It makes me wonder if this was a rushed project to capitalize on the home workout craze due to COVID.

On August 26, 2021, an anime television series adaptation produced by Imagineer and Story Effect was announced. The first Fitness Boxing had 20 songs, and the general theme was pop: you had the likes of Lady Gaga, Kelly Clarkson, Justin Bieber, Maroon 5 and co. Crank up the volume and work up a sweat as you box to the beat of 23 punchy tracks, including instrumental versions of hit songs. These tracks are catchy enough during the workout to keep you going, and the fact that you can swap tracks between different exercises is a great touch.You may think that you are only working your arms while playing, but you’ll find you’ll also be putting your core and legs to work too; my entire body was definitely aching the day after my first set of workouts.

Fitness Boxing 2 is a good alternative to Ring Fit Adventure if you don't want any additional equipment. This gets repetitive very quickly and while in the moment it helps you to change your form, if you are playing the game right, there’s still the same reminder ever so often. The workout strings are well-paced and can feel quite hype, but in two-player mode the instructor will congratulate both of you, separately, with the exact same audio same time, every time.These icons represent different actions and while early on it’s fairly straightforward stuff like jabs, straights, hooks and uppercuts, eventually it throws in ducking, weaving, blocking, stepping and the like. Ring Fit Adventure redefined expectations for traditional fitness experiences in gaming, showing that the genre can be much more than strict recreations of existing exercises in a bland, poppy setting, but Fitness Boxing 2: Rhythm and Exercise sits somewhere between the two.

A light workout is great for days when you just want to get it over with, while regular ones are a balanced three-part affair, and a heavy session is longer – perfect for feeling the burn. For that reason, this followup title is also a bit of a letdown… but I understand why it’s important to prioritize the commands of the trainer rather than the lyrics of the included songs. Luckily, there is an option to remove specific actions within Daily Workout, though it only lists half of the available movements.After your workout is complete, you’re then scored on how accurate your punches were – and that’s more or less it, really. It has a wealth of excellent accessibility options, wherein you can avoid motions you can’t make and tweak other essential things, but aside from a couple of new instructors, some new songs, and some fancier graphics and UI, it’s not really a new game. The true sequel to FitnessBoxing is obviously FiNC Home Fit, which is apparently only available in Japan.

The main menu gives the choice of a Daily Workout or Free Training: the latter of these lets you choose which workout to do, its intensity level, which music you want to accompany you, how fast you want the music to play and which background you’d like as you work out.

Some new trainers and music tracks have been added, but you can expect a lot of the same if you’re a veteran of the series. Let us just throw in one suggestion if we may, though, and while such an undertaking is obviously far too late now for Fitness Boxing 2, maybe it might be an idea for the third game. These daily routines have you participating in a variety of movements, such as one focusing just on jabs and straights, while others introduce new boxing techniques. This meant after just two days I’ve had about 80 tickets, but barely unlocked any cosmetics to spend them on, which came across as lackluster. I do think it’s cool however that you can play two player mode with a single JoyCon or a pair each and that the mode is available in both Daily Workout and Free Training.