The President’s Challenge is meant to encourage people of all ages to increase the amount of physical activity they do everyday. The idea is to promote a more healthy lifestyle amidst the growing obesity numbers in the United States. EA Sports has now joined the President’s Challenge as an advocate.

If you are playing the EA Sports Active games on your Wii, you may be satisfying the American College of Sports Medicine‘s (ACSM) guidelines for an active lifestyle.

A study released on June 2, 2010, conducted by Dr. John Porcari of the University of Wisconsin concluded that these games passed the fitness guidelines of ACSM.

ACSM recommends…

I’m not into this whole weight loss culture. My problem is that, by and large, most fitness gurus I run into make me want to punch them in the mouth. I don’t, of course (I’m a gamer, not a fighter), but the “trainers” EA has included in SPORTS Active More Workouts are much more annoying than any fitness trainers I’ve met in real life. I can’t hate them too much, though, because the program they’re leading does produce results.

Remember that moldy stereotype that gamers are all overweight, couch-crusty adolescents? Well, we actually have financial proof that it’s not the case anymore (not that it ever was) – in a recent story at 1Up, it was revealed that the new genre of fitness games has created an incredible $2 billion in revenue. The report originally comes from the Games for Health Project, and the figure was generated in just 18 months. Holy guacamole.

Wii Fit has officially started a trend. Coming off of the mammoth sales of Nintendo’s fitness game (and a little gem called Jillian Michaels Fitness Ultimatum) is EA’s announcement that it’s developing a fitness title called EA Sports Active. The game will reportedly offer players a real workout – as it was developed in collaboration with Oprah approved exercise physiologist Bob Greene, and focuses on simple, effective exercise techniques. It’s set to launch worldwide (exclusively on Wii, duh) next spring.

It’s aimed squarely at women (of course, the target weight-loss demographic), and is slated to kick off a new line of AE products intended to promote fitness and performance. I approve heartily.