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u/Ekra_Fleetfoot 1d ago
These consistently get sent in to eCommerce at my location.
They don't sell (indeed, adding them to a Wii lot is a surefire way to reduce how much the lot sells for!), which means they get sent back to the stores where they are inevitably overpriced and sit on the shelf until they're pulled. During my stint as a department liaison, I told them that the best thing to do was to just send them out to the floor with a $0.99 price tag on them; it was the only way we could get them out the door!
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u/xrtpatriot 1d ago
My ecommerce location will pair them with a lot of about 20 wii fit or any other fitness related wii games. The lot sells for 150-300 dollars or so without fail. Fitness studios will pick them up, its weird.
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u/wootybooty 1d ago
I am an IT Director and can confirm we have a Black Wii and a Wii fit board in our workout/community center. Last time it was used? Probably over a decade ago but its still there on standby lol
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u/LessFeature9350 1d ago
What is e-commerce and where do I find one. We've been wanting to get a wii again
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u/ajc89 1d ago
I think they're talking about goodwill selling stuff on eBay, etc.
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u/LessFeature9350 21h ago
Ohhhhh. Our local goodwill is crazy expensive. I hadn't even considered them for electronics. They have target dollar spot items used for $10 and old cat & Jack tshirts for $8. I'll have to check that out
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u/ajc89 21h ago
Yeah they typically put the best stuff (if it's easy to ship) online. Goodwill is only a charity in name, it's definitely a very profitable business.
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u/LessFeature9350 20h ago
I didn't even realize there was online Goodwill. Do you find their prices are fair online?
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u/Ekra_Fleetfoot 20h ago
Seeing as it's primarily auctions, "fair" is "whatever someone is willing to pay".
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u/LessFeature9350 15h ago
I've noticed on ebay auctions when there aren't enough buyers, I can get an item for good deal and then it gets cancelled and then mysteriously the item goes back up for auction in the next few days. Hoping no funny business like that. I'll have to check it out
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u/xrtpatriot 19h ago
Goodwill is not one large organization, they are regionalized with their own goals, missions, etc. there are some centralized services, like ShopGoodwill(dot)com, where many (but not all) Goodwill organizations sell product online.
I work for the shopgoodwill team for the Cincinnati Ohio goodwill org. We sell consoles ALL the time, and we test and reformat our consoles so they are known functional product. You can get a wii for as cheap as 9.99. We also sell lots of games (20 or more per lot typically) for all consoles. Prices vary widely by console and the games that happen to be inside.
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u/GoatCovfefe 16h ago edited 6h ago
So how much does your goodwill organization donate to charity?
Edit: yeah thats what i thought.
I qish more people realized how anti lgbt goodwill was , regardless of their stance that theyre "all different companies.
Fuck off, the entire organization are made up of slob white boomers looking for the most profit.
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u/Artemis251 8h ago
I wish! I never had one and wouldn't mind grabbing one for my gaming collection, but I ain't paying the $20 they want for them at my local thrift store. $5, maybe, but why $20 when you legit have 6 that have been there for over a year?
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u/MuNansen 1d ago
Too bad. The Fit was actually kinda cool.
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u/mjzim9022 1d ago
Honestly I've been meaning to pick one up, apparently they aren't that bad for light exercise
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u/mrjoeysweller 1d ago
I used to do the yoga every morning and it was great. The balance indicator was really cool and helped you focus on staying still in a pose.
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u/User_Nomi 23h ago
I feel like the balance indicator had me doing these poses pretty wrong to stay within the range lol
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u/KurtRussellsMullet 1d ago
There has to be some way to repurpose these. Has anyone done a no-death Dark Souls speedrun with one yet?
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u/Bruised_Shin 1d ago
You have to pair it with a set of Rockband drums or it would be impractical
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u/DrDDeFalco 1d ago
Using a wii fit board to parry while fighting with drums or a guitar sounds hilarious.
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u/KurtRussellsMullet 1d ago edited 1d ago
No no no it’s just the board or the run doesn’t count
Edit: why did I get downvoted for this lol, I was kidding
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u/jupiter172 1d ago
According to the top comment, they apparently make excellent lap trays to do puzzles!
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u/geneticdefekt 1d ago
I bet they could be modified to act as foot pedals for accessible gaming. That guy who leveled a frost mage on wow classic essentially dancing on a control pad comes to mind - no idea how his set up was done.
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u/c14rk0 1d ago
I think the problem is this would require quite a bit of work for a fairly poor wireless foot pedal that has essentially zero movement to actually feel you're pressing it properly and would just lay flat instead of at an angle.
