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Boys young and old love to play video games. Video games can be stimulating, fun, and even educational to young minds. However, video games can also produce laziness and some extra, unwanted pounds. Luckily, there are a few new video games and video game systems that incorporate movement within each game. The Wii and the Xbox 360 Kinect are both great systems with fun, active games.

The Wii and Wii Fit System are both great systems. The Wii has several games, but only a few will get your guy off the couch and moving. Two great games for kids (and adults too) are Wii Fit and Wii Fit Plus. While these games are targeted towards those looking to lose weight, they each have several games in them that kids will love.

The Wii Fit and Wii Fit Plus offer games such as skateboarding, snowball fights, and balancing games. The workouts of rhythmic kickboxing, hula hooping and aerobic dancing seem more like a game than a workout. For tween guys who want to get muscles, both games also offer several muscle toning and building moves.

The Xbox 360 Kinect system recently came out last year, and the technology behind it is fun, innovative, and just amazing. The Kinect system is like a camera that sits on top of your television. It sees and records your every movement while you are playing. The Kinect comes with a series of games, called Kinect Adventures, which includes river rafting and dodge ball. The Kinect Sports video game is another fun and active game. It comes with games such as volleyball, track, bowling, and soccer. With the Kinect system, you are the controller. So in all of the Kinect games, you have to jump, hit, kick, run, and more to accomplish the task.

Get your groove on with Kinect’s dance games. Their dance games are equivalent to Dance, Dance Revolution, but with a twist – the game knows if you are doing the right movements and even replays your dancing as a video at the end. The dancing games, such as Dance Central, are both fun and hilarious. The one concern with this and the other dance games are the songs – some are more suitable for teenage boys than the younger crowd.

For younger boys, Kinectimals is a game that lets the player have a pet, play with the pet, and teach the pet tricks. You do not adopt just any pet though. You can choose from wild animals such as lions, cheetahs, and tigers. This game is not as active as the other games mentioned above, but it will have your guy up off his feet and interacting with the game, instead of playing passively on the couch.

There are several more Wii and Kinect games that are a lot of fun for guys young and old. Use game play as a reward, and as an alternative to other video games, not an alternative to exercise. Allow your children to earn game time tokens when they complete chores or do well in their homework. Even good behavior can earn them game time.