So I spent a little time over the weekend playing around with the Kilowatt Sport sent to my house on Thursday. The giant joystick is designed to give you an upper body workout while playing games.

I'm supposed to walk through some set-up issues with the company on Monday, but of course I've already put it together and tested it out.

So far, I can say I'm fairly impressed. The thing is basically a giant metal pole mounted to a floor board with a universal game controller stuck to the top. It works be sensing the amount of pressure you exert on the pole and converting it into joystick movement.

The controller seems best for shooters and racers, though I plan on testing it out on everything. There are two ways you can use the stick in one of these games. By sliding two switches on the face of the controller you can adjust the stick to be either or both axis of either thumbstick, then it's just a matter of deciding how hard you want to make it on yourself.

For instance, in Gran Turismo 4 you can set up the stick to just control your steering and use buttons to control braking and gas or you can use the stick to control breaking and gas and a thumbstick to steer. In other words, you can set this bad buy up to convert how hard you push forward on the chest high pole into acceleration. So when you're running a race you have to literally press the pole forward and hold it there for the duration. Setting it to steer doesn't make it much easier on your muscles. Now instead of having to push the pole forward and hold it, you have to push the pole side to side over and over and over again.

You can also use the controller in shooters to either control your character's movement or aim.

This weekend I played around mostly with Burnout 3, letting the controller stand in for my steering. Man are my chest, back and arms sore. Granted, I'm not exactly fit, but I really think this could have some benefit for me.

Using the controller for a shooter wasn't quite as easy, but I'm sure with time I will adjust. The main thing is that so far the Kilowatt is an excellent distraction for exercise. I may not want to set aside 20 minutes or so to do push-ups and pull-ups, but I will to play a game with this thing.

The two most important things a piece of exercise equipment needs to do are motivate you and provide results. So far the Kilowatt passes the first test with flying colors. The final test will really be the results, I'll make sure to keep you up to date on how motivated I remain and how well this thing works over time with different games. I plan to post at least once a week about the Kilowatt. Make sure to check back.

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