you people sure make me laugh. over here arguin domestics and imports. lets face it they both have their ups and downs.
American cars - made with big engines, big gas eaters, big power, big torque (well, for the most part) oh yes, did I mention big gas eaters ? well you can get decent gas milage as long as you dont pass 2500 rpm lol. viper, corvette, saleen, etc. yes they eat lots of gas, but were not made to be daily drivers. they were meant for people that want a high performance car and dont care about gas, dont usually have intentions to tune the car, and want to be fast.
Jap cars - made with small engines, good gas milage, shitty power, and torque, we wont really get into that. I'll give respect to a few that were meant to be performance cars. the 3000gt vr4 (yea yea yea, it's a boat, weighs 37xx pounds (almost 2 ton's), etc. but there are a few things you guys dont know. you can rev it up to even redline, dump the clutch, and you beraly spin the tires, all you do is take off, wwhhheeeeee, it handles like a dream, it has a great LUXURY interior, full leather, etc), the rx7, toyota supra (love the car, only complaint is the interior, kind of a plane interior but I still want one), 300zx (they needed to invest a bit more money in those, my stock vr4 does circles around a stock tt 300z, but I will give them credit on top-end), acura nsx (wow, what a gorgeous car). all these cars were made to be competition to the american muscle/high performance cars.
in general the americans had and most still have the theory of simple is better, which I agree with. to a degree. look at something else. the 3000gt vr4 is faster than the camaros, corvettes, and trans ams. that is ofcourse until 97-98 when they changed engines. the LS1 engines are good. stock for stock my ws6 walks my vr4, but it does so slowly. my vr4 takes almost all cars off the line and it's a lot of fun.
now as for your debate between the skyline and the viper racing up the mountain/hill/forgot what it was, lets think of what you said. a "TUNED TO 500+ HP SKYLINE" there is a key word here and that's "TUNED" most people that buy the vipers buy them for their name and reputation and usually have no intentions of "TUNING" the car. if you tune the skyline, why not tune the viper. you invest 1000 in the skyline, invest 1000 in the viper. make the race more realistic.
and to finish this long speach (hmm is anyone sleeping yet ?), hondas and toyotas were made to be economical and reliable cars. that goal was reached. the s2000 is the only honda that I can think of that was not meant to be economical, it was a great attempt at a race car. hit the target pretty good for a 4 cylinder. but my vr4 is still faster :-D just say it's due to the two extra cylinders, and the turbos and it's all good hehe.
Jaggy