When you could just buy an actual foot pedal relatively cheaply that would work a lot better.
The fact these don't just use Bluetooth as far as I'm aware is a huge problem with making them more usable.
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u/ScottyBLaZe 1d ago
I did see a project in one of the golf subs where someone was using the board with their sim software to track their weight transfer throughout the swing.
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u/Magic_Neil 1d ago
It’s funny, when Wii Fit first launched these things were impossibly hard to get, and used were only slightly cheaper than MSRP.
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u/pinkwooper 1d ago
Yep. The only way I got one was my brother worked for the store and put one aside for me. I still have it and they are actually pretty fun!
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u/blueberryrockcandy 1d ago
there is a goodwill near me, well several, but the one in the south, ALLWAYS has wii fit boards, like 4 of them. never seen them sell. allways on the shelf.
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u/IceNein 1d ago
I run a thrift store. I mostly just chuck them in the trash. Something that sits on the shelf but never sells has negative value. It is taking the space of something that will sell.
I do put them out occasionally, just in case someone wants one.
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u/-BlueDream- 1d ago
The only way to get rid of them is to bundle them with a Wii and a game that works with it.
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u/Javerage 1d ago
Not sure who needs to hear this but: If you find broken rock band / guitar hero drums, there's a good chance you can take parts off of them and pop em on other sets. They're really simple devices and I've done that.
Also on a further off chance you find some guitars without adapters, these days you can find a lot of fan made converters / adapters. Source: Someone that has way too many guitars / drums and is yet to pull the trigger on the keyboard / real guitar adapter again.
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u/WoolooOfWallStreet 21h ago
Also, the patents for those should be expiring about now-ish, so I’ve always been hopeful some Chinese company would find a niche making these
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u/Javerage 21h ago
I saw on aliexpress there's a good number of guitars. Every now and then a part of me is really tempted to order one and see how it works.
Also recently found a christian knock-off of guitar hero in a secondhand store. Invasive thoughts make me wanna buy it.
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u/SuicidalChair 1d ago
With stage tour releasing in a few months there will also be brand new band sets being sold again
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u/Javerage 1d ago
To be fair, you can already get new instruments now from a few places. And if I was really desperate for the keyboard I'd just get the midi converter for it and use a real midi supported piano. :)
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u/_Imposter_ 1d ago
I hunt Goodwill's specifically for Guita Hero gear! The Guitars can still be repurposed and modded for use on PC even without the proper adapter.
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u/RockwellB1 1d ago
My Goodwill never gets anything good like this
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u/Penguinkeith 1d ago
That’s cause all good stuff goes onto their online auction site
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u/RockwellB1 1d ago
Yeah, some stuff people find at theirs always makes me wonder why it went to the shelf and not the site
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u/Primae_Noctis 1d ago
I picked up a BNIB Brother Laser Printer for 20$ like two weeks ago.
I've had decent luck with older digital alarm clocks and exact copies of old kitchen appliances that my parents still have and use, like a Food Processor and Electric Knife.
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u/Raider_Scum 1d ago
yep, i've found the sweet spot for goodwill to be large items that cost money to ship - like printers.
I've gotten an air conditioner for $40, and a 12" subwoofer for $40.
Both worth considerably more, but you would spend $80 shipping it anywhere.3
u/lovelylotuseater 1d ago
Don’t worry, the polyester Fashion Nova and visibly decaying furs and nylon purses with holes go on there too.
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u/a_talking_face 1d ago
You can get one of these so cheap online.
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u/RockwellB1 1d ago
Probably not 4 bucks like Goodwill would be (2 bucks if you go on the correct color sticker day). Not that I want one, I don't have a Wii.
What I meant was, my Goodwill electronics section is never anything useful. Went there over the weekend and I had my choice of VGA monitors, keyboards without dongles, and a weird brand GPS without the proprietary charger
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u/a_talking_face 1d ago
These aren't very useful either. There's a reason there are 3 of them there that have probably been sitting there for years.
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u/SeparateLawfulness53 1d ago
Average Goodwill game collection in the past ~3 years:
- Fitness game (sometimes + accessory)
- Rhythm game (sometimes + instrument)
- One version of COD
- One version of Sims
Just before you'd often find a DOS game like Warcraft II on that shelf, but all the flea market people seem to have gotten them.
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u/Meelapo 1d ago
I've been visiting Goodwill stores a fair number of times to find older PC games and I see this exact thing all the time.
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u/SeparateLawfulness53 1d ago
Yep, even stuff like Super Solvers or Puddle Books which I would often see 5 years ago and people have little interest in today are only seen in collections of flea market resellers who track eBay prices.
