Your Shape: Fitness Evolved 2013 (Wii U) Review

Fitness games were all the rage a few years ago, especially when Nintendo made them ever popular with Wii Fit and its successor, Wii Fit Plus. However, an onslaught of releases saturated the market, similar to how training videos and DVDs started to lose some of their appeal when every man and his dog jumped on the bandwagon. Anyone buying a Wii U this Christmas may be wondering if they should merely stick with Wii Fit Plus using the console's backwards compatibility or find something new. Ubisoft is hoping to lure folk in with Your Shape: Fitness Evolved 2013, though, and has indeed brought something quite impressive to the gym.

Your Shape leaves the player to ruminate over what course of action should be taken, offering up a whole host of options that can be accessed using the GamePad. Change the personal profile details to detail height, weight, and so on; keep track of medals earned by completing certain tasks, hitting targets, or even keeping going on a specific routine for a set amount of time; head to the in-game Store to spend coins earned during exercises on the likes of new personal trainers, routines, and music; play around in Options to adjust factors such as whether or not to be hooked up online, share profile photos, let Ubisoft track data; and much more. Two of the key choices on the menu bar are 'Play' and 'Fitness Pal.' The latter is a neat little extra whereby a range of recipes (more than 150!) for a wide variety of dishes are displayed, with the game recommending different types for the likes of losing weight, reducing stress, suitable food for children, and more, giving ingredient details, nutritional information, and rough guidelines for how long it will take to cook and how hard it be to succeed in the kitchen!

'Play' is the heart and soul of Your Shape: Fitness Evolved 2013, however. Each day undertake the special 'To Do' challenges the game recommends, face off against a handful of popular tracks from the likes of LMFAO, Lady Gaga and Rihanna, or try out some Zen workouts to ease into the exercise process before deciding upon a stringent regime. The on-screen model will expect his or her moves to be mimicked, with a movement guide appearing on the left of the TV set to help strike the right poses, plus a total of how many rounds of that move remain, and a running score total at the top that will add to the overall rating at the end. As with any game like this, plenty of room is required for the full range of body movements that must be carried out, although for some activities it is entirely possible to get away with half-hearted gestures to get 'good' scores. Then again, anyone that buys a training game and then cheats to get high scores clearly wasted their money on the wrong product!

The game boasts 125 different workouts and 215 moves, covering everything from strength building to stretching, cardio to relaxation, and allows for online competitions with friends and family to keep motivation levels high. The only problem is there is no guidance to point out if a manoeuvre is being done wrong and how to rectify it. The inclusion of online challenges, leader-boards, and the ability to hook up to the Your Shape Centre and wider community for local or global events is a stroke of genius and hopefully Nintendo will follow suit with the eventual release of Wii Fit U. There are tests to carry out further into the game, where exercise skills will be put to the test, combining numerous moves together into one intensive programme, and if that is not enough, employing the Personal Trainer element will push trainees to their limits. Finally, for those who love Just Dance, there is a dedicated Dance Mode where calories can be burned to a selection of music. Your Shape: Fitness Evolved 2013 is a surprisingly robust package for anyone hoping to add some home exercise entertainment to their healthier change in lifestyle.