I'd love to see how much energy is expended playing drums on Rockband for an hour or two. Probably not enough, but might be interesting to see.

I would have liked to see this with wii fit but obviously the dancing games are real calorie burners

This feels familiar, I'm pretty sure this study has been stated before =/

Anyway the only problem is that there's no way newbies or obese children would dare to play DDR in public. I can say, from personal experience, that there's just no point in attempting the DDR machine with all those pro-fanatics around >_< You'll either ridiculed, or just contemptuously looked at the entire time you try to play.

And the DDR mats for consoles are just too darn slippery!

EyeToy games burn as much as a treadmill?

damn they took my plan for putting a tredmill in my gaming room...i should have patented it

were the kids paid in lard?

*badumtiss*

The results are pretty much what you would expect using common sense. Those DDR games make you feel the burn.

@Byakko:

i was pretty much a newb the first time i tried DDR and it was at the arcades. no one ridiculed because i asked for help. some were very eager to help (mostly females). embarrassing situation averted.

@dafthero:

Lucky you! I happen to near an arcade where the local 'pros' always seem to hover around. Doesn't help that the DDR machine must be shoved RIGHT TO THE ENTRANCE of the arcade, and it's an open-air entrance to boot >_<

It always seems to be the case of using a small smaple group. I've only ever see studies of this nature with a large sample group a few times. Why is this?

I was quite suprised to find that walking ona treadmill only increases amount of energy burnt by three times, compared to sitting still. Can I not just sit still for three times longer...? God knows that would be great for some RPGs.

@Krondonian: Because typically studies like this pay their participants in some form or another, the larger your sample the more the study costs.

@Krondonian: "sit for three times longer". i bow to thy comedy!

Id like to see this when they play on expert. I put on the workout mode and my record for one song is about 30 calories burned.

You know what else kids and gamers around the world could do? Eat right, exercise 4-6 times a week and be healthy! That would be crazy.

Oh wait.....I did that already and still enjoy my video games. Put down the chips and eat an apple. Don't eat the pizza eat a chicken breast. You know, do healthy stuff. Actually care about your health by doing the simple things that are required to keep you from turning into man/woman jelly. Not every dude out there is going to be a piece of man-meat (on sale at Costco for $12.99 a pound ladies) but being fit is something that everyone can do via small changes in their diet and lifestyle. But that would be too damn hard, especially for the parents who are supposed to be in control of their children.

The thing I dont understand is that people try to directly correlate the obesity problem with video games, when the correlation is lack of physical activity and bad diet. What do you expect to happen when you shove fast food into a kid (1000-1500 calories in a Happy Meal) and then have them sit in front of a video game system? A lot of us are super sizing gluttony and sloth and then wondering why we can't see our toes in the morning. We only have ourselves to blame for this because each and everyone of us is able to stand up and get out for even a 20 minute walk every day. Instead we want to buy a Wii sports and Wii Fit and try to convince ourselves that it is healthy and is going to undue the Ultimate Bacon Cheeseburger we just had two of along with an Oreo shake and a large order of fries.

Parents need to do their job which is to be responsible for their children. So the answer isn't buying the kids DDR and Wii games and hoping that will do for exercise. RESPONSIBILITY! Something I think some of us forgot somewhere along the way.

Hang on, a study into fatness completed by a clinic named after eggs-and-oil?
Surely some sort of vested interest there. Thats like a study into violence being completed by "Daves Guns & Guns Emporium: You Like Guns? We Got Guns"

Wow never knew of this! The energy I spend is shouting at enemies in COD 4.

I'm surprised traditional video games and TV watching expended the same amount of energy. Studying/rigorous mental work burns a surprisingly high amount of calories, so I thought gaming might win out a bit there.

@Byakko:

get an ignition pad they are a little pricey but well worth it. They last longer and are not slippery, 3 years ago I lost 40 pounds by just playing DDR and eating right.

I don't think I can trust weight loss testing from a company with the word 'Mayo' in their name.

weight loss statistical video on the dance game Pump It Up. Enjoy the awesome korenglish :

+ Watch video

@ShawnC++: The Mayo clinic is nationally renowned. Look it up before you just diss it base on its name.

I can run on a treadmill a lot longer than I can continuously dance in DDR though...

@Blackjack1353:

Only 30? I think I've burned up to 49 on one song before. Possibly Afronova? Possibly Sakura. I can't remember.

If the calorie-counter is at all accurate on the game, I was burning over 1000 calories a day playing DDR at one point.

