Bite Me, Best Buy

June 15, 2006 at 6:30 pm | 1 Comment »

I am not a video gamer. When I was 12 or so, my cousin got a Pong console. Stupidest thing I’d ever seen. All the excitement of staring out the car window and watching mile markers zip by. Haven’t given games much of a chance since. That said, the passion gamers have strikes me as intriguing. I casually watch their scene from a comfortable distant. So this week’s Time piece on Nintendo’s DS Lite pulled me in. The tact of appealing to non-gamers (hey that’s me) seems different. And I’ve heard some of the buzz about Brain Age so the news that a Father’s Day promotion gets you the system and game for the price of the system alone hooked me. I dutifully clicked over and wade through to find the links, printed the Best Buy coupon and headed out for afternoon errands. At the store, I made a couple of laps around the video game section but couldn’t find DS hardware then pounced on a pimply-faced blue shirt who was trying to scoot by unnoticed. I asked where the DS Lite bundle was and brandished the coupon. He laughed in my face and shook his head then said, “We’re completely sold out.” When I got home, I checked bestbuy.com. No stores in the area have stock yet their website showed immediate availability. Just a coincidence that the coupon was restricted to in store only? I took it as a sign that I don’t need the damn thing. I mean I have experienced Pong already. It can’t be much different.

So Best Buy (and I suppose Nintendo by extension) for hiring arrogant hygienically-challenged help and putting out offers that you have little or no intention of honoring, bite me.

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