) As the excises continue, some of them are like pushups, which mean you can't easily face the TV (and mine is 5 feet up on the wall.) More audio feedback here would be nice on these (not a deal breaker.) Also, the instructor alternates between doing opposite and mirror moves. Please pick one, maybe set this as an option? When the tutorials talk about things like gluts and your core, use arrows. I have no idea what you're talking about, and it sure isn't in the booklet. There's a couple of times between exercises when the game says "take a water break." It only gives you the normal 3 second pause between workouts to do this, & since there's no pausing the game, it's essentially useless. It's doubly useless because you really need to be in position for the next exercise so the monitors can register you properly (not a deal breaker.) There's a log where you can enter in nutrition info, but it's pretty sparse. I'd really like to see a fruits & veggie like serving inputs here. Maybe coordinate with a WeightWatcher & Atkins like diet programs for EASPA3? A really cool feature is that you can enter in your own workout soundtrack. I dumped in ~70 songs, but it keeps replaying the first one over every workout. A shuffle option would be nice here (not a deal breaker.) The good news, it doesn't take long, you break a sweat, you get your heart rate up, and you feel obligated to keep going. My ankles, calves, and laterals are shaping up nicely, I've lost weight, my back doesn't ache and I've stopped snoring! EASPA2 is pretty generous with the trophies, & the online tracking component is detailed almost to a fault. In conclusion, EA get that patch out and start shipping those accessory packs! You've got a potentially great product here that you could almost sell for $99 if you fixed it. Addendum (three weeks later): The sensors seem to be more reliable, BUT the problem exercises don't seem to be popping back up so it's hard to tell. Wearing the monitors properly is key here (I put little stickers on the top so I know they're oriented properly.) Anyway, I would've popped my rating up a star, BUT I purchased the EASPA2 Accessory pack for the PS3. This contains another set of sensors & another USB dongle. So I ASSUMED this would allow a second user to play the game simultaneously. Remember how I mentioned before about how stupid setting up a user is? It gets worse. So I set my wife's primary PS3 account avatar to her name, gender, etc., then I log into my PS3 account (same console,) and create a new avatar using my name, gender, etc. Seems so good so far, but wait! Were's my wife's avatar? So I log back into her PS3 account, and there's her avatar, but where's mine? (And yes, I had two active controllers, still no dice.) My only conclusion, you CAN't do two simultaneous users at once. I've been bugging EA Support for days to confirm/deny this (since the documentation isn't worth the tree they killed for it.) No response. If this is the intended function, it's unbelievably stupid. You could get the same results using only one set of sensors and logging in back and forth. If this isn't the intended function, why isn't it working? No other game makes you create secondary users using separate PS3 accounts, Even PS3 Home (which was in Beta, & they fixed that.) DO NOT BUY the Accessory Pack (or at least till they have this figured out.) If it's just one of you, go for it, the exercises do get results.