As you explore, you learn secrets about the wilderness and how to survive there. You will face challenges such as figuring out which plants grow better closer to water and where certain animals need to live to survive. The game is interactive, so what you do in one area may affect other areas of the game. Up to four people can play the game at the same time, which makes for interesting results based on each player’s actions.

SimAnimals for the Nintendo Wii regularly sells for $49.99, but Amazon has it on sale right now for $46.99.

Once a certain number of cases have been chosen, you get the option to chose “Deal” or “No Deal” to the banker’s offers. But, there are also different versions of the game such as Banker’s challenge, Variety Ladder, or Risky Business available. You can customize the game to bring along a friend or even play as the banker!

By playing, you can unlock 20 awards, which show up in the My Estate screen of the game. Up to four people can compete. Deal or No Deal for the Nintendo Wii will be priced at $29.99.

After taking a brief look at it, I can see several differences between the two.  First, My Fitness Coach seems to take what I consider to be a more accurate BMI analysis during the initial profile setup.  While I suppose the Wii Fit goes on only height and weight, My Fitness Coach wants you to enter measurements of biceps, chest, waist, hips, and thighs, like a real fitness coach would.  It also measures your resting and exercising heart rate to find the optimum rate.

My Fitness Coach does a few things that Wii Fit does not.  It focuses on more traditional workouts such as yoga, cardio, upper body, core body, lower body, and flexibility.  Maya, the fitness coach, makes suggestions based on your profile, which I like.  Maya also chooses the amount of workouts you need each week based on your profile and how much you hope to lose.  Of course, since My Fitness Coach doesn’t come with a board like Wii Fit, you have to guesstimate your weight, but one thing I did like was it told you how long to work out and estimated the calories burned at the end of each workout session.

You get cutsie options like where you want to work out (a dojo, a meditation garden, etc) and get to choose your music (80s, latin, techno).  Both sections have locked areas that can only be opened through use.  When you actually do the workout, there is a tutorial which is slowed down to let uncoordinated people like me learn the steps.  You can choose from options such as increasing or decreasing the intensity of the workout and there are the occasional fitness tips.

Overall, I think I will like Nintendo Wii’s My Fitness Coach.  It is more serious than the Wii Fit, which seems to focus on fun more than actual workouts sometimes, but it is more personalize than just your everyday workout DVD.

Of course, my son is not quite coordinated enough to drive the trucks, even with the steering wheel, which was a massive help to mom and dad, but he loves watching us. And, while I hate to admit it publically, it is fun to drive these monster trucks as your get to crush cars, jump over obstacles, and basically destroy everything in the stadium. There are different events such as Eliminator, Circuit, Freestyle, Stadium Racing, Stadium Circuit, Time Trial, and Cross Country and if you play the championship and finish 3rd or better, you can unlock tracks.

There are nine different stadiums from which to choose and you can even take to truck to 12 different outdoor tracks. There is a split screen option, so you can have up to four players. As you play, you earn Monster Points, which allows you to unlock hidden trucks.

Monster Jam can be purchased for $36.99, but you might be able to find it on sale for as low as $25.

But, while it may not improve your physique, it is designed to help improve your mind.  Big Brain Academy is a series of puzzles done to test your brain power.  There are three ways to play.  You can test to see how you perform originally, practice to get better, or play against someone else.

Big Brain Academy tests you in five categories:  Think (logical), Analyze (reason), Compute (math), Identify (visual), and Memorize (memory).  As you go through each category, you are asked to do puzzles such as watch colored balls go into a basket, then say which color scored the most baskets, pick out identical Miis from a group, or remove one number from a group to get a certain sum.  All in all, there are 15 activities.  You are timed with each response, so that makes it a bit tricky.  You not only need to be good, you need to be good and fast.

As you train and play, you are supposed to be able to increase your brain size and therefore, your brain power.  Frankly, I don’t think I have much of a chance in the Compute category.  Once the game is over, you are given a letter grade and shown what areas need improvement.  Dr. Lobe, the headmaster, then tells you what profession, based on your scores, would be best for you.

I find the game to be both fun and frustrating, but I definitely think it helps to make your mind sharper.  Big Brain Academy Wii Degree normally sells for $49.99 although some times you can find it on sale for less.

And there is obviously still a demand. eBay reported selling 3,171 Wiis and a little over a thousand Wii Fit games. eBay reported the average price of Wiis on Black Friday was $350, about $100 more Nintendo’s suggested price. The Wii Fit game sold for about $50 more than the retail price of $140. Some stores still ran out of the game system, enough though many had a “20 people at a time” policy the morning of Black Friday. So far, an estimated 7 million consoles have been sold since the release of the Nintendo Wii.

If you are still searching for a Nintendo Wii, check out the Nintendo Wii Tracker to find the system online.

I’ve read some bad reviews, but personally, I thought it was fun and it remains one of my favorite Nintendo Wii games.  There are 25 carnival games from which to choose.  You can select from areas such as Fortune Way, which features games such as alley ball (where you roll the bowling ball down the alley and try to get it to stay in the valley of two curved pieces of steel), test your strength (which I suck at), and hoops.  Claw Alley features something I love – a claw game or crane game as we always called it.  This is where you maneuver the claw to grasp a prize.  Yes, the prizes are a bit cheesy – you can trade up smaller prizes for larger prizes, just like on a real midway.
But, the games are still fun.  Love Lane offers balloon darts and Meter-o-Love, Lucky Pass has Push a Prize (where you drop coins to get more), and a dunk tank (always fun), and Rodent’s Row has Buckets of Fun.  This is the one where you toss the softball into the tilted bushel barrel.  For some reason, I am freakishly good at this game, which I have never been able to master in real life.  And, just like the real carnival, most games have carnies that bark at you while you are trying to concentrate.

As you plan and win, you unlock new games and new items that your character can wear, such as silly hats or butterfly wings.  You can play solo or against another player for competition.

At $39.99, Carnival Games is a bit steep in price compared to some Nintendo Wii games, but since I enjoy these games, I think it was money well spent.  The kiddies seem to love these games as well.

What I love most about it is that it makes me responsible for activity and weight loss. The only time I ever really committed to losing weight and followed through on it was when I signed up with an online service. Each week, I had to log my weight, so if I gained, not only did I know, but I had to tell my mentor. While it is easy for me to write off weight gain to stress or illness, when I have to tell someone else, I take a closer look and realize I was probably just lazy with my diet or exercise.

And, the Nintendo Wii Fit holds me accountable, just like the online service. Sure, I can leave it turned off, but there it is, right on top of my television. When I turn it on, the first thing it wants to do is evaluate where I am with my weight loss goal. While I do question its reasoning for my Wii age sometimes, I do appreciate it keeping track of my weight loss (or yes, even my weight gain) as well as keeping up with how much I work out.

Will the Nintendo Wii Fit make you get up off your butt and exercise? No, it won’t work for everyone. There are still going to be people who can and will ignore it not long after it has been removed from the box. But, when you do get serious about losing weight and exercising, the Nintendo Wii Fit can help you keep tabs on your progress, which for me is an easier way to stay motivated!