Posting Date: April 28, 2008
Nabbing a Wii System requires more than a wee effort
I've been trying to get a Nintendo Wii System for the past five months. Nintendo has been playing mind games with parents like me, slowly releasing the game systems to retailers a few at a time.
I guess for the public, playing the game is fun. But for the corporate people at Nintendo, playing the public is even more fun.
I've visited every possible retailer. Target. Toys-R-Us. K-Mart. Game Shop and even Wal-Mart. One time, I drove to 30 stores from here to Indiana. I don't know how many times I would go up to a clerk and ask, "Do you have any Wii systems?" But, before I could finish the sentence, the clerks would usually respond like Allison Dubois in TV's "Medium" saying, "Nope. We don't
have any."
I think the clerks enjoyed telling me they didn't have any in stock. They always had the smirk, like they were mumbling "Loser!"
No luck.
Fine, I'd mumble back. I really didn't want to buy my son one of those video games to fry his mind. He's learned to read at age seven like a 5th grader. Well, the thanks really goes to his teacher at Center School for that.
But stubborness is not a virtue. It's a political statement. I wanted to get my son the video game.
After months of trying, and after so much rejection, I finally gave up. Then last Friday, my wife Alison was online picking out a birthday present for one of my son's classmates. That's what wives do. They carefully plan everything. They leave nothing for chance. She came across an announcement on the Toys-R-Us web site that the Orland Park store would have systems available on Sunday.
It's just like driving, I shrugged when she told me. Guys use all their God-given talents. Guts. Intuition. Luck. Women just use their brains.
Toys-R-Us said customers could come to the store on Sunday and wait in line for the limited number of systems, or, go there before and put a $200 deposit down and reserve the system.
Me, I would have just gone on Sunday. Fortunately for my son, mom knew better. They prefer the sure thing. She came home with a Wii System "Golden Coupon," like the one kids throughout the world scoured through billions of chocolate bars to find in "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory."
"Okay grandpa. Maybe we might get one this time?" my son asked, tears welling up in his eyes. Like a combination of a wistful plea from Willy Wonka's "Charley" and "Tiny Tim" asking about Christmas.
I'm the man. I'll get this done.
When Sunday came around, I set aside my original plans to roast a lamb for Orthodox Easter, and made an easier meal of green peppers stuffed with rice and diced lamb. Corn and tabouleh (tabouli) Mediterranean salad.
It only took two hours.
While the meal simmered, I made my way to Toys-R-Us. Past a couple of pot holes. Through the traffic and long lights on 151st Street. Past the abandoned eyesore of the old, deteriorating Orland Park movie theater with the boarded windows. Only to discover, to my surprise, there wasn't even a line at the Toys-R-Us store.
I felt cheated. I mean, I paid ahead of time. For what? So I could finally buy a system I've been looking for mainly because I couldn't get it. Supply and demand. Or Pavlov's dog. I'm not sure which principle applied in my case.
"You should purchase a second remote," the clerk advised. That was $49. "But you also get more games with the extra controller."
And the clerk added, "You should probably also buy the two year warranty. We had a lady buy a system and it broke. It cost a fortune to replace."
It's bad enough that Nintendo has me wrapped around their greedy little fingers, let alone I have to buy insurance to make sure that the system I am buying with the game CDs and accessories that cost me $360 with the tax will actually work.
Hey. We don't guarantee the systems. We just sell them!
When I was a kid, if you plopped down $25 for anything, you knew it was going to work. You didn't need to kick in an extra 15 percent to insure that "just in case" you wouldn't lose your money.
It cost $39 for the "warranty" for two years.
"Okay. So I pay you the $39 and if something goes wrong over the next two years, I come back to Toys-R-Us and replace it?" I asked, wishfully thinking I wasn't asking, but just reassuring myself about what I thought I heard.
"No," the clerk responded. Politely. "You pay the warranty so you can contact Nintendo and they ship you a form and then you ship the system to them. You could have it back in a week."
Oh. That would be fun. I didn't want to buy the warranty. But then I figured if Nintendo is so set on telling me I should buy it, chances are something's going to go wrong.
It took two hours after I got home to set up the system. It's no simple task, and the High Definition TV set and all the useless connections they offer in the back didn't make it any easier.
After figuring it out, switching the TV to AV1. Reading and re-reading the instructions, Syncing and re-syncing the extra controller. I finally got it to work.
By the time it was done, I was exhausted.
"Want to play dad?"
"Maybe next Easter, kid."
"Wanna go see a movie dad?"
"Sure. Let's go."
Wii can wait.
(Ray Hanania can be reached at rayhanania@comcast.net. Listen to Ray's radio talk show on WCEV AM 1450 on Tuesday and Thursday from 4-6 p.m. His weekly TV Show “30 Minutes” is broadcast every Friday at 7 p.m. on Channel 19 in Oak Lawn, Burbank and Bridgeview.)
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