Game Show Corner

[Flowgli]

Hey, there, people! Flo here, and welcome to this month’s edition of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

Let me tell you guys about Bill Rafferty. Bill Rafferty was a comedian and impressionist who hosted three game shows during his lifetime, all of which were short-lived. He also hosted a couple of pilot episodes, both of which became series in different countries in Europe but never in the US. Those two pilots were Run For The Money and Boggle, which became full series in the UK and The Netherlands, respectively. The game shows with full series in the US were short-lived revivals of Card Sharks and Blockbusters. While he was hosting those shows, he used terms like “dual implication” and “the land of parting gifts”. A “dual implication” is when a game is reached to a point where either contestant could win, and “the land of parting gifts” is where a contestant is “sent to” where they received consolation prizes when they lost a game. Before any of this, though, he hosted a game show that is the subject of this month’s edition. This is the game show where Every Second Counts.

Every Second Counts aired in syndication for one season from September 17, 1984 to an unknown day in September 1985. It was hosted by Bill Rafferty, announced by Jeopardy! announcer Johnny Gilbert, co-hosted originally by Debbie Bartlett and later by Susie Carr—with the former having left the show to join the cast of The Love Boat—produced by Group W Productions in association with Charles Colarusso Productions—the former of which also distributed the show—and taped at Studio 7, KTTV Television in Los Angeles, California.

The game is played in two rounds by three couples. In each round, one half of each couple plays without any help from their spouse, with the wives playing in round one and the husbands playing in round two. Three categories are played in each round, and in each category, the contestants playing in that round take turns answering dual-choice questions, with the two possible answers being the same for each and every question in that category. Each question is a listed item, and that item must be answered by a contestant choosing which answer correctly fits that item. For example, if the category is “Jell-O Flavors”, a series of flavors are given, and a contestant has to choose whether or not a flavor given is a Jell-O flavor by saying “Yum!” if it is or “Yuck!” if it’s not.

As provided in the example, a category whose dual-choice answers are “Yes” or “No” has a specific way for the contestants to give the answers to the items in that category.

Each time a contestant chooses the correct answer, they add seconds to their time, with each correct answer worth two seconds in round one and four seconds in round two. However, if a contestant chooses the incorrect answer, they are locked out for the remainder of the category. Each category is played until all nine items in it are played, or until all three contestants have locked themselves out with incorrect answers in that category.

After two rounds, the couple with the most seconds wins the game and advances to the bonus round, where they will be using the seconds that they have accumulated to win up to four prizes.

The bonus round consists of four levels for the winning couple to complete within the time that they have accumulated in the main game. On each level, the couple is given two categories to choose from, each having a set of three possible answers to choose from on each item in that category. After the three possible answers in the chosen category have been revealed, the couple’s time starts, and the two halves of the couple take turns answering items in that category until a specific number of correct answers needed to complete the level has been given, at which point the clock stops, another pair of categories is given on the next level, and the clock starts counting down again as soon as Bill starts reading items in the chosen category on that level.

The couple must give four correct answers to complete the first level, five to complete the second level, six to complete the third level, and seven to complete the fourth level. Each level completed wins the couple a prize, each one more valuable than the previous one, with the prize on the fourth level always being a car. The couple keeps all the prizes that they have won, regardless of the outcome of the bonus round. But if they run out of time before they complete the fourth level, they win $100 for each correct answer given on the level that they are on at that point.

And that’s Every Second Counts. It’s a very simple game to follow, and yet its fast-paced and fun. With the idea of collecting time to spend in the bonus round by choosing correct answers to listed items, especially with the possible answers being exactly the same for each item in a category, I can’t help but think that this game should’ve been played by teams consisting of various relationships and not just married couples. I really like how the bonus round is played, as it’s a fun, fast-paced one with increasing difficulty and increasingly valuable prizes worth playing for at the time. What I don’t get, though, is why a couple can win money only if they fail to win the car. I thought that they would win $100 for every correct answer regardless of the outcome of the round. It’s also amusing that when it comes to categories with the possible answers to each item in them being “Yes” or “No”, they came up with different ways for contestants to give those answers that fit those categories very well. It’s all done to add variety to how items in these particular categories are answered, as just answering “Yes” or “No”, or “True” or “False”, would make it redundant the more of these categories are played, even though only one category like this is played per episode. At least, all that’s what I really believe. But whether or not that’s the case, the way the answers are phrased for the contestants to give in these particular categories do add humor to the show and get laughs from everyone involved in or watching the show. I guess that’s why this show is billed as “television’s funniest game show” or “television’s newest comedy game show”. Despite all the attempts to include humor and get laughs, I just don’t see this show as a comedy game show or the funniest game show, for there are other game shows that are actually all about comedy and therefore much funnier.

This show, as you can tell, wasn’t a success. Apparently, according to Bill in an interview, certain executives at Group W Productions didn’t like this show, not to mention that it aired in only a small amount of stations across the country. However, despite not being a success in the US, it did become a success in the UK with that place’s adaptation, which aired for nine seasons—or “series”, as they are called there—from 1986 to 1993, hosted by Paul Daniels. There were other international adaptations of the show in New Zealand, Spain, Indonesia, and Bahrain.

The title of the show continued to be used in other game shows. It was used as the title of an unsold pilot episode of an unrelated game show that was shot in 2009 and hosted by Mark Walberg. It was also used by Apolo Ohno in the GSN run of Minute To Win It in 2013 to 2014 when he tells the contestants “You’ve got a Minute To Win It. Every…Second…Counts!”

Even though Every Second Counts wasn’t a success in the US, it was still strong enough to leave an impact, what with its international adaptations and the uses of the title on other game show projects. To me, that is a great accomplishment for a game show with simple-to-follow gameplay. The game show that I’ll be covering next month has simple-to-follow gameplay, too, if you can really call it that, but I won’t have much of it to give praise for. You’ll know why in next month’s edition when I cover what appeared to be Endemol’s second shot at capitalizing on the success of its hit Deal Or No Deal.

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a great day.