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u/jordanundead 1d ago
I remember getting this when it first came out. My friend got on and when his Mii inflated like Wayne Knight in Space Jam he cried.
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u/terdfergus0n 1d ago
I worked for the giraffe when the Wii came out, these were so fucking hard to keep in stock back then. Sad to see them unloved
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u/Missesbonez 1d ago
I was at a rehabilitation hospital, and wii fit was one of the activities we did. 10/10 fun way to get your body to corporate with you again. (This was like, 3 years ago lol)
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u/barrynomad 1d ago
Weirdly I’ve been looking for these at Goodwill for the past few years and no longer see them! I wanted to try some of the SEGA titles that utilize it but don’t want to pay for eBay shipping or the silly prices retro stores are asking.
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u/c14rk0 1d ago
As someone who has one sitting around unused...any idea where I can find a good list of all the titles that support it?
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u/jardex22 1d ago
Aside from Wii Fit, I recall that there was a Rabbids minigame that you could play with your butt, and I believe one entry of Mario+Sonic and the Olympic Games had games that supported it.
Aside from that, there's a Wikipedia article that you could use to start researching with.
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u/tinleyyyyyyxo 1d ago
Same here, they used to be everywhere and now they somehow disappear whenever you actually want one
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u/Particular_Reply5906 1d ago
I found a 1080ti at Goodwill once. I bought a lottery ticket twice. I didn't strike gold again- unfortunately
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u/Alternative-Shift459 1d ago
Each of those has four strain gauge load cells in it. Researchers validated them against laboratory force plates costing five figures, they held up, and there are systematic reviews now on using them for stroke balance assessment. The only reason that research exists is that the boards are worthless and everywhere, which is to say, this shelf.
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u/jindofox 1d ago
Can always count on the same stuff at thrift shops. Tribond, Scene It! the DVD or VHS game, old sports games for Xbox and ps2, and the Wii fit boards.
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u/Puppetainer 1d ago
As a former GameStop manager I can tell you I routinely had an impressive pile of those on hand.
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u/xrtpatriot 1d ago
Can confirm, i work for an Ohio based Goodwill division in their ShopGoodwill (ecommerce) arm, and i currently have four of these on a rack waiting to be lotted up with a bunch of wii fit games. Fitness studios use this shit all the time still.
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u/TheGoodDoctorGonzo 1d ago
Someone’s gonna figure out how to use an array of these to train an AI and they’re gonna jump up to $1,000 each and we’re all gonna be pissed 🤣
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u/BadIdeaSociety 1d ago
Wii Fit boards would be a million times better if the elevation platforms were included with them. The best way to warm up aerobically for Wii Fit is doing 3 minutes of stepping on a reasonably-elevated platform.
Nintendo: Naw, man. Do the same steps 20 centimeters off the ground.
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u/mailwasnotforwarded 1d ago
It's kind of eye opening if you realize how much tech waste exists in the world because of deprecated technology or old technology. Even with all the tech waste recyclers out there there is still tons and tons of old tech just sitting around. I know there are tech waste recyclers that will actually extract the metals from the waste and sell it off but all the small integrated circuits etc all those are technically still useful so its kind of eye opening.
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u/fromthedarqwaves 1d ago
I bought one for $5. We still did Wii Fit up until a couple years ago. It was great.
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u/jtmonkey 1d ago
Bro there’s some cool snow boarding games that used it. And there’s some Wii ware stuff that was pretty clever if you’ve got an emulator.
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u/thehambeard 1d ago
What is crazy I just had to get some CT scans this weekend and my hospital had some xbox 360 Kinect cameras in the ceiling just before the CT machine itself
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u/BoredWeazul 1d ago
when these came out i desperately wished for like a Time Crisis port for the Wii so that i could use these as like the pedal or something
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u/whiteowl76 1d ago
when i worked at a thrift store we consistently threw these in the compactor cause they never sold and we got multiple per week
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u/ClitStitches 20h ago
Here in Japan recycle stores are stacked to the ceiling with Wii Fit boards. It's nuts.
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u/theShpydar 18h ago
A friend owns a retro shop, and basically would buy everything that came his way. One day he showed me the huge back storage area they had, and there were shelves and shelves of balance board and guitar hero/rock band instruments. Like hundreds of them.
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u/Huzzzzzzzzzzi 1d ago
How much were they asking for them? Usually they're priced either at $3 or an insane $30 with no inbetween
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u/BLoSCboy 1d ago
Crazily last week at the thrift store someone was loading all 5 into their cart to buy
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u/ActionQuinn 1d ago
I had one i used all the time and it was rad. Then i took some LSD and set every record. Kinda lost it's fun after that.
