Exergame approach to floorball training

Finnish starup A4SP has just released their first exergame product. They approach is a bit different than the typical idea of exergaming. This far majority of the solutions have been either home fitness equipment type of interfaces to console and PC games or alternative interfaces and new ways of interaction such as Nintendo Wii and Playstation EyeToy.

A4SP is developing exergames that improve the performance of team sports participants. At first A4SP product is utilized in floorball training. A4SP product enables measurement and comparison of the results worldwide in a playful way.

There is not yet too much public information available but this certainly is a refreshing and innovative approach to exergaming.

The Next Big Thing

We have been following the development the trend of Exergames. Thanks to Google Alert (and Fight, Trend...) we have been able to anticipate the rise of the trend. Recently The Economist published an interesting article on Exergames. You'll find a recap of the article from here.

As we know, there are number of alternatives for the "Next Big Thing" and probably there will be several big things coming up. In any case we have to agree that such issues as gesture interfaces for console/PC/mobile, social gaming and ways to allure new groups into gaming are all established in exergames. Also please check out VTT's Exergame seminar materials. Some of the slides are in Finnish. If you want to get more details and more information in general about our findings and the future trends, send me (Sonja Kangas) a message (@vtt.fi).