[Flowgli]

Hey, everybody! Flo here, and welcome to this month’s edition of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

Endemol gave us a worldwide hit game show called Deal Or No Deal, which actually started out as a Dutch game show called Miljoenenjacht, and because of how successful and popular that show became, particularly the US adaptation that aired on NBC primetime at the time, there have been other game shows that tried to capitalize on the success and popularity of it while it was still successful and popular, but they all came and went, while Deal Or No Deal lived on, regardless of which version in the world. I already covered two game shows here that were made to capitalize on the success and popularity of Deal Or No Deal here, one of which was created and produced by the same person and company that gave people all over the world that show, Dick de Rijk and Endemol, respectively. That one game show that Dick de Rijk created and Endemol produced to capitalize on the success and popularity of Deal Or No Deal was called Show Me The Money, and it was their first of two attempts at that. Their second attempt at that was what the subject of this month’s edition is, Set For Life.

Set For Life is the US adaptation of a UK game show called For The Rest Of Your Life. It lasted one season, airing on Friday nights on ABC from July 20, 2007 to August 31 on that same year. It was hosted by television host and comedian Jimmy Kimmel, best known for hosting late-night talk show Jimmy Kimmel Live!, and known in the game show world for co-hosting Win Ben Stein’s Money—which I already covered back in year one—and currently hosting the ABC primetime run of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? with celebrities as the contestants. It was announced by a male whose identity remains unknown to this day, created by Dick de Rijk, produced by Endemol, and taped at Van Nuys, California.

This show uses a straddling format, so a game can be stopped anywhere when time for an episode runs out and can be continued where it has left off at the start of the next episode.

Each game is played by one contestant, who is accompanied by at least one family member of theirs, with that family member taking on their role in the game as the “guardian angel”. The contestant is on the stage where there are fifteen cylinders in holders, while the “guardian angel” is in a booth where they can monitor the contestant’s progress but can’t hear what is going on outside, and all additional accompanying family members—if any—are seated in the studio audience.

Before the game, a contestant chooses an envelope to determine how much money they can possibly receive each month, though this is never televised. In the game itself, the contestant pulls cylinders out of their holders to determine how long a period of time for which they can possibly receive their monthly payments. One end of each cylinder has a light on one end of it covered by its holder. Therefore, these cylinders are referred to as “light sticks”. Eleven of the “light sticks” have white lights, while the other four have red lights.

The period of time for which the contestant can possibly receive their monthly payments are kept track of on the “time ladder”, which consists of eleven levels. The following levels are 1 month, 6 months, 1 year, 2 years, 3 years, 5 years, 10 years, 15 years, 20 years, 25 years, and 40 years, the latter of which is referred to as “SET FOR LIFE”.

The contestant chooses the “light sticks”, one at a time, and they choose each “light stick” by number, grab that “light stick” by its handle, confirm that they are set at that “light stick” when asked by Jimmy, and pull that “light stick” out of its holder, revealing the color of the light on that “light stick”. If the light on the chosen “light stick” is white, the contestant is moved up a step on the “time ladder”, and they have the option to stop the game and possibly walk away with what they have won up to that point or continue the game and choose another “light stick”. But if the light on the chosen “light stick” is red, the contestant is moved down a step on the “time ladder”—unless they are at the very bottom of the “time ladder” at that point, in which case, their position is left unchanged—and they have no choice but to continue the game and choose another “light stick”.

The game ends after all eleven white lights are chosen, the contestant chooses to stop—in which the case of both, the contestant can possibly walk away with what they have won up to that point—or all four red lights are chosen—in which case, the contestant can possibly win nothing, or as Jimmy puts it, “Four reds, and you’re dead.”

Meanwhile, the “guardian angel” watches the game from inside the booth for the entirety of it, and during all that time, they are shown which “light sticks” are chosen and which step on the “time ladder” the contestant is currently on. They are also provided with a big, red button that they have the opportunity to press to officially end the game after each white light chosen. Their choices of whether they want to continue or end after the white lights chosen are recorded, but they are not shown until after the game on the stage ends. Then, the contestant’s game is recapped, and a video of the decisions made by the “guardian angel” after the white lights chosen of whether the contestant should continue the game or stop is played, showing whether or not they have pressed the button to officially end the game for the contestant. If the “guardian angel” does not press the button, the contestant wins how much they have ended the game with. But if the “guardian angel” does press the button, the contestant wins how much the “guardian angel” has officially ended the game on at the time the button is pressed.

After a game is finished entirely, a new game is played by a new contestant with at least one friend or family member accompanying them.

That’s Set For Life, and after having checked out this show, I actually would’ve preferred Show Me The Money over this one. At least that show had enough differences from Deal Or No Deal to be its own thing. Set For Life is a lot more of a clone of Deal Or No Deal, as those two are luck-based big money game shows where contestants choose items by number, trying to uncover good surprises and avoid bad ones in order to win big money, and facing decisions on whether to continue the game and risk their potential winnings or stop and possibly take how much they have won up to that point. However, unlike Deal Or No Deal, Set For Life doesn’t have strong gameplay, a great atmosphere, a heart, or any care put into it. It also doesn’t have a proper round that determines how much the monthly payments are going to be, just like in the original UK version of the show. Yes, in the UK version of the show, there is a proper round that determines the monthly payments. In that round, a couple chooses from three envelopes with amounts of cash ranging from £100 to £200 in them, and whatever amount of cash is in that envelope, each white light is worth that much cash, while each red light costs them that much cash. There are eight white lights and three red lights in that round. If the round ends with the couple choosing all eight white lights or choosing to stop after a white light is chosen, whatever amount of cash is accumulated up to that point becomes the monthly payment, and they advance to the next round. But if the round ends with the couple choosing all three red lights, the game is over, and the couple wins nothing. The second round of the UK version is exactly the same game as what I just described that of the US adaptation, but with the couple choosing which spouse will go into the isolation booth and which one will remain on stage. See, if the US adaptation actually included the first round into the game for it to actually be seen, it would make the show less problematic, but all it happens is that Jimmy announces the amount of cash in the chosen envelope. It’s never revealed how high or low the amounts of cash in this version can go. It has been announced somewhere, though, that the highest amount of cash ever revealed on this version was $4,625. I never knew myself if that was the highest amount of cash chosen on the show or not, but the episode with that amount chosen was the only episode of the show that I could find anywhere on the Internet, so I used just that episode to get as much accurate information as I can to put together this edition. The most insulting thing about this show, though, is the “guardian angel”. With the “guardian angel” as part of the game, it can be sometimes good, but sometimes bad. The good thing about it that it is that it prevents a contestant from leaving with nothing, but the bad thing about it is that it has a contestant ending up winning less than how much they have chosen to stop the game with. So, it can prevent the contestant from losing a lot of money, but it also can prevent the contestant from winning a lot of money. More often than not, from what I understand, a “guardian angel” officially ends the game too early, forcing a contestant to win a lot less money than they themselves have chosen to stop the game with. That’s a waste of gameplay, thus making it a huge disappointment. Because of this, no contestant has ever reached “LIFE”, and the only way for a contestant to reach “LIFE” is to uncover all eleven white lights in a row, with no red lights uncovered inbetween. That’s not an easy thing to accomplish at all. All a contestant can do to make it all the way up there is just uncover lights, be really lucky, and hope that the “guardian angel” didn’t press the button at any point. That’s pretty much it.

