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A new DVD-based game available in retail outlets such as CVS, Target and Borders is using interactivity in an attempt to educate kids on the dangers of obesity, reports the Associated Press (via Wired News).

The game, Body Mechanics, teaches youngsters how to avoid being overweight by joining forces with a team of superheroes who battle villains with names like Col Estorol and Betes II.

With children becoming gamers as early as age two, according to an NPD Group survey, and roughly 17 percent of U.S. kids deemed obese, gaming is a perfect match for the message.

Ironically viewed as sedentary pastimes, videogames and their cousins, the TV and PC, are typically the object of parental finger-waving, yet games like Body Mechanics and the Nintendo Wii are making parents rethink videogaming.