Technophile readers will know that Wii Fit is only one of a number of exergaming products on the market today. In fact exergaming as a concept has been around for over 25 years. For a good read on exergaming check out From Atari Joyboard to Wii Fit on BoingBoing.

One of the products listed in that article is Yourself!Fitness. Released in 2004, this exergame developed by Respondesign for Xbox, PS2 and PC is currently Wii Fit's closest competition and they know it, promoting the title online with the tag "Before Wii Fit there was Yourself Fitness". The game has received a great deal of positive press and by all accounts, it really does work. In many respects it is far better than Wii Fit but it does have one major drawback – Y!F does not provide real-time feedback.

Like Wii Fit, Y!F has an onscreen trainer who guides you through the various activities but since there are no motion/weight-sensitive controllers, the game relies on asking the user for feedback on how they feel they are performing and then adjusts the workout accordingly.

This is obviously where Wii Fit has a distinct advantage over Y!F and why, moving forward, the Wii platform will lead the way in exergaming. Y!F users would no doubt look at Wii Fit and say that it's more game than true fitness and they would be right but I don't think it's fair to compare the two games in that way. As I've said in previous posts, Wii Fit was never intended to be the ultimate fitness title. I see Wii Fit as more of a proof of concept of what could be done on the Wii platform with the introduction of the Wii Balance Board and now it's up to third-party developers to run with it.

We know that EA are considering a fitness title and that Majesco will be releasing Jillian Michaels' Fitness Ultimatum - let's just hope that they learn from games like Yourself!Fitness and give us the exergames we really want.

For a more in-depth comparison of Wii Fit and Yourself!Fitness check out GameSpy.

The American Council on Exercise (ACE) has just released its findings on a study investigating the potential fitness benefits of Wii Sports. Unfortunately this study was completed before the launch of Wii Fit, but the good news is that ACE are now busy with a similar study examining Wii Fit.

While the findings of the current report are not earth-shattering (playing Wii Sports IS better for you than sitting on the couch), they do make for some interesting reading. More importantly however, the study, conducted at the University of Wisconsin, La Crosse Exercise and Health Program, seemed, in my view to be very well thought out and extremely scientific so we should be able to look forward to an accurate assessment of Wii Fit in the coming months.

You can read the official press release and download the results of the study from www.acefitness.org.

GameDaily has just published an interview with Nintendo President Satoru Iwata. They were lucky enough to get some one-on-one time with him at E3 last week and discussed several topics and touched briefly on the whole supply and demand issue. Here's what he had to say:

"In the spring of this year, we announced that starting from this summer (2008) we would have a monthly maximum production capacity for Wii of 2.4 million, and we are working with that schedule right now. We are [continuing] to increase the maximum production capability... However, the expansion of the market for potential customers, the number of people who are waiting to purchase Wii, is beyond our expectations right now. So for the time being, I really do not think that the imbalance for supply and demand can be solved immediately. For example, when we look back at the whole history of video games, in the past it was unthinkable that other than during the November – December time period we would have 700,000 monthly unit sales in U.S. alone."

Now I understand that he's referring here to the Wii console itself and not Wii Fit, but his comments do give us some insight into the way in which Nintendo handles it's production so here's my bit of speculation. For Wii Fit, they would have estimated launch sales based on past Wii sales to set a target (difficult considering that Wii Fit opened up an entirely new market) and then set their monthly production figures. Clearly they underestimated that figure and now need to ramp up production but that doesn't happen overnight. In the meantime they have to rotate distribution globally with the stock they do have which means that different regions are going to experience shortages at different times. That would explain why, for example, Wii Fit dropped off the UK sales charts for three weeks at the end of May / beginning June - just as launch sales would have ramped up following Wii Fit's release in the US. It all sounds logical but it's no consolation to those of you who still can't get your hands on one.

The UK's Telegraph has published an article claiming that Wii Fit may be sold out by Christmas. If the desperate emails we get from readers are anything to go by, then never mind Christmas, for the vast majority of people, Wii Fit is sold out now.

While this kind of scaremongering only helps to feed the frenzy, it may unfortunately prove to be true. The article quotes a spokesperson for one of the UK's largest electrical retailers who says, "If we get 1,000 in on Thursday or Friday they are all gone by Sunday. We comfortably sell out of our allocation".

Meanwhile the debate goes on with regards to why there's an ongoing shortage of stock. Is it simply a case of demand outstripping supply? And just how much is the average consumer being cheated by the whole buy and resell at a profit on eBay market?

You'd have thought that Nintendo would have learnt a lesson from the Wii console launch and ensured that there was more than enough stock this time around. But the conspiracy theorists among you will say that in fact the artificial shortage of the console actually worked in Nintendo's favour and now they’re simply doing the same with Wii Fit. You've got to love a good conspiracy.

Update: It seems that all this doom and gloom in the papers about stock shortages got the attention of Nintendo who responded to MCV in an attempt to reassure the public.