On the episode where each monthly payment is worth $4,625, the contestant who chose that amount of money, Chris Reynolds, made all the right decisions in the game thanks to his four-year-old nephew, Cory, and he made only two wrong decisions in the game, both of which were the only decisions that he made on his own. Chris stopped the game at ten years, for a possible total of $555,000 out of the maximum of $2,220,000, but his “guardian angel”, his brother named Ken, officially stopped the game at five years, for a total of $277,500.

Well, that’s all I have to say about Set For Life. Next month, I’ll be covering another short-lived US game show of an equally short-lived UK game show. This one aired on Game Show Network—known as GSN at the time—and even though it is a game show, it doesn’t look, feel, or play like one. You’ll understand what I’m talking about when the next edition comes.

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a great day.

[Flowgli]

Hello, members of the general public. I’m Dr. Flo, your psychotherapist, and welcome to this month’s edition of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

Wouldn’t you have wanted there to be a game show where a contestant can win a nice cash prize by doing nothing but showing members of the general public the kind of person they really are in order to convince them that you deserve that money based on just that? Well, there used to be one, albeit very short-lived, never to be seen again after it ran its course, showing that a premise like that doesn’t work for a game show one bit. It also doesn’t help that said members of the general public did get to decide which contestant gets the money and which contestant doesn’t with or Without Prejudice?

Without Prejudice? is a short-lived US adaptation of the equally short-lived UK game show of the same name. It lasted one season consisting of eight episodes, having aired on Tuesday nights on Game Show Network—simply known as GSN at the time—from July 17, 2007 to September 16 of that same year. It was hosted by psychotherapist Dr. Robi Ludwig and packaged by 12 Yard Productions, Rainbow Media, and Sony Pictures Television.

A panel of five members of the general public is introduced to five contestants, and they must determine which contestant will win the cash prize of $25,000 by eliminating the other contestants, one at a time, with the panel’s decisions on who they think should receive the money based on which contestant they like the most or hate the least, and not based on which contestant they think needs the money the most.

The five contestants are in a separate room next door, unable to see or hear anything that’s being said in the discussions had among Robi and the panel. At the end of each round, the eliminated contestant gets to see or hear from Robi and the panel about what has happened in the discussions had in that round that has gotten them to their final decisions of the elimination, and they explain what they will have had done with the money if they have had won it after being asked about it by Robi, who, by the way, is the only one on the show who gets to ask that question to the contestants.

The members of the panel make their individual decisions on which contestants to eliminate, and they make their decisions verbally and explain their reasons as to why the contestants of their choices should be eliminated, with the reasons sometimes having to do with race, gender, religion, or any other personal categories, hence the name of the show. After the choices of elimination have been made, the contestant with the most votes is eliminated.

In round one, the five contestants introduce themselves, one at a time, saying their first and last names, their ages, and the cities and states that they come from. The panel then discuss their first impressions on the contestants. Afterwards, a contestant elimination takes place.

In round two, the remaining four contestants reveal information about themselves, such as their background and education, as well as their work and personal lives. Based on all the information provided, another contestant elimination takes place.

In round three, the remaining three contestants reveal their beliefs in certain subjects—such as sex and violence in the media, gun control, and job outsourcing—and they reveal their behaviors in certain situations with members of the production on hidden camera—such as meeting one of said members of the production team in an interview room who is pretending to be another contestant, and reacting to that fake contestant being given too much money in their expenses and saying that they are keeping the extra money. Based on what the panel has seen in the behavior category, another contestant elimination takes place.

In round four, the remaining two contestants enter the main room, and they are interviewed by the panel in person, one at a time. As the panel interviews each contestant, they can ask that contestant any question they like except what they will do with the money. Based on the answers the panel has heard from the contestants, the panel vote for which contestant to award the money to.

After the panel has made their votes on which contestant will win the money, the contestants are brought back into the main room, one at a time, to be told the panel’s final decisions by Robi, with the losing contestant coming back in first, and the winning contestant coming back in next. After being told the results, each contestant explains what they will do with the money when being asked by Robi about it, and the winning contestant wins the money.

That’s Without Prejudice? After seeing this show and having covered it, is it ever any wonder why the idea of contestants vying for a cash prize by showing members of the general public the kind of people that they are in order to convince them that they deserve it failed really hard and never tried again since then? There’s no gameplay, and it doesn’t even look or feel like a game show, even though it’s placed in the category of a “game show”. This just makes this show a boring game show. And not only is this show boring, but it’s also controversial. Yes, this show is controversial, just like the original UK version. On the show’s premiere episode—which is the episode I found on YouTube and Vimeo, and used to make this edition—a Polynesian man in the panel named R. Jay Fullmer made the choice of eliminating a contestant named Michael Graham after the first round for the sole reason being that that contestant was black. He got called out for this by the other panelists, particularly one named David Rhodes, who is a black man. Michael, however was not eliminated after that round. In fact, he ended up being chosen as the winner of the game and the money. As the game progressed, R. Jay was having a change of how he felt about Michael, though he did also make the choice to eliminate him again after round three, but the reason for that was based on how Michael handled the situation in the behavior category. R. Jay then chose that Michael should win the money after the interviews with him and Nancy in round four.

