Do you want to get into shape but simply cannot be bothered to get away from the Xbox? Well, grab yourself a copy of UFC Personal Trainer, that’s exactly what I did and here’s how I got along in my quest for a six pack and bulging abs.
Before beginning, you must undergo a physical check-up, this requires you to input your age, height and weight. To complete the check-up you must then undergo a minute of push ups, a minute of sit ups and one for jumping jacks so that the game knows what its dealing with.
You will be automatically enrolled with a difficulty level depending on your check-up’s results, so you can either be shuffled into the Beginner category, Intermediate or Advanced. Personally, I was Advanced! What do you mean you don’t believe me? Ok, I was on the Beginner difficulty level (sigh). The only difference between the difficulty levels is the duration and overall gnarliness of the exercises and challenges that you will face. The lower the difficulty level, the lower the medal you can earn (Bronze, Silver and Gold being the choices). You can then choose a preset or customized workout with a hardened UFC trainer: Mark DellaGrotte, Greg Jackson or Javier Mendez.
The exercises come with a learning curve, but once you’ve got the hang of things you’re away. Along with various lower body and upper body challenges, you are faced with warm-up and cool-down stretching exercises to avoid injury. I feel loved. If you think you’re too ‘ard for those stretching exercises, you can use the customize option to allow you to line up to ten main exercises of your choice.
UFC Personal Trainer doesn’t really teach you the basics of Mixed Martial Arts fighting, and doesn’t have any focus on technique, form and methods, something I was quite stunned at. THQ might have chosen not to include those features in order to avoid confusing the average user, as afterall, does Joe Bloggs want to know how to shift his weight when performing a left-angle slice kick? No.
The Kinect detector stunned me at first, it’s incredibly responsive and shows how developers THQ have really spent a lot of time perfecting its Kinect features. Of course, it does suffer a few niggles, but they’re usually down to the Kinect itself or your positioning most of the time.
Is UFC Personal Trainer fun I hear you ask? If you’re looking for a game to idle away the hours with, then no, but if you want to get in to shape and have some fun while your at, it then yes. UFC Peronal Trainer really is one of the best fitness titles around for the Kinect, far better than its competitors and combines a number of exercises routines with combat-related challenges.
Do I feel fitter though? Not really. Although I’ve only been doing the excersies for a week or two, I’m sure you’ll get some pretty nice results after a few weeks or months, but it’s certainly no gym replacement.
REVIEW CODE: A complimentary Microsoft Xbox 360 code was provided to Brash Games for this review. Please send all review code enquiries to editor@brashgames.co.uk.
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I thought about buying this and after seeing this review I think I will