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u/sadmac356 1d ago
Yep, ya want six (6) Wii balance boards and someone's abandoned arts and crafts project? Goodwill's the place
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u/Full_Aperture 1d ago
Still got one NIB in the basement .... Never realized my plans of grandeur.... Didn't even make it out of the Amazon box
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u/GenericFatGuy 1d ago
My mom wanted Wii Fit for like a year after it came out, and was impossible to find initially. She finally got a copy, and I don't think I ever saw her actually use it.
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u/Pale_Ad2980 1d ago
Every time I see one for less than five dollars I get one. I only have two they’re always over pressed for how many there are in the wild.
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u/Daminite 1d ago
The only one I've ever found at any of my local Goodwill has such bad battery corrosion I didn't think it was worth trying to repair. The batteries were still in it too. Solid block, fused to the contacts.
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u/pulley999 10h ago
5% White vinegar. Once had a Fujifilm camera where the batteries had corroded so badly the battery door was stuck shut. Poured in white vinegar into the cracks, after ~40 minutes the door would open. Cleaned it out from there using more vinegar, q-tips, sanding tools and a brush, then flushed out the remaining vinegar and freed corrosion with isopropyl. Put fresh batteries in once it dried out and it fired right up.
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u/Daminite 8h ago
Is been a couple of years since then but I'll try vinegar next time I find something that bad. Thanks.
I usually use peroxide, ipa, and an abrasive paste made from baking soda to clean up corroded battery contacts.
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u/Confusedwarthog 1d ago
I saw two at the D.I. in Utah (for those out there), they’re sadly becoming moreso old tech today
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u/Efficient-Concept768 1d ago
Yo I could actually really use that external cd drive. Just found my copy of rainbow six raven shield. How much was it?
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u/CattuccinoVR 1d ago
Think it would be possible to make a DDR dance pad with wii fit board controllers?
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u/Squirrelking666 17h ago
I was just wondering the same thing. Or a VR floor puzzle (if you're from the UK think Knightmare, if not look it up, alternatively Pit-Pot on the Master System would be a good model)
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u/Cheesetorian 1d ago
Before they got greedy and started selling shit online, I used to find a lot of old PS1 and GB games, some I sold online, a few I kept to collect (before I donated a lot of my stuff).
But yes, Wii Fits are very common. That and Guitar Hero guitars.
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u/Deadeyescum 1d ago
I remember when these first came out they were like gold dust in our store. We would have people of all ages in our store asking when our next delivery of Wii Fit was, and on the days we had them on the delivery note they would wait in store untill the delivery turn up. We would be sold out before the delivery driver had unloaded the rest of the boxes.
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u/sage1700 23h ago
I still have mine somewhere I think, or maybe binned it?
I think I used it three times less than an hour haha. Oh well.
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u/Mental_Tea_4084 18h ago
I used one I pulled out of a dumpster to keep my PC off the carpet for years. 10/10 works great
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u/Fritzo2162 18h ago
Haha...I was cleaning my basement the other day and found one of those. I automatically wondered if it is worth anything.
Evidently not.
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u/itskrvpt 17h ago
The best part about wii fit was the socks.
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u/Squirrelking666 17h ago
The what now?
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u/SPECTRE-Agent-No-13 17h ago
I had a pretty hot neighbor in my college apartment complex who did her workout on a Wii Fit board every evening in her underwear. We were 4th floor and she left the blinds open. It was...hard not to watch.
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u/Choice-Layer 16h ago
Does anyone know how reliable/sturdy Wii Fit boards are? I got my own from a Peddler's Mall (flea market), but I've never used it and I'm curious on the whole how well they've held up over the years.
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u/Embarrassed-Jump6037 16h ago
I remeber when you could find anything Wii related like the Mario cart wheels the fit boards gun things it was crazy how popular it was.
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u/HellDimensionQueen 12h ago
I miss this. I also never properly had the living room space to do all the workouts, and kept wishing I did xD
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u/Various-Salt-7738 10h ago
I worked in a used game store in like 2013 and we had hundreds of these-- eventually stopped buying them because we never sold any
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u/Icylifestylez 7h ago
One time my friend wanted to hussle me and wanted me to buy about 30 of these he had. I mean if it was for cents I would but they were like black 😵. Like if someone really used it and never cleaned it black...
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u/midwest_dimples 1d ago
I still remember the days of hotties playing wii fit and posting the videos on YouTube 😭
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u/capticetrice 1d ago
My grandmother bought one of these home thinking they were lap trays, she still uses it to complete her crossword puzzles.