Zumba Fitness Core Kinect Review

As I am very new to the whole XBox-Kinect thing and also very new to the whole Zumba thing (I know WAAAY behind the times on both). I know I know I am a PC gamer through and through and haven't played on a game console since the original Nintendo and then the original Sega.  Since then it has been strictly PC for me.  I was always interested in the workout games when Wii first came out for playstation and I remember hearing that Kinect had expounded upon Wii when it came out.  Overall it just looked like quite a bit of fun.  I also was always interested in Zumba class, but even after a one year membership at the gym I found that the classes that were offered did not fit into my single mommy, bedtime for Liam schedule and so I was never able to get into it.  Also I felt like Zumba was something that I really wanted to do WITH someone.  I thought it would be a great class to take with a friend.  Alas as with everything else in San Angelo, at the time I found it quit difficult to try to get anyone to do anything outside of going out or drinking so I stuck with myself again.

Back to the topic at hand, when my boyfriend told me that he had a Kinect with his XBOX I was SO excited to try some of the workout "games" that were available.  I immediately started my search for which ones were the best and what I could find used and for cheap and also in my facebook shopping
groups.  Within a few days I was able to find someone selling a couple of Zumba Kinect "games" so I negotiated a fair price and was able to gleefully take them home.  Immediately I tried it out having no idea what I was doing.

Let me just say that I SUCK at using the kinect controls.  I am getting better at it, but I think that the placement of certain things was not the greatest in ease of use.  If you have something in the bottom right corner that you need to get your hand on (using the Kinect sensor) and then hold for a few second, it should NOT be in the bottom right corner next to something else to the right that will swipe the screen to the right, it should have been placed at the very least at the bottom center or just the center as a whole.   That is my main complaint, other than that I am slowly getting more accustomed to the way it works and getting more familiar with it.

 Get pumped up for Zumba Core!

As far as the Zumba Core disc in and of itself, I have to say that I definitely recommend it to anyone who is interested in cardo, Core , Dance or Zumba workouts.  It is very fun and definitely effective.  You have many options to customize your workout to yourself.  I have tried the pre-set workouts and they are really great, I have tried going through by a song at a time to get a feel for what was available.  This evening I tried the playlist option where you get to create your own playlist and then workout to it.  I did 5 songs for tonight.  There is everything from bollywood, to hip hop to salsa to warm up types of songs, so that you can change it up or stick to one kind.  The sensors are pretty accurate in being able to distinguish your whole body and if you are doing the entire move correctly.  You get to track your progress and at the end of the workout it shows you how many calories you burned and the accuracy percentage for your technique.  You can track your progress and even have it suggest workouts based on your progress.  Definitely something worth a try that is both fun and effective :).

 For a great preview of what the Zumba actually looks like on the console

*As an added bonus and for the "game" part, as your progress is tracked you get to unlock different added bonuses to the game such as videos from the real life trainers, more songs, etc.