Hotashi - Jack’s Blog

A teenage staff member at a Tim’s Horton’s posted a racist poster that reads, “No Drunken Indians Allowed.” Furious First Nations resident are now calling for a Boycott on the coffee shop. (story here)

While I think the action of the teenage is stupid and wrong, I don’t agree with the boycott at all. It was an action of one individual that acted independently of the corporation. If it was a business decision by Tim Horton’s to put up that poster then I would agree with the boycott. But come on! I know the First Nations are outraged, but don’t react by doing something just as stupid. The teenager in question should be fired, and that’s the end of that.

It astounds me that even now there are analysts who doubt the Wii’s success. Before its launch last November, I remember reading articles talking about how the Wii would be nothing more than a fad and in the long run the PS3 will be top with Xbox 360 coming in second in the then-next-gen console race. It’s close to June, 2007 right now and you still can’t walk into a store and buy a Wii off the shelves — not unless you are extremely lucky. It seems the “experts” were wrong, and the general public is liking the Wii very much. Thank God! Having nice graphics and is great and all, but I’d rather play a great game with mediocre graphics than a mediocre game with great graphics. Sony and Microsoft invested heavily in “nice graphics” and the whole media center idea. Nintendo went the odd route and focused on *gasp* making fun games. If anyone doubted the Nintendo Wii it’s time to start believing.

Of course there are always those younger generation types who think Sony is and will always be the best. They think Xbox 360 and PS3 is for the “hardcore” gamers, whereas the Wii is for those casual types. But really, what is a hardcore gamer? People need to stop being elitists and admit that there isn’t much of a difference between being a hardcore gamer and a casual gamer. I’m a hardcore gamer, but I’m also a casual gamer at times. The only difference between the two is that one labels you as someone who plays a lot of video games, and the other as someone who plays every now and then. Sure, I can gloat about my “l337″ skills in [insert game title]. But really, I would much rather play games with friends that are intuitive to play and wouldn’t give me much edge over them just because I’m more used to the controls. Maybe that’s the reason why these hardcore gamers are so offended by Wii games. Now when they face off against a gaming novice at Wii Tennis, for example, they no longer have the advantage of being hardcore.

I think the Wii is here to stay. Don’t fuss over the graphics too much because I don’t think it’s a big issue. World of Warcraft has pretty outdated graphics (understandably), but it’s still the most successful MMO game ever created! In the end there might be a few people that will complain about not having the best graphics possible, but most gamers play games because they are fun. As long as the Wii doesn’t stop being fun, people will play it.

Did anyone see the Heroes season finale last night? Wow. Definitely one of the best season finales I’ve ever seen! Not to mention one of the best shows that ever played on TV! If you haven’t seen it yet… what is wrong with you?! (Just kidding) But I don’t want to spoil anything for those that have not yet seen the finale, so stop reading if that’s you. :)

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I must say that I was a bit disappointed that the fight between Sylar and Peter didn’t last that long. I was looking forward to an epic battle between the two super-mutants. And the way Hiro “killed” Sylar was a bit anti-dramatic. When Hiro was running towards Sylar to stab him shouldn’t Sylar be able to stop him with telekinesis? I mean, that’s a good 1-2 seconds for Hiro to run to where Sylar was standing, and you can’t tell me that Sylar did not have enough time to react. What I think should have happened is for Sylar to raise his hand to try and use telekinesis against Hiro. But then Hiro stops time and the next thing you see is Sylar with a sword through his body. With that aside, it was still a very good episode. And it seems that Sylar survived that “fatal” stab by Hiro. Perhaps he was able to study the cockroach and become resilient like it? Was that also how he was able to fake his death when he was captured by Primatech?

I can’t wait for the next season to start. I’m glad that the end of season one didn’t exactly end on a cliffhanger. Yes, the ending left you guessing what will happen next, but there was closure for all the major things of season one. Go Hiro!

I just finished watching game 4 of the Suns-Spurs western conference semi-final. I must say, I did not expect the Suns to pull that one out — as much as I would have liked to believe they would. I’m very glad the Suns managed to win 104-98 when it seemed like everything was going the Spurs way.

Did anyone see the body-check Horry had on Nash? That was a dirty play! Not that I’m surprised that it happened since it seems that it is how the Spurs plays these days. Bruce Bowen is a dirty player. You can talk about his great defensive plays all you want, but in the end I think Amare is right in calling Bowen out. And did you see when Robert Horry tried to pull Stoudemire in game 3 to make it look like Stoudemire commited the foul (to get him his 5th foul)? To me — and I think many would agree — the Suns should have won game 3 if the refs made the right calls.

Another reason why I don’t like the Spurs is because they are simply boring to watch. Sure, once in a while Parker or Ginobili would make an entertaining play, but overall the Spurs are old, slow and boring! I don’t care how good Tim Duncan is at the fundamentals, I don’t watch NBA basketball to see lock-out games with textbook plays. I want games to be high scoring and exciting. What’s the point of watching NBA basketball if they are not fun to watch? I really hope the NBA Finals would not come down to a Spurs-Pistons matchup. The last time that happened I didn’t even watch any of the games.

So here’s to Nash and the Suns. I hope they come out on top in the series against the Spurs. The win in game 4 should be the turning point for them. Spurs had everything going their way and the game’s pace was in Spurs’ favour, but somehow the Suns kept it close and pull off a win in the end.