It sounds crazy doesn't it? I mean playing video games isn't a way to get INTO shape right? In fact, historically being a video game addict is one of the surest ways to get OUT of shape. Well I'm here to tell you that's all changed thanks to Virtual Reality.
Now first off, let me say that I am not really a gamer. Other than some time in World of Warcraft quite some time ago my "gaming" has pretty much been restricted to social environments such as Utherverse and Second Life. That being said though, spending all your time hanging out in second life is no better for your general fitness than playing WoW, or Grand Theft Auto, or any other computer or console game you might be playing. Enter Virtual Reality.
For those of you who are not extremely familiar with VR I'll give you a little history on it. Virtual Reality is not new. It's been around in some form or other since the last century, and it's been available for individuals to use at home for 7 or 8 years or so. It's never really taken off though, it's always been too expensive, requiring not only an expensive headset, but an expensive gaming PC. It's also historically been clunky an inconvenient to set up and use, requiring dedicated, wired base stations to track your movements, and you also had to be cabled to your expensive gaming computer, which restricted your movement and caused you to get tangled up in your own cables. This has all changed very recently with the introduction of the Oculus Quest. More on that in a bit.
My husband and I had tried VR for the first time last year while on vacation, and we were both pretty much blown away with how immersive it was. We were both able to play together in some game (I never did get the name of it) in which we were killing hordes of zombies that were attacking us (Why are zombies always attacking us anyway? Aren't there any FRIENDLY zombies? Sheesh!). My screams, yips, and yelps had both my husband and the guy running the VR stuff in stitches (not to mention a few amused on-lookers. I'm lucky I didn't end up on a youtube video!), but that's only because it was such an immersive experience.
We both decided we wanted to get one, but unfortunately our best computer at home turned out to be not quite up to snuff for running VR stuff, so we forgot about it for now. Over the course of the coming year we got a new PC that WAS capable of running VR, so I decided I would get him a VR headset for Christmas. But which one? Well, as it turns out the Oculus Quest had just been released a few months ago, and when I saw that it didn't even require a PC to run, AND it was only $400, we both agreed that was the one to get. Not only would he get his VR, but he wouldn't have to take over my beloved Second Life PC in the process! Sounds like a win-win to me!
Ok, so let's fast forward to Christmas and get to the point of this blog (You knew I'd get there eventually right? :) ). I got him his Quest, and of course we immediately got some games for it. Now of course some of the games were of the "stand there and shoot zombies" variety, which as with most video games will do very little for your cardio vascular health (unless you consider being scared out of your wits when you turn around to find a zombie in your face good for your cardio vascular health...), but one of the games I wanted to play was Beat Saber. Now unless you've been living under a rock (apologies if you DO in fact live under a rock, no offense!) you've probably at least heard of Beat Saber. In case you haven't though, it's a mind numbingly simple and incredibly addictive game in which you slice colored blocks that come flying at you with light sabers to the beat of music. I guess it sounds kind of dopey when you just write it out, but it is actually incredibly fun and addictive.
Well I started playing Beat Saber pretty regularly, and I actually started to get pretty good at it, (Yes sir, if we ever find ourselves being attacked by colored blocks and there happen to be a couple of light sabers handy, I'm your girl!) and I found that I was actually getting a pretty good workout playing that game. In the meantime my husband had bought a boxing game and a table tennis game, and he was noticing the same thing, these games were giving us a good workout! I stink at Table Tennis, and I tried the boxing game but I got knocked out by the sparring partner :(, so I figured those games wouldn't do it for me. I really liked the concept of getting a workout playing games though, so I did a little research and found a game similar to Beat Saber called BoxVR. In BoxVR you swap out your light sabers for boxing gloves and you're punching colored balls instead of blocks, but it's also done to music, and as it turns out I'm much better at punching stuff that doesn't punch back!
I really felt like I was on to something here, so I put together a workout schedule using BoxVR and Beat Saber, and I also added another game to the mix, Racket NX. Racket NX is kind of a space age racket ball game which you also play to music, and while it's not as much of a workout as BoxVR, it does get you moving about and helps your burn off a few additional calories. The best part of Racket Nx is you can actually user your own songs instead of just the included soundtrack. We even found a program called Yur that tracks your calorie usage while you're doing stuff in VR (we had to get set up with a site called "Sidequest" and do something called "side loading") to get that, but fortunately there are plenty of Youtube videos to show you how to do that).