After the run of Without Prejudice? ended, Dr. Robi Ludwig went on to appear on Hannity & Colmes on the Fox News Channel. Also, on August 28, 2007, the show was once in partnership with the NAACP in order to air the newest PSA spot during a special episode that was presented in association with the organization.

Okay, that’s it for Without Prejudice? Next month, I’ll be going back to covering a game show that has gameplay. Yeah, actual gameplay. Yeah, haven’t done something like that in a while. See you in the next edition for that.

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a great day.

[Flowgli]

Hello, there, worldwide game show fans! I’m Flo, your voiceover host, and welcome to this month’s edition of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

Remember back in year one when I covered a boring Q&A game show called Inquizition? Well, there’s another game show whose gameplay is similar to that of that show, and it’s a bit more boring than that show. Actually, it’s 100% boring. Yeah, this show is called 100%.

100% is a short-lived US adaptation of the UK game show of the same name. It had a limited run, so it didn’t last a full season. It aired in syndication from an unknown day in January 1999 to September 17 on that same year. It was hosted by the original voice of Shaggy in the Scooby-Doo franchise himself, Casey Kasem. There’s also a pilot episode of this show from 1998 hosted by Mark Henning. Both Casey and Mark hosted via voiceover, which was also the case for the original UK version and all the other international adaptations of the show. This show was also packaged by O.H.P. Productions and distributed by Pearson Television—later known as FremantleMedia North America and known today as Fremantle.

The game is played by three contestants. They are asked one hundred questions, most of which are multiple-choice questions whose answer choices are labeled with “A”, “B”, and “C”. Every fifth question is a true-or-false question, with “True” labeled with “A” and “False” labeled with “B”. The one hundredth and final question is in the form of a ridiculous fact that is almost always true.

On each question, each contestant locks in an answer by pressing a button corresponding to the answer of their choice on their podium. The contestants never know each other’s choices of answers; they are only revealed the correct answer to that question, and they are not told who has answered it correctly or who has answered it incorrectly.

After every ten questions, the contestants are revealed each of their percentages of the questions they have answered correctly up to that point, but they are not revealed who has scored what percentage. However, they are revealed if there’s a change in the lead if that has happened.

After the one hundred questions, the contestant with the highest percentage wins the game and ten times their winning percentage in cash, up to $990 without achieving a perfect score of 100%; but if they do achieve a perfect score of 100%, they instead win $100,000.

And that’s 100%. As you can tell from my explanation of the gameplay, this show is just plain BORING! It’s dull, it’s bland, it’s repetitive. It’s just…boring! All there is to the gameplay is answering one hundred questions by secretly locking in answers using corresponding buttons. That’s it. Not only is it boring, but it’s also cheap! All a contestant wins for winning the game is $10 times their winning percentage, and that’s for having to go through one hundred questions, which is a lot of material for contestants to go through in one game. A cash prize of $100,000 would’ve been great if someone actually won it, but the thing is, it was never won! No, really! It wasn’t won. Not once! But that shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone, since contestants are asked one hundred questions, and with that many questions asked in one game, contestants are bound to answer at least one question incorrectly, so of course, they’re not gonna be able to answer all one hundred questions correctly. It’s impossible. And $990 and $100,000 is a very, very huge gap. If they had the cash prize be $100 times a contestant’s winning percentage, for a possible $10,000, with no bonus for achieving a perfect score of 100%, then that would’ve been fine. That would’ve been very acceptable.

This show aired in only seven stations, and they were Seattle, Washington; Columbus, Ohio; Dallas and Houston, Texas; Buffalo, New York; and Jacksonville and Tampa, Florida. With the show being the way it is, it shouldn’t come to anyone as a surprise that it would have ended up airing in an amount of stations that small. There are also a couple of other countries that had their own adaptations of 100%, and those countries were France and Italy, with the French adaptation called 100% Question rather than simply 100%. Keep in mind that the show originated in the UK.

Speaking of US game shows that originated in the UK, I have now just covered three game shows like these in a row, and they’re all bombs! First, I covered Set For Life. Then, I covered Without Prejudice? And now, I just covered 100%, the most boring game show ever. Well, next month, I will break the pattern, and I only have one chance to do that. Why? Because next month’s edition is the year eight finale! And to finish the year off, I’m gonna go out and destroy, build, and destroy! Yeah, I said “destroy” twice, so what? That makes the title of the game show that I’ll be covering in the year eight finale of Game Show Corner. Join me next month when I cover a game show played by kids called—you guessed it—Destroy Build Destroy!

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a great day.

[Flowgli]

Hey, there, you destructive kids! I’m Flo, your engineer, and welcome to the year eight finale of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

This year hasn’t been a very exciting one, and that’s due to the shows I chose to cover for it being so weak and very uninteresting. And even though I have been able to release every edition on the day it’s scheduled to be released for the eight years I have been doing this series, I have been releasing each one at a later time of that day than I usually do. That’s because other projects got in the way, I ended up getting sidetracked by some things, and my interest in doing this series consistently had been decreasing as of late. But now, I will be stepping outside to get some air, or as much as I can with the pandemic still going on, as I cover a children’s game show of destruction, a game show that involves vehicles built and used in challenges, a game show that aired on Cartoon Network, just like a game show that I covered in the year six finale of Game Show Corner called BrainRush. Yeah. This game show that I’m covering today is called Destroy Build Destroy.

Destroy Build Destroy aired on Cartoon Network on a block called CN Real from June 20, 2009 to September 21, 2011, having ran for four seasons. It was one of only two shows in the CN Real block that got renewed for more seasons, the other being Dude, What Would Happen. It was hosted by music personality Andrew W.K., created and executive produced by Dan Taberski and Scott Messick, produced by Mess Media and Idiot Box Productions, and distributed by Warner Bros. Television Distribution—known today as Warner Bros. Domestic Television Distribution.