As for the whole conspiracy theory thing, this blog post received (if the associated email address is to be believed) a comment from Nintendo.com confirming 'intentional shortage'. I'm sorry, call me naïve, but I don't believe a word of it so nice try whoever you were. The fact is that when there's limited supply of something, a company will move that stock to where it makes most financial sense - surely that's not 'intentional shortage', that's business strategy? As to why Nintendo doesn't seem to be able to cope with demand, only Nintendo knows the real answer and anything other than that is simply speculation.

Responses to the Wii Fit Survey have been coming in steadily and while it's still too soon to draw any objective conclusions, the response to Wii Fit and the Wii Balance Board has been overwhelmingly positive. As expected, considering that Wii Fit has only been available for 2 to 3 months worldwide, and despite some valid gripes about the game, we've seen very little drop-off in usage in our survey. No doubt over time we will start to see some drop-off but if the feedback we’ve been getting is anything to go by, the balance board itself should go from strength to strength.

Incidentally, 22% of Wii Fit users polled thus far have bought another balance board compatible game which is not bad when you consider that the only other game available right now is We Ski/Family Ski. This is another figure which is certain to increase over the coming months and will continue to do so as long as developers like Ubisoft and Electronic Arts remain committed to the balance board. I only hope that the Wiiboard isn't overshadowed by Wii MotionPlus.

We've also been getting some really great feedback on Wii Fit and some excellent suggestions on how it could be improved. One of the most common complaints, certainly from an exercise point of view, was the disjointedness of the various activities and the time it takes to move from one to the other. Ideally, users would like to have the ability to create a personalised exercise routine by stringing together a number of different activities and then performing them without interruption. Sounds like a good idea to me. We now know (or at least hope) that EA is working on a dedicated fitness title so let's hope that this is the kind of thing they take into consideration.

PS - If you haven't already, do please take a moment to give us your feedback on Wii Fit and help us to get the word out about the Wii Fit Balance Board Survey.

A bit off topic, but here's a clever use of Wii Fit jogging and an exercise bike - instead of sticking the Wiimote in your pocket, attach it to your foot as you pedal on a stationary bike.

It's a very simple idea which opens up some interesting possibilites for cycling games. Imagine being able to cycle the Tour de France or Giro d'Italia routes from the comfort of your own home, getting some exercise while you do it. Anyone for a Lance Amstrong endorsed Wii Cycle?

To be honest it's unlikely that anyone would develop this into a game since the market would be fairly limited - Wii owners with exercise/stationary bikes - but with rumours of EA developing fitness titles surely it wouldn't be too difficult to add this as an option?

Those of you who've been following the buzz surrounding Wii Fit may have seen the recent results of a poll conducted by IT Media Japan which showed that out of the 1000 Japanese Wii Fit owners they polled, a staggering 64% had stopped using it.

Wii Fit has been available outside of Japan since April, and while we don't expect to see anywhere near the same kind of dropoff as Japan at this early stage, we thought it would be a good idea to try and gauge some initial reactions to Wii Fit from the rest of the world by creating a short Wii Fit Balance Board Survey. In addition to simply asking how often people use Wii Fit we thought it would be useful to try to find out a bit more about how Wii Fit is used and also gauge reactions to the Wii Balance Board itself.

Click here to start the survey - it will only take you a minute or two and the results will be published on WiiBBG once we have enough responses for some meaningful results.

Even if you don't own Wii Fit you can still tell us what you think so have your say.

It's been almost two months since the US launch of Wii Fit and although the Nintendo Wii Fit marketing machine grinds on, enough time has passed to be able to make a fair assessment of the game's success or failure. I think it's safe to say that response has been mixed but now that the initial hype has begun to die down we're starting to notice a growing sense of disappointment as we see more and more instances of users telling us why Wii Fit sucks. Don't get me wrong, I'm a big Nintendo fan, but this comes as no surprise and here's why.

From a gaming perspective, Wii Fit was bound to disappoint. The various games, while fun initially, are very limited and have no long term appeal – again, that's no surprise and I'll explain later why I say this. As far as appealing to casual / non-gamers, it was a stroke of marketing genius to position Wii Fit as a 'lifestyle' product and tap into the growing health/fitness market but here's the rub. In my opinion, gaming and exercise, certainly goal-oriented exercise, don't mix. Gaming is about having fun and getting away from reality. It's not about being reminded that in the real world you're overweight and probably going to die from a heart attack before you turn 40. Games are there to be played when you want, for however long you want and you don't want to be reminded that "it's been 7 days since you last exercised".

Wii Fit may have come as a shock to many users who bought it thinking, hey, this is a game so it will be a fun and easy way to lose weight and get fit. But it's a lot like joining the gym after that New Year's resolution – a few days in and you suddenly realise that it's not easy and actually requires more hard work and dedication than you thought. That's not to say that Wii Fit doesn't work. There are lots of examples of people having lost weight and improved their overall fitness using it but the one thing they all have in common is that they embraced the 'lifestyle' aspect of Wii Fit and committed to using it consistently (as you would with any other exercise program). For them, it wasn't a game. Whether it continues to deliver results long term is hard to say but there's a gap waiting to be filled, something that hasn't gone unnoticed by the likes of EA Games.