I'm sure by now you're all dying to find out how all this turned out right? Well either that or you've already fallen asleep or left, but if you have then your loss! Now my husband lives at the gym and was already in great shape, but even so he finds his boxing and table tennis games to be good supplementary workouts. For me though, this has been life changing. While I've always tried to stay in decent shape, I've always HATED the drudgery of exercising. Peddling away on a bike to nowhere or walking/jogging on a treadmill to nowhere is just dreary and boring. Dance aerobics with some sadistic instructor who is doing her damnedest to make you puke gets old too, but they were always necessary evils if I wanted to keep my ass from getting double chins.
Well no more! I've completely ditched all that stuff, and my daily routine now consists of a half hour of BoxVR in the morning, a half hour of Beat Saber at lunch (I work from home a lot), and whatever I feel like doing after work, usually either more Beat Saber or some Racket NX. The best part is, this stuff is actually FUN! And I've lost 4 lbs since I started without any major dieting effort. I've modified my diet a little just to eat a bit healthier, but I'm not counting calories or points or anything, and I've actually taken off most of my holiday baggage, and I feel better too.
Now I don't want to give you the impression this stuff is training you for the Olympics or anything. If you really want to go for totally buff, you're still going to have to do the more traditional stuff. This is more for the person who just wants to drop a few pounds, feel better, be healthier, and have fun in the process. If, like me you just want to look good in your summer bikini and don't want to waste hours and hours of your life with dreary, boring exercise routines, this just might be for you.
Of course you'll have to buy the VR gear (I recommend the Oculus Quest!), but honestly, it's so cool I would recommend getting that even if you COULDN'T exercise with it. Exercise was never our intention for getting it, it's just an awesome bonus we kind of stumbled upon after we'd already bought the thing.
Going forward I'm hoping to add some additional games to my routine as well. As you've probably guessed from my previous blog (You HAVE read my previous blog right? RIGHT?!! ) I absolutely love music, so anything I add will probably be other rhythm games. I think my next purchase might be a game called Audica, which is kind of like Beat Saber with guns instead of light sabers. I think Beat Saber and BoxVR will always be my one-two punch (pun intended) for workout games, but the more I can supplement my daily routine of slicing blocks and punching balls, the better I'll look in my bikini this summer.
Ok so all of this sounds good and you want in, so what do you do next? Well first off obviously is to get a VR headset. Unfortunately the Quest is pretty hard to come by these days (I guess it's manufactured in China and has been clobbered by Coronavirus), but there are plenty of other options if you want to jump in right now. I'm not going to go into what else is available but there are plenty of Youtube videos out there that give a really good comparison of the currently available VR headsets.
Once you get a headset (PLEASE make sure your PC is capable of running it if you get anything besides a Quest!), you're pretty much good to go. Any of the games I mentioned that we're using (Beat Saber, BoxVR, RacketNx, Thrill of the Fight, and Racket Fury) is a great place to start. If none of those float your boat though (in which case I'm sorry to hear your boat is sinking!), here's a link to a website article that lists 25 of the best VR fitness games, and what headsets they run on.
Oh, and one additional note if you decide to wait and get a Quest. The Oculus Quest can now connect to your PC (again, assuming you have a PC that can run this stuff) and play any game that the Oculus Rift can play. It does require an expensive, not included cable to do so, but I think it's worth it as it really expands the number of games available to you. Anyway, don't worry if a game you want to try doesn't list the Quest as one of it's platforms. If you have a PC and get a cable, you can play any of them!
Here's the Website Article. If you found this blog at all useful, informative, or entertaining, please leave a comment below, I'd love to hear from you! If on the other hand you found it to be shallow, trite, and lacking any worthwhile information whatsoever, well I would still love to hear from you anyway (Meanie!!).
I guess that's about it. Maybe I'll do a follow-up after a few more months of doing this and let you know how it's going. Or not. I dunno, I make this stuff up as I go, and in case you haven't figured it out for yourself yet I'm a bit of a ditz, so no promises! :). But anyway, wish me luck, I'm off to kill some VR zombies! DJ CherryBomb, Over, Out, and Done! :)
XX-Cherry-XX
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