The game is played by two teams, each one consisting of three members. In season one, one team is orange, and the other team is green. In every season thereafter, one team is blue, and the other team is yellow. Each team has a team name—with both team names having a theme, such as Younger Siblings vs. Older Siblings, Country Fans vs. Rock’n Rollers, Students vs. Teachers, and Army Brats vs. Navy Seals—and is assisted by a celebrity who fits the theme of that team name, such as rocker Pete Wentz for Team Wentz and rapper Chiddy for Team Chiddy.

The two teams will be announced what kind of vehicles they will be building, but before they can build anything, they each must destroy a vehicle. Specifically, each team has their own vehicle, and the two teams must destroy each other’s vehicles. The teams are given three options on how to destroy the vehicles, with the team that has won a coin toss before the show choosing first, and the other team choosing from the remaining two options. Examples of how to destroy the vehicles include a feedback bomb, a three-piano drop, and a group of three guys appropriately called “Destroyers”. After a team makes their choice of how to destroy the other team’s vehicles, they destroy that vehicle in that way, and then, the other team chooses how to destroy the opposing team’s vehicle and destroy it that way.

After the teams have destroyed each other’s vehicles, they must build new vehicles from the wreckage of their own vehicles. First, they each work on a blueprint for their vehicle, deciding what to add to it and where each essential part of that vehicle should be placed on it. Then, the teams compete in a “setback challenge”, such as running back and forth on an obstacle course to transfer water into glass bottles with their mouths so that the bottles play notes to “Mary Had A Little Lamb”; this challenge determines which team gets to set back the other team, and the team that has won the “setback challenge” is given to options to choose from on how to set back the other team, such as dumping mud all over the other team’s vehicle or getting the other team to serenade them about how awesome they are during the building of the vehicles. After the winning team of the “setback challenge” has made their choice of setback for the other team, the setback takes place as the building of the vehicles continues. After that, the celebrity assistants are later excused from the building of the vehicles, leaving the teams to carry on without them.

The teams keep building their vehicles until Andrew announces to them via a megaphone that the building of the vehicles is over. Then, the teams compete in the final challenge where they use the vehicles they have built. An example of a challenge is rolling tires into targets with different point values ranging from one to five on them without going for the same target twice in a row within ten minutes, with the targets worth more points the smaller and further away they are.

After the final challenge, the team that wins it wins the game. The winning team receives $3,000 and gets to destroy the other team’s vehicle, choosing one of two ways to destroy that vehicle, such as a digital bomb or an analog bomb, and having it destroyed that way. In some episodes, though, only one way to destroy the losing team’s vehicle is presented, such as a remote-control explosive boat. If the final challenge ends in a tie, both teams’ vehicles get destroyed by Andrew, and neither team wins any money.

There are some episodes where cast members from Cartoon Network shows and movies compete against each other, and in those episodes, the winning team receives a trophy called the “golden sledgehammer” on top of the $3,000 and the right to destroy the losing team’s vehicle. Also, there are no celebrity assistants accompanying the teams in these episodes.

And that’s Destroy Build Destroy. It’s a very interesting reality game show that has been enjoyed by Cartoon Network viewers so much that it is considered one of the better live-action shows that Cartoon Network has to offer, and because of that, it deserved all the additional seasons it got. We get to see the creativity of the vehicles, and the challenges in which the vehicles are used and the way the losing teams’ vehicles get destroyed are fun and interesting to watch. It’s amazing to see what kids can do with all that they have been given to do. The “setback challenge” is also a great addition to the game, as it adds more variety to it so we don’t get just several long minutes of teams just building their vehicles. The prize for the winning team is good for standards of the channel and the time in which this show aired; the prize is a cash prize of $3,000, which is the perfect amount of cash for a team of three to receive for winning on a game show on Cartoon Network from 2009 to 2011, as it can be easily split equally three ways by that team, so each member of that team receives $1,000. There are a few problems I have when this show. Just a few. First of all, this show is a live-action show that was created for Cartoon Network. Even though it had a good run on Cartoon Network and it was one of the better-received live-action shows on that channel, I just think that it doesn’t belong on that channel. If it was made for a channel that doesn’t have any specified content of programming in said channel’s name, such as Nickelodeon, then that would’ve made sense. Another problem I have with this show is that the “setback challenge” can have some gross moments happen in it due to what the teams had to do, such as transferring things with their mouths. One more thing about the show that I have a problem with is that if the final challenge ends in a tie, nobody wins the money when they could’ve had all the members of both teams split the money six ways, with each contestant receiving $500.

The game ended in a tie only once on the show. The teams that competed in the sole episode where the game ended in a tie were cast members of fellow CN Real show Dude, What Would Happen on the blue team and cast members of Cartoon Network original movie Scooby-Doo: Curse Of The Lake Monster on the yellow team. What the teams had to do was to build vehicles that launch and sink boats, launch the boats into a pond—with one member of each team in the boats—and sink each other’s boats by spraying water into them using their intake hoses, while the contestants on the boats must reach islands on the pond and retrieve tools from there, which they must use to get the water sprayed into their boats out of them to keep them afloat. The first team to sink the other team’s boat into the pond would’ve won, but the teams weren’t getting anywhere in that challenge, especially with the contestants not on the boats jumping into the pond, getting onto the islands to be able to reach their opponents in the boats, and fighting each other over one of the hoses. So, instead of letting the challenge continue to its proper end, Andrew brought it to an abrupt stop, and he had the two teams’ vehicles stacked on top of each other and blown up. He also handed out the “golden sledgehammer”, as well as a spare—which was a smaller “golden sledgehammer”—leaving the two teams to fight over who gets which trophy.