So does Wii Fit really suck? Well yes, if you were expecting a full-on game. Yes if you thought it would be a fun, easy way to lose weight and get fit without really committing to anything. But in terms of its real purpose (at least in my opinion) it's done its job very well. Think of Wii Fit in these terms – Wii Fit is to the Wii Balance Board what Wii Sports was to the Wii Console. Like Wii Sports, Wii Fit wasn't supposed to have long term appeal. Wii Fit's purpose was to get as many Wii Balance Boards into homes as possible; to prove to third-party developers that the peripheral could have mass-market appeal and to fill the gap between the board's launch and the release of more fully-featured balance board games.

A recent Japanese poll showed that 64% of Wii Fit users had stopped using it. I'm sure that had the poll instead asked how many people had stopped using their balance boards for Wii Fit AND other games (unfortunately limited to Family Ski at this point) that figure would have dropped slightly. Had more balance board compatible games been available, I guarantee you that the number would have been significantly less than 64%.

It really is a shame that third-party developers didn't come to the party sooner but in a way you can kind of understand their reluctance to commit to a new peripheral that could have turned out to be a white elephant. But now that Wii Fit continues to sell out everywhere I think it's clear that the market for balance board games is there and developers have responded accordingly. Of course some credit must go to Namco who included balance board support in We Ski/Family Ski which was available at the launch of Wii Fit, but it's guys like EA Games and Ubisoft who are going to pick up where Wii Fit leaves off, not only in terms of pure games but also the lifestyle/fitness market.

This month's E3 convention will really give us a feel for just how committed they are and let's hope we see some really great games released soon – we don't want lose the momentum that the buzz and excitement of Wii Fit has generated. So those of you who feel the need to knock Wii Fit now, just remember that in months to come, when you are playing games like EA Skate It or Shaun White Snowboarding, it's thanks to Wii Fit that they even exist.

If you're still on the hunt for Wii Fit (in the US) then these two sites are worth paying a visit - zooLert and WiiAlerts. They both keep a constant eye on Wii Fit at many of the top online retailers (Amazon, CircuitCity, BestBuy, Walmart) and will alert you via email or sms/text as soon as stock becomes available.

Thanks to clevelandmom who posted these sites on her blog - she received alerts yesterday morning and was able to order a Wii Fit online.

Update: UK visitors, check out Wii-consoles.co.uk for realtime Wii console stock alerts and Wii Fit stock alerts.

If you haven't managed to get your hands (or feet) on Wii Fit yet and you'd like to give it a try, Nintendo has announced more tour venue dates for July and August. Check the list below to see if the tour is in your area. For more details and a chance to win a trip to the Lake District visit feelgreatbritain.com.

JULY
Trafford Centre, Manchester (3 - 6 July)
Gyle Shopping Centre, Edinburgh (3 - 6 July)
Sunbury Leisure Centre, Middlesex (5 - 6 July)
Ikea Cardiff, Cardiff (5 - 6 July)
RAF Waddington Air Show, RAF Waddington (5 - 6 July)
Arndale Centre, Manchester (10 - 13 July)
Ikea Bristol, Bristol (12 - 13 July)
Stratford Leisure Centre, Stratford-upon-Avon (12 - 13 July)
The Royal Commonwealth Pool, Edinburgh (12 - 15 July)
Bullring, Birmingham (17 - 20 July)
Hereford Leisure Centre, Hereford (19 - 20 July)
Ikea Lakeside, Essex (19 - 20 July)
JJB Fitness Club, Belfast (19 -20 July)
Aldershot Lido, Aldershot (24 August)
Beach Promenade, Bournemouth (26 - 27 July)
JJB Fitness Club, Londonderry (26 - 27 July)
Knutsford Leisure Centre, Knutsford (26 - 27 July)
Toolcross Park Leisure Centre, Glasgow (28 - 29 July)
Xscape Castleford, Leeds (28 July - 3 August)
Xscape Braehead, Braehead (28 July - 3 August)

AUGUST
Xscape Milton Keynes, Milton Keynes (4 - 10 August)
Center Parcs - Whinfell Forest(6 August)
International Balloon Fiesta, Bristol (7 - 10 August)
Liverpool Central Library, Liverpool (7 August)
Briggate, Leeds (8 - 9 August)
Richmond Lido, Richmond (10 August)
Birmingham Central Library (12 August)
Center Parcs - Elveden Forest (13 August)
Center Parcs - Sherwood Forest (13 August)
Eastbourne Air Show, Eastbourne (14 - 17 August)
Gosforth Library, Newcastle (15 August)
Northampton Balloon Festival, Northampton (15 - 17 August)
Center Parcs - Longleat Forest (16 August)
Tooting Bec Lido, Tooting Bec (17 August)
Nottingham Central Library, Nottingham (20 August)
Braehead Centre, Glasgow (21 - 24 August)
Forum Library Manchester, Manchester (23 August)
Sunderland Air Show, Sunderland (26 - 27 July)
Brighton Beach, Brighton (29 - 31 August)