Zumba fitness core xbox 360 kinect review

Top positive review

4.0 out of 5 starsFun way to sweat and workout

Reviewed in the United States on December 24, 2012

Zumba Fitness Core

I've never really heard of Zumba until a friend at work told me about her part-time job as a Zumba / Hip Beatz (sic) instructor at a local dance fitness studio. I ordered a Kinect for my Xbox 360 Slim and decided to give Zumba Fitness Core a try since it is the latest in the Zumba Fitness franchise, and is supposed to focus on the core muscles.

While many people seem to complain about the repetitive dance moves, I find that the choreography of most songs seem to rely on similar routines, which is beneficial for participants since you can piece together some of the familiar movements. I don't know the names of these dance moves but I could recognize them when I watched some videos of my friend's classes on Youtube.

The game uses "realistic" models of the instructors, which doesn't really help or hurt the overall experience. What does hurt the overall experience of the game is when the camera moves away from the instructor to make it look more "artsy", as if the game developers wanted to impress you with a 2005-era graphics engine - except the whole point of the game is to follow the instructor's movements. This can be hard to do when the camera pans out at an angle so the instructor is about 0.5 inches tall!

I don't recognize most of the songs, but some of the high intensity routines are truly intense. I am breaking some serious sweat after 5 songs (short Zumba workout session). My friend uses a MotoActv for her actual classes, and she will burn 800-900 calories in a 1 hour session as the instructor. Her heart rate spikes up to 199 bpm and maintains that throughout the class. I used my own MotoActv and heart rate sensor, and will manage to burn about 300 calories in a short 20 minute session, hitting some decent heart rate peaks. I'm in decent shape (6'3", 160 lb, runner, cyclist) and didn't feel like I was going to collapse but I could definitely feel it was giving me a decent workout while indoors - it definitely wasn't boring.

Overall: 4/5 stars, a great and fun way to work out although not very regimented. It will help you sweat and burn calories dancing to some fun tunes, but the camera likes to pan away from the instructor during certain movements which interferes with matching your movements to the instructor.