Now, that episode I just talked about was not the first time that the cast members of Dude, What Would Happen appeared on Destroy Build Destroy as contestants. Yes, they appeared on this show twice. In their first appearance on the show, they competed against the cast members of Cartoon Network original movie Ben 10: Alien Swarm. The cast members of Dude, What Would Happen were the blue team in both of their appearances on the show. In their first appearance, they and the cast members of Ben 10: Alien Swarm had to build paddle boats that run on giant rotating paddles powered by the teams themselves, of course, and in the challenge with those paddle boats, they had to retrieve giant balls with letters on them—except one of the balls, which has the number 10 on it—bring them to their ball holders, and spell out their respective titles with those balls. The cast members of Dude, What Would Happen had to spell out “DUDE”, while the cast members of Ben 10: Alien Swarm had to spell out “BEN10”. The first team to spell out their respective title won that challenge, with the cast members of Ben 10: Alien Swarm having won it, so the cast members of Dude, What Would Happen, lost on their first appearance. They returned on the show for their second appearance for a chance to redeem themselves, but…well, I already explained what happened there, so I think you know what happened there, by now. I don’t need to explain it again.

You know what else I already explained in this edition that I don’t need to explain again? What has been happening with me lately regarding doing this series. But what I’ll explain, right now, now that I’m done covering Destroy Build Destroy, is what will come of year nine of this series. Well, it will still be a monthly series, and a new episode will be released on the final Friday of each month from September to June. However, year nine will be the final year of Game Show Corner, not just as a monthly series, but as a consistently scheduled series altogether. After year nine, Game Show Corner will no longer be a consistently scheduled series; instead, I will release editions occasionally, whenever I feel like it. That’s what I have planned for this series in the future. Yeah, having done this series on a regular basis, whether weekly for the first five years or monthly for the past three years—and pretty soon, the next year—has taken a lot out of me, especially with many other things having gotten in the way. On top of what I have planned for this series in the future, I will still be doing my other series, Game Show Graveyard, consistently, as I plan to make only five editions for it every year on October.

Now, with all that out of the way, I will be spending the summer preparing as many editions for both series this year as I can before the new year of either series begins. So, here’s hoping that I have better luck with the next year of Game Show Corner than I did with this year. See you this fall!

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a great summer.

[Flowgli]

Hey, everybody! I’m Flo, and welcome to the year nine premiere of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

Now, for those of you who haven’t checked out the year eight finale, I’ve stated that year nine will be the final year of Game Show Corner as not just a monthly series, but also as a consistently scheduled series. Remember when I did this on a weekly basis from years one through five, before I started doing this on a weekly basis starting in year six? Well, having done this series on a consistent basis for eight years had caused my interest in doing so to decrease as of late. It also didn’t help that other projects got in the way, and that I ended up getting sidetracked by some things. So, after year nine ends, Game Show Corner will no longer be a consistently scheduled series. Starting after year nine, I will just release editions occasionally, whenever I feel like it. This’ll make things easier for me, especially with me having released editions in later times than I usually did before on the days they were to be released. What else can I do when it comes to this. You gotta make cutbacks whenever it’s necessary. That’s life for you. Speaking of life. I’m starting off year nine by covering The Game Of Life.

Based on the board game of the same name by Milton Bradley, The Game Of Life aired on The Hub—known today as Discovery Family—on a weekly basis alongside Scrabble Showdown from September 24, 2011 to April 15, 2012. It was hosted by Debt contestant and Street Smarts host Frank Nicotero, music composed by Paul Zimmer, directed by Rich DiPirro, produced by Andrew Golder Productions—with its founder, Andrew Golder, as an executive producer of this show, along with Ruben Klammer—1/17 Productions, and Hasbro Studios, with the latter company also having distributed it.

The game is played by two families, each one consisting of two kids and an adult and having the name of the younger child in that family as that family’s team name. The two families play against each other in three rounds, trying to score as many points as possible, with the points referred to by Frank as “Life Points”. The family with the most Life Points after three rounds wins the game and goes to the Game of Life spinner for a chance to win a grand prize vacation.

In round one, each family gets a turn getting a ride on a ridefilm vehicle that resembles a car, with the child captain taking the driver’s seat, the other child taking the passenger seat, and the adult taking the back seat. While a family is in the vehicle, they are given two careers to choose from, which are basic careers like a veterinarian or a firefighter, and they choose a career by the child captain turning the steering wheel left or right. Then, the family goes on an adventure where they ride on the vehicle in front of green screen animation, reaching forks in the road at some points. Each time a fork in the road is reached, the vehicle stops moving, and the family is asked a dual-choice question connected to the chosen career. The family then talks among each other of which answer they think is the correct one to that question, and the child captain then chooses an answer by turning the steering wheel left or right. Then, the family heads to the direction of the child captain’s choice, seeing if the answer that they have chosen is correct or incorrect. If they have chosen the correct answer, they score Life Points; but if they have chosen the incorrect answer, they are stopped from going any further for five seconds, causing “gas”—in other words, time for that family’s turn in the vehicle—to be wasted.

For each family, the first question is worth 100 Life Points, and each question thereafter is worth 100 Life Points more than the previous question.

A family’s adventure ends when they run out of gas, at which point they get out of the vehicle. After the first family’s turn in the vehicle, the other family gets in it, and the career just played is replaced with a new one, so that that family will also have two to choose from, and that family plays under the same rules as those for the family that has gone first. The round ends after both families have their turns in the vehicle.

Round two is played the same way as round one, but with the the family who has gone second in the previous round going first in this round, the careers to choose from being more recreational—such as exploring a volcano or visiting Japan—and the Life Points doubled; for each family, the first question is worth 200 Life Points, and each question thereafter is worth 200 Life Points more than the previous question. Also, each family’s third question is an “extra gas” question, and if a family answers their “extra gas” question correctly, not only do they score 600 Life Points, but they also get the extra gas, meaning that they get more time in their turn to try and answer even more questions.

After both families have their turns in the vehicle in this round, the family with the most Life Points goes to the Game of Life spinner for a chance to win a bonus prize. The spinner is a multi-colored wheel with numbers ranging from one to ten on it. At the spinner, the family who has earned the right to spin the spinner makes a prediction of whether it will stop at either an even number or an odd number. The chosen numbers are then flipped over, revealing “BONUS PRIZE” behind each number to lock those numbers in, and the child captain spins the spinner. If the spinner stops on one of the five predicted numbers, the family win the bonus prize; but if it stops on one of the other five numbers, the family wins a consolation prize.

In some episodes, the predicted numbers are not flipped over to be locked in. In those episodes, each number has a different consolation prize behind it, and if the wheel stops on one of the five unpredicted numbers, that number is flipped over, revealing what consolation prize the family wins.

