As a kid, I didn’t have an affinity towards Twister, the iconic mat game in which you move your hands and feet across different colored dots while trying not to fall over. But reimagined for the modern day, the augmented reality-based Twister Air game is totally my speed.
Twister Air ($19 at Amazon) takes the mat and puts it in the open space in front of you. Stretchy arm and ankle bands communicate with an AR app to track movements such as arm waves and jumps. You play by following the movement cues from the app, in challenges I can best describe as Just Dance meets the VR game Beat Saber.
I had the chance to play Twister Air for myself, and it definitely surprised me. While the game’s controls and difficulty level options certainly makes it suitable for young kids, I discovered it’s fun for adults, too.
One of my friends and I launched a versus game of Twister Air, both of us strapped up with our bands. We scrolled through a menu of song options, which again, felt very similar to Just Dance. Once we selected a soundtrack and calibrated our limbs with the app, it was all moving and grooving from there.
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Different directions popped up on the screen, and our goal was to complete them with our movements. Some points are earned just by hitting an on-screen spot with the coordinating color band, while others require you to swirl your arms or hold a three-pointed pose. At random, the game called for us to switch sides, and we had to do so quickly without colliding. One round even had us reaching for spots in each other’s areas, and that’s when things got competitive.
At the end, our points were tallied up. I won’t tell you who won (kidding, I did!) but it was a fair match. The only mistake I made was not launching a gaming exercise in my Apple Watch’s workout app, because let me tell you, Twister Air is a great way to close those Apple Watch rings.
The app then created a highlight reel from the match, so that we could see the best moments of our movements. It’s safe to say that we had a good laugh watching the chaos back. Although for next time, I think we’ll both step up to the harder difficulty mode.
Twister Air is a fresh and fast-paced take on a familiar game. It’s also an approachable introduction to AR for kids who haven’t seen it before. Plus, it’s never a bad thing to promote having fun while getting some light exercise.
The game is available for pre-order on Amazon now, with the product officially launching on June 2. The free-to-download Twister Air app will launch on June 1, meaning it will be ready by the time people get their hands (and wrists and ankles) on the game. Full availability will come to other major retailers on August 1.
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