Product Description

"The first in the Active Life series, Outdoor Challenge offers a variety of fast-paced games that engages your whole body for a fun and challenging experience. Using the specially-designed mat and the Wii Remote™, players compete in over a dozen single and multi-player events like river rafting, mine-cart adventure, log jumping, and more. "

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #150 in Video Games
• Brand: Namco
• Model: 80006
• Released on: 2008-09-09
• ESRB Rating: Everyone
• Platform: Nintendo Wii
• Dimensions: 4.30" h x 12.70" w x 11.80" l, 2.75 pounds

Features

• Get Active – A fun and easy way to get off the couch and get hearts pumping!
• Gameplay Variety – Play over a dozen fast-paced games, alone or with friends, in energetic events that gets players’ whole bodies into the action.
• Tremendous Replay Value – Over a dozen games, each with multiple levels of play: river rafting, mine-cart adventure, log jumping, see-saw, jump rope, water trampoline, plus many more!
• Mii Support – Play as your Mii from the very beginning
• The Active Life Mat – The specially-designed mat is bundled with the game so you can jump straight into the action!

Amazon.com
Jump into the fun with Active Life Outdoor Challenge. The first of many planned titles in the new Active Life series, Outdoor Challenge offers a variety of fast-paced, heart-pumping games that will engage your whole body for a fun and challenging experience.

Using the specially-designed eight pad Active Life mat and the Wii Remote, players get totally physical as they compete in over a dozen single and multi-player challenges like river rafting, mine-cart adventure, log jumping, and more. Simple controls and intuitive actions make these games easy to pick up and play right out of the box and in the process will get you and your whole family off the couch and into the game in no time.

Game Features:

• The Active Life Mat - A fun and easy way to get off the couch and get hearts pumping.
• Gameplay Variety - Play over a dozen fast-paced games, alone or with friends,in energetic events that gets players’ whole bodies into the action.
• Intuitive Gameplay - Simple controls allow for quick pick up and play. Great for parties.
• Play Together - With both competitive and co-operative challenges.
• Track Character’s Fitness Progress - See your character’s body change according to how you play.
• Tremendous Replay Value - Over a dozen games, each with multiple levels of play: river rafting, mine-cart adventure, log jumping, see-saw, jump rope, water trampoline, plus many more.
• Other Features - Includes training mode to work different body parts and synchronization gauge to check the level of team work in cooperative play.

Enjoy challenges on the land. View larger.

And on the water. View larger.

Battle friends in multiplayer action. View larger.

Or team up in co-op play. View larger.

Customer Reviews

Good Cardio workout!
I am an owner of a Wii Fit, so I wanted to try another interactive game that moved my whole body. This game is just as great as the Wii Fit. Here are a couple of pros and cons of Namco's Active Life Outdoor Challenge:

Pro:

Will move your entire body - if you looking for a cardio workout. There are a lot of games that you can play by yourself, against someone or as a team. You can use your Mii; and the game will collect fitness data that you can gage your fitness over time.

Con:

My kids kept jumping off the mat and off the small squares and triangles. They are not looking down at the mat, but up at the television. So you have to make sure your eyes and feet are coordinated enough for you to watch the screen and ensure your feet are in the right place on the mat.

The mat itself is like the Wii Remote so while was reading the instructions my daughter was using the mat to move the instructions before I could finish reading them. I thought I was going crazy because I wasn't using the actual Wii Remote to move to the next screen. (This will eventually become a pro when you really get the hang of it)

My daughters and I played for about 90 minutes and we were all sweaty and tired by the time we said ENOUGH! Between this game and Wii Fit I don't see how anyone could not get a good cardio and strength training fitness regime.

I am anxious to see how Namco will franchise this "interactive mat" into more physically challenging games...i.e. an Active Life series.

Great exercise!
I'm not a kid. In fact I'm almost 60 and I bought the game for myself after getting Wii Fit a couple weeks ago and really enjoying the games that are included with that.

I LOVE this game (or series of small games) If you want a good workout and you're a kid at heart, you're going to love Outdoor Challenge. I've only played it by myself so far but I can tell you that it works every part of your body. I was dripping with sweat after 10 minutes. Some of the games you do standing, or I should say running in place and jumping over logs or jumping on a trampoline over water or jumping rope. There's a Mine Cart game where you're leaning to the side and lifting one foot while pumping both hands up and down to propel the cart at ever faster speeds. Or sitting on the mat and rowing with the "paddle" (wiimote) trying to get to the goal as fast as you can.

Like the Wii Fit games, it keeps track of your scores and the scores of others that play so you are constantly trying to beat your best scores and get top scores in the games.

This game is too much fun to waste on kids. Get it for yourself! It'll make you laugh out loud!

What a Workout!
I'm in my 40s, been working out for many years and I'm a big fan of Dance Dance Revolution which stripped 50 pounds off me. I don't have Wii Fit, but this is the first game I've tried for the Wii that really gives DDR a run for its money.

At the beginning, go to Free Play mode first as it lets you practice all the minigames on their easiest levels. Once you get the hang of them, go to the courses on Outdoor Adventure mode that will unlock higher levels as you pass them.

The third mode, Exercise Training, has a variety of courses that range from about 5-10 minutes long. You can't fail the games on these courses; just keep playing as well as you can for the allotted time. One of the courses, 10 Minute Marathon, simply has you walking or running for 10 minutes. You can use this course for interval training; for instance, run for 10 seconds and walk for 20 seconds (or the other way around!) for 20 rounds. The Outdoor Adventure mode also allows you to design your own courses, although it seems you can only save one course at a time.

You get "Activity Points" for completing the exercise courses, which are put on a daily graph along with a Brain Age-like stamp. Unfortunately there is no calorie counter in this game (unlike DDR for PS2) and it doesn't record exact dates you worked out, just "2 days ago", etc. It also doesn't record your weight, but maybe that makes this more suitable for children than Wii Fit.

I'd like to add that this game is VERY beginner-friendly, especially compared to another Namco exergame for Wii, We Cheer (another excellent game, but with a huge leap in difficulty level). Active Life can be played by anyone - young or old, from sedentary overweight folks to athletes. On Free Play, there are scrolling instructions for each game that you can easily skip past, and Easy mode even has on-screen prompts. Exercise mode allows you to go at your own pace, even if you have to just walk through or keep taking breaks. On the other end of the spectrum, the most advanced courses are super-tough; I still haven't passed them! This is one game you won't "outgrow".

My favorite games are the mine cart (a real core/balance challenge), mountain boarding, pipe slider, speed skating and the most DDR-like game, whack-a-mole. The mat slides around a bit (putting it on a sticky yoga mat helped) and is probably too narrow for two "plus-sized" adults to play at once, but it responds very well. I would love to see future Active Life games add more enhancements to Exercise mode (like keeping track of scores, dates and calories burned) and add more types of games like perhaps a music/rhythm game and games that use lateral and forward/back jumping.

But overall, this is an awesome first entry for what I hope will be a long and successful series!