If there is a tie after each family has their turn in the vehicle in round two, both families go to the spinner, where they each have an equal chance at winning the bonus prize. In this case, the family that has won a coin toss before the show makes the prediction of whether the spinner will stop at an even number or an odd number, while the other family is left with the remaining five numbers. Then, Frank himself spins the spinner, and the family whose one of their numbers is stopped on wins the bonus prize, while the other family wins a consolation prize.

In round three, the two families compete against each other in a one-minute stunt game. In some episodes, each family wears shirts of a different color—one in red, the other in blue—so that the home viewers can tell which contestant is on which family as the families play the stunt game. In most episodes, each member of a family has a different task to perform; for example, if a stunt game involves feeding monkeys—which are actually images of monkeys on boards with holes at the mouths—one member of each family picks a banana from a tree using a fruit picker and takes it over to the next member of each family, who removes the peel from the banana and tosses the banana to the last member of each family, who catches the banana in midair and shoves it into the monkey’s “mouth”. Each success in the stunt game is worth 250 Life Points in most episodes and 500 Life Points in a few other episodes.

After round three, the family with the most Life Points wins the game and advances to the bonus round. If the game ends in a tie, the families go to the Game of Life spinner, and the tie is broken using the same rules as in the end of round two when that round ends in a tie.

Before the bonus round, each member of the winning family is asked a dual-choice “would you rather” question that relates to one of the three adventures that that family has in the main game, with the child captain being asked a question related to that family’s chosen career in round one, the other child being asked a question related to that family’s chosen career in round two, and the adult being asked a question related to the stunt game in round three, in that order. In the bonus round itself, the three questions are asked in that order, and on each question, two members of the family discuss with each other and come to an agreement on which answer is chosen by the family member who is the subject of that question. Then, the two guessing family members make their guess together, and the family member who is the subject of that question strikes a thinking pose, while that family member’s answer is revealed, with that answer shown in a superimposed thought bubble for the home viewers.

After the three questions have been played, the family goes to the Game of Life spinner and makes predictions of which numbers it will possibly stop at. First, they must predict whether the spinner will stop at an even number or an odd number. Then, they must predict an additional number for each question answered correctly in this round. After the predictions are made, the child captain spins the spinner, and if it stops at one of the predicted numbers, the family wins the grand prize; but if the spinner stops at one of the unpredicted numbers, the family wins a consolation prize.

That’s The Game Of Life, and I can’t say that I’m impressed. For a game show based on the board game called The Game Of Life, it seems to be bare of what is found in the board game itself. Sure, the set looks like the board game, complete with colorful spaces and a colorful spinner with numbers one to ten on it, and it’s got families go on a car and choose careers, but that’s about it; instead of adding more to make it an interesting game show adaptation of a board game, it takes away a lot and adds just a few things that makes it a weak game show adaptation of said board game. It takes away many things that make the board game what it was, such as college, marriage, having children, retirement, and other things that people go through in their lives. The board game and this game show adaptation of it are called The Game Of Life, after all, with literally huge emphasis on the word “Life”. There’s even money involved in the board game, a whole lot of it. If this game show adaptation of the board game was made as a high stakes game show for a major television network, then it probably would’ve had a better chance. But instead, it was made as a game show with gameplay that’s way too basic for a smaller television network. The first two rounds are just question rounds where families lock in answers by choosing to go left or right, and the third round is just a basic one-minute stunt game that has nothing to do with the board game which this show is based on and can be added to any family-friendly game show. The bonus round is the only round that’s actually worth anything in this show based on the board game, as it’s simply using the Game of Life spinner to decide whether or not the winning family wins the grand prize and, before that, has that family increase their chances of winning the grand prize using the dual-choice “would you rather” questions. The downside of the bonus round, though, is that it’s one of those games where you can play the game perfectly and still end up losing. For this bonus round, the winning family can get up to eight numbers out of a possible ten on the spinner, meaning that there’s a chance that that family can end up not winning the grand prize by the spinner stopping at one of the two unpredicted numbers.

The prizes are all great, though. Bonus prizes include a surf adventure, a San Diego Zoo safari, a hot air balloon ride, a ride from school in a limousine, and a $1,000 Beverly Hills shopping spree. Grand prizes include a speedboat adventure in the Dominican Republic, a Broadway adventure in New York City, a catamaran or volcano adventure in Hawaii, a waterfall adventure in Jamaica, a cowboy adventure in Arizona, and a state-of-the-art 3D family screening room. And consolation prizes include a thrill park adventure, a pirate dinner adventure, a medieval times dinner and tournament adventure, family scooters, and a $1,000 electronic shopping spree. Yeah, a lot of the prizes are trips, most of which are referred to as “adventures” by Frank. All these prizes are still cool. I do think, though, that the shopping sprees should be worth $3,000 instead of just $1,000, since there’s three members in a family on this show.

The Game Of Life was paired up with another game show on The Hub called Scrabble Showdown, three weeks after the latter premiered. Both of these shows’ runs ended on the same day. I’ll cover Scrabble Showdown on the year nine finale. Next month, though, I will be covering a music game show on BET. I don’t think I’ve covered any game shows from that channel except the revival of Triple Threat back in year two, probably because there aren’t many game shows from that channel. Oh, well, best to be on the beat in next month’s edition.

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a great day.

[Flowgli]

What’s up, y’all! This is DJ Flo, and welcome to this month’s edition of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

It’s time we get down to an obscure music-themed game show, people. So, let’s turn up the music, ‘cause we’re gonna party like it’s 2001. The subject of this month’s edition is On The Beat.

On The Beat aired on a weekly basis on BET from October 2001 to February 2002, with the exact days of those dates unknown. It was hosted by Spike Davis and co-hosted by La La Anthony, with the companies behind it unknown.

The game is started off with three contestants, all of whom play against each other in round one. In the game, contestants are asked questions related to music and pop culture, and contestants signal in and answer the questions, scoring points for answering correctly.

In round one, the three contestants take turns answering questions, with each question answered correctly worth 10 points. But if a contestant misses their question, their opponents get to signal in and answer that question for 5 points. This round is played until time runs out, and the contestant with the lowest score is eliminated from the game.