I will also say that though I have a high metabolism and don't gain weight easily, playing/competing on the dance game Pump It Up since 2001 has definitely been a large contributor to keeping me in shape overall, not just in weight. I highly recommend consistent dance game playing to people who want to stay in or get into shape.

Since when is the Mayo Clinic only "sort of" reputable? Especially when it's on our side!

Not to say anything against this study, but anybody can burn calories doing anything! All you have to do is have your heart beating and you're burning calories. Just thought I'd throw that out there.

@Byakko: I know whaty you mean. The local arcade I used to live by only have greatly skilled DDR players so that pretty much meant I couldn't play.

Then a friend bought the home version and I was like, "YES! I can now just like an ass at home with a friend. We'll get good and finally be able to show ourselves in public!"

Stupid home mats ruined that route.

@baked ham: You can burn calories by eating. Celery comes to mind.

@AsWater: no kidding. celery is pretty much the only food you can eat and burn callories at the same time. too bad it sucks (at least i never got the taste for it).

to be honest, before this study i was kind of interested in getting one of those home DDR mats just so i could actually make it entertaining for me to burn a few calories. this study just reinstates that desire. i need to find out how much these things go for.

i could probably go with the treadmill thing though. a while back i actually had my ps2 hooked up to a tv in front of the treadmill and played something easy (control-wise) while walking for a couple of miles. DDR might be more entertaining though (and useful, seeing how i dance like a retarded weasel).

"I would like to see something about the Wii"

I happen to be a PhD student at the Mayo clinic, and I know the group that conducts these studies. They have been doing a Wii study for some time now. The problem is that to make an official publication out of such things it takes time. Gathering the data, writing up the paper, and then taking it through peer review are all part of the process. Then getting it accepted to be published in a major journal takes time as well.

The reason why these studies are done with so few people is that statistical power calculation do show that it is enough, but more over there is a large IRB ( group that approves human studies) approval process that requires certain conditions be met when dealing with humans. They are especially harsh with their conditions when it comes to humans. Also, the study would take far too long if there were more people involved as each trial takes one day ( or 2) per person. The more people you have the more data you have to analyze as well. Either that or you limit the amount of data from each person.

I would have to say I agree with Saleen when he says that a healthy life style is the key. Prevention and responsibility coupled with moderation.

how about partitioning the kids days into time slot...ie one for school, one for sports, one for playing games/TV...I personally find studies like this to restricting. You can't attribute causes of one thing to another because that's not the way the world works. Of course you're going to burn more calories doing something, that's a given. The worst thing is that people receive funding for studies like these only to reinforce certain peoples beliefs such as video games don't/do make kids fat.

My seven year old son plays games so intensely that he ends up stripping down to his underwear to cool down. He literally kicks his feet and moves all over because he gets so into the games. For him, there's little difference between a Wii-mote and an Xbox controller.

@SageofAnacostia: Wow, 1000 a day is a pretty high number, but I wouldn't doubt it as it definately gets the heart rate up but you'd need to be playing for a while. I burn about 1100-2000 calories a day due to running 55-70 miles per week. The plus side to that is I also get to eat like a homeless person and not gain any weight. :)

Why don't they just hook up a stationery bike to an electric generator and power games off of that? Gamers would be the most fit category of people, and WoW addicts could compete in the Tour de France.

@thegreatpablo: I would say a a moderate amount. I'm not in the best shape, but I work up a pretty good sweat playing ride the lighting and justice for all on hard drums. I actually think I actually think I've lost about 5 pounds playing.

@Sparky13: When I played In The Groove (ddr clone) with the calory mode, I averaged around 10 calories/minute most of the time. So if you play two sessions of around an hour each day, you'd burn 1000 calories. (As other posters noted, I have no idea if the game's estimate is in any way accurate.) That's a lot of DDR, though; one session of half an hour would be more my style...

There is absolutely no problem getting heartrate up with the game, although if you go for the harder songs it tends to come in short bursts - you play a song which lasts a bit under two minutes, get completely wiped out so that you're barely able to breathe, then take a minute to recover before you play another. It's probably better for regular exercise if you play on a level you can more easily cope with but set it to continuous mode.

@AsWater: Eating celery burns calories; unfortunately, I can only eat celery when it's covered in peanut butter.

so im not the only person who found it kinda funny the place is called the Mayo Clinic?

If you play drums in Rock Band you burn a lot of calories. So does the guy who goes nuts with the guitar and jumps up and down and all around like he's Angus Young.