Wii Sports--the next diet craze?

First there was Dance Dance Revolution, a rhythm-based game series first introduced to Japanese arcades in 1998. The game, which is played using a dance pad with four arrows for a controller, has players time their steps to the beat of a song. After Dance Dance Revolution's release in the West, many reported that the game had the added bonus of being adaptable to an exercise routine, with anecdotal tales of significant weight loss due to playing the game.

In January 2006, more than 750 schools in the US incorporated Konami's game into their health and physical education curricula.

A recent study also confirmed that playing activity-based games such as DDR burns up to six times as many calories as traditional games.

Now, one Philadelphia man has claimed on his blog that playing Wii Sports has caused him to lose nine pounds, after playing the game for 30 minutes a day since the beginning of December.

Mickey DeLorenzo, 25, shows "before" and "after" photos of himself on his Web site, along with details of his heart rate, calories burned per session, body fat percentage, and Wii fitness age. He states that he made no other changes to his daily routine other than to add the game to his schedule.

DeLorenzo commented, "I moved my feet, I used full body motion, and I swung my arms to mimic the real thing. If you just stand there and make small moves or sit on the couch and play, I don't think you'll [get] much if any results regarding exercise."