What I would like to make clear
is that I am by no means a
‘gamer’. I do not even own a
gaming console. In my late teens
I swapped Playstations and
Nintendo 64s for the gym, live
rugby league, travel and beer. I
haven’t looked back since.
I can say, however, that this
game has tempted me.
It’s a fully fledged RPG with
monsters and enemies to
battle, worlds to explore and
demanding challenges that
took me by surprise.
The game involves setting up
your own personal character to
explore the worlds and take part
in challenges. On the first level
you meet your sentient ring,
ironically named Ring. Ring acts
as your personal trainer and
mentor, guiding you through a
map-based world, hopping from
level to level while collecting
gear, upgrades, tokens etc. In
essence, it has everything that
you would expect from any
adventure game.
“
The
muscular
endurance
needed to
keep up
with the
gameplay is
surprising.”
With one controller inside a leg
strap and another that slots into
the ring accessory, the game
measures and monitors your
body position to ensure you are
doing the exercises correctly.
Squeezing or pulling on the ring
blasts or sucks in coins, while
14
FM
to move forward you have to
constantly run on the spot. It
even has nice little touches like
you have to perform high knees
to be able to wade through
water. The further through the
levels you progress, the more
complicated and advanced
the basic gameplay and
movements become.
At some stage during a level
you will need to battle an
enemy – this is where the
real work begins. To battle an
enemy you have to perform a
series of repeated exercises
using the ring as resistance.
This is where the game took me
by surprise!
As a regular gym goer who
loves nothing more than
throwing some weights around I
was expecting this to be easy. I
was wrong!
www.exerciseregister.org
The ring provides a good level
of resistance and the muscular
endurance needed to keep up
with the gameplay is surprising.
Some of the exercises include
an overhead ring squeeze,
a chest press squeeze and
crunches, among others. My
deltoids had a nice little burn to
them afterwards and my lack
of mobility was highlighted in
some of the more Yoga-based
exercises. The combination
of concentric and isometric
muscular contractions needed
to hold the poses when battling
has been well thought out
and provides a great way of
exercising without the need for
heavy resistance.
The part of the gameplay
that lets this game down for