Letter to Nintendo

Dear makers of Nintendo Wii Fit,

First let me begin by telling you how much I truly love your product. My husband and I have just recently purchased our copy of Wii Fit and have already logged countless hours “working out” with our Mii characters.
Since we are new to the Wii Fit community it only seemed natural that we would run into one or two snags in the system. Our first snag came when we first stepped onto the fitness board. I told the game my height and obviously it took my weight. Well, I’m 9 months pregnant… so my weight has an extra 30lbs tacked onto it. The Wii Fit proceeded to inform me that I am obese.
I’ve got to be honest, I was a little bit offended. I wasn’t given the option to say that the game should subtract 30lbs from my weight because of the pregnancy. I didn’t think it was fair that I had to be thrown into the obese category.
While this little issue really kicked me in my “obese” keyster, the part that truly bothered me was the difference that is made between my character and my husband’s. His weight and height are within the “normal” category and while I am very pleased that my husband is keeping himself healthy I was EXTREMELY disappointed to see the differences in how his character was treated. For example, his character was weighed and measured and when he was found to be “normal” he did a little dance and had happy music played for him. My character, on the other hand, when placed into the “obese” category gets tuba music and pats her chubby little belly. Not cool Wii Fit, not cool.
I don’t know how many of the Wii Fit programmers are women and I’m guessing that a good portion of them have not been pregnant. But, I think it’s vital that you keep a few things in mind while programming these games.

1. Pregnant women are already juiced up on more hormones than a pubescent teenager so using words like “obese” in their general vicinity is NOT going to fly. I’m not making a threat, just stating a fact. Pregnant women are crazy and you’re literally risking your life every time one stands on a fitness board & is told she’s obese. Just saying.
2. Unless you have a ready stash of chocolate that magically appears when a pregnant woman is being weighed in front of her husband and friends, you’re asking for a cry-fest. Now, I don’t know about everyone else but my husband has a rule… whoever makes me cry will eventually cry himself. His name is Wes, watch out for him.
3. If you are going to give users an option to subtract a certain amount of weight because of the clothes they are wearing, you should also give them the option to subtract the amount of weight that their child adds. 7lbs is the most I’m able to subtract and my child ALONE weighs 8.
4. Obese is a mean word. Wouldn’t it be great if the Wii Fit could give women the option of having “pregnant” as their description instead of something as nasty as “obese”?

I’m glad we had this talk. I think it’s important that you consider the feelings of all of your consumers before releasing your product. I’ll be excited to see the new version of Wii Fit that at least gives a pregnant woman a fighting chance at fitness before calling her obese and drawing a fat little version of her.

Sincerely,
Summer Slovak