Fitbit Arcade is for kids, but this adult wants to see it on every smartwatch

The latest smartwatch for kids, the Fitbit Ace LTE, offers gamified activity tracking complete with incentive-based play in the Fitbit Arcade. From racing chickens in space to golfing around the world with a hoard of monsters, the games are as simple as they are entertaining, and most importantly, they help get children moving. But what about adults? I’m not saying access to wrist-based entertainment is the key to a fitness regimen, but I don’t see why we can’t also be motivated by addictive arcade games.

To start, there is absolutely zero doubt in my mind that the right game could manipulate me into a healthier lifestyle. At the risk of sounding cliche with a “studying abroad story,” I once spent an entire semester’s worth of Australian college courses adamantly playing snake on an $18 flip phone. This did nothing for my fitness and was even worse for my grades, but I was hooked nonetheless. I’ve also been known to stay up an extra hour or two just to access the next day’s New York Times Connections game before hitting the hay. I was even briefly obsessed with the Minesweeper app on my Garmin Venu SQ, and that game is truly a crapshoot.

I don’t think I’m the only adult to enjoy simple games on small screens. However, I may be the only one who wore a child’s smartwatch for a week and felt kind of jealous afterward. The good news is that Google already owns Fitbit and already has a powerful adult smartwatch ripe for the decking out. Why not make the Fitbit Arcade accessible to Pixel Watch and Pixel Watch 2 owners? Most smartwatch users are at least passively interested in step counts and activity streaks. These games add further incentive by rewarding users with more turns and new levels for hitting their fitness tracking goals.

Granted, not every one of the Arcade’s current offerings would be home runs for the average adult. Some may be too childish or simple. Others require sweeping physical movements, like simulating a fishing reel, that limit how much you’d want to play the game in public. I’m also personally not nearly as flexible as a seven-year-old and would prefer a tapping-based game to one that I have to manipulate my arm to play. Regardless, the foundation for an adult-friendly experience is set, and I can easily imagine the development of more options catering to an older user base.

The Fitbit Ace LTE also features a Sims-like experience called Bit Valley in which children can create their own Eejie, or virtual friend. Here again, activity in the real world earns you on-device rewards like money to buy your Eejie clothing and belongings. This is not a concept I would personally want to see on my smartwatch. I can hardly manage to take care of real-life Kaitlyn and her environment. However, it is definitely another example of how entertainment can be leveraged to motivate users to healthier lifestyles. After all, isn’t that what we’re all after?

I don’t want my smartwatch to turn into a distraction or another bad habit to break. If Google found a way to put Pokemon Snap on my wrist, for example, I’d be a goner; the nostalgia alone would hook me. Fitbit currently combats this on the Ace LTE by limiting gameplay and requiring users to “earn” turns. Theoretically, the same parameters could be added to games on the Google Pixel Watch line to keep adult users in check as well. The games themselves are also specifically designed to be played in bite-sized sessions rather than time-warping binges. They’re simple and somewhat repetitive, so you aren’t tempted to overdo it, unlike me whiling away my days playing Nintendo games.

All of this to say, there are many ways to lead a horse to water and make her get on the treadmill (I’m the horse in this analogy). Fitbit’s Ace LTE introduced a fun opportunity for kids that could appeal to adults just as well, and I hope they do.