In round two, the remaining two contestants are asked toss-up questions, each one worth 20 points. A contestant who signals in with the correct answer to a question scores the points, while a contestant who signals in with an incorrect answer loses 10 points, giving their opponent a chance to answer that question for the 20 points. Like before, this round is played until time runs out.

At the end of round two, the contestant with the highest score wins the game and advances to the bonus round for a chance to win a grand prize trip.

In the bonus round, the winning contestant stands behind a path consisting of eight numbered spaces. Specifically, they stand behind space #8. Then, they are asked one question, which has at least eight correct answers. Each time they give a correct answer, they move one space forward on the path; but each time they give an incorrect answer, they get a strike.

The contestant has 40 seconds to reach space #1 by giving eight correct answers, and if they succeed in doing so before they run out of time or get three strikes, they win the grand prize trip.

This show has at least one episode where celebrities in the music industry play for charity, with the losing celebrities each receiving $5,000 for charity, and the winning celebrity receiving $10,000 for charity if they win the bonus round.

That’s On The Beat, and I gotta say that, for a music-themed game show, it looks and feels too generic. The gameplay is so generic; you can switch out the music theme with any other theme, and the game will still be exactly the same. It’s just answering questions, whether by taking turns or signaling in. The most interesting round in the game is the bonus round, and even that will work exactly the same with the music theme switched with any other theme. Yeah, everything about the gameplay is so generic that it doesn’t fit the title of the show. The set also doesn’t even look like a game show set; it looks more like a generic club. It looks bland and doesn’t look fun. Even the people on the show, no matter who it is, don’t make the show fun, no matter how much fun they appear to be having in it. Pretty much everything about this show is so generic; it’s forgettable, even to the point where there are only a couple of things on the Internet overall about this show. Yeah, it’s that forgettable, and it’s that obscure.

With all this talk about how forgettable and obscure a game show is, I’ll be covering another game show that’s not only forgettable and obscure, but also so bad that it can be considered a game show turkey. Yes, it’ll be that time of year again for next month’s edition, and it’ll be that time for the final time here on Game Show Corner. So, join me next month when I cover a game show for Game Show Turkey Month for the last time. Yeah, I never had an official name for that time of the year on Game Show Corner until now, and this’ll be the last time I do this kind of month. And boy, will I have a big game show turkey for you.

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a great day.

[Flowgli]

Hello, family and friends! I’m Flo, hosting a Thanksgiving dinner and welcoming you to this month’s edition of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

Let’s play the clip one last time.



As you should know, by now, this is the last game show turkey edition that I am doing. It’s going to be a really big turkey, and what better way to finish off editions like these for good than to cover a game show that’s so bad that it ranks up there with Shopper’s Casino as one of the worst game shows ever, if not the worst game show ever. I wish I was kidding. Unfortunately, this is not the case. So, here we go. It’s time to finish off game show turkey editions for good with The Million Dollar Word Game.

The Million Dollar Word Game lasted 40 episodes, having aired on America One on a daily basis from September 27, 1999 to November 19 on that same year, with reruns airing until March 30, 2001. It was hosted by The Lonely Chef star and executive producer Ian Jamieson, who also executive produced the show and composed the music for it with Rob Williams. Clare Denman, Ian’s then-wife, also produced the show. Also, the show was packaged and distributed by SuperVision Entertainment, Inc., and it was taped in Canada.

Each episode can have multiple games played in it due to the show having a rollover format. Each game is played by one contestant. In each game, the contestant plays up to fourteen levels—referred to as “questions” by Ian—of unscrambling words and making words using letters from longer words. The contestant has 30 seconds on each level to unscramble or make enough words in order to complete that level. On each word the contestant spells or makes, they must say the word clearly and spell it correctly. Also, proper names and foreign words are not allowed. Each time the contestant completes a level, they advance to the next level. If, however, on any level, the contestant fails to unscramble the word or make enough words within the 30-second time limit, the game is over, and the contestant leaves with whatever they have won up to that point, depending on how far they have gotten in the game.

On the first level, the contestant must unscramble a three-letter word. On the second level, they must unscramble a four-letter word. On the third level, they must unscramble another four-letter word or a five-letter word. On the fourth level, they must make three three-letter words out of a five-letter word or a six-letter word. On the fifth level, they must make four four-letter words out of a seven-letter word, an eight-letter word, or a nine-letter word. On the sixth level, they must make two five-letter words out of the same word from the previous level. It is currently unknown what the contestant must do on the seventh, eighth, ninth, tenth, eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth levels, but on the fourteenth and final level, the contestant must unscramble a twelve-letter word.

If the contestant completes the fifth level, they win a check for $1,000. If they complete the tenth level, they win a trip. If they complete the fourteenth and final level, they choose one of the twenty-four numbered circular envelopes behind Ian, and they win the prize inside that envelope.

The prizes in the envelopes include cars, furniture, and large cash prizes, including $250,000, $500,000, and the top cash prize of $1,000,000.

And that’s the show. Now, there’s nothing wrong with making a half-hour game show that is a word game where contestants play for the top prize of $1,000,000. However, the problem is that The Million Dollar Word Game is way too cheap to be a game show where $1,000,000 is played for. The set looks too cheap, the atmosphere makes the show look and feel too cheap, the graphics look too cheap, and the music sounds too cheap. The show looks like a public access television show rather than a game show where big money is played for, as the set just consists of two podiums with a dollar sign on the front of each one of them, a wall in the back with the show’s title on it, and two racks containing twenty-four numbered envelopes each, with one rack behind the contestant and the other rack behind Ian. Speaking of those envelopes, they were never chosen. The envelopes behind the contestant never seemed to be mentioned. The reason why the envelopes never got chosen was because nobody completed all fourteen levels. Actually, some people who watched the show recalled one contestant having reached the fourteenth level, and that contestant failed to unscramble the word on that level, with that word being “BICENTENNIAL”. Even if that contestant has completed that level, that contestant still would’ve had only a very small chance at winning the $1,000,000 cash prize. In game shows where $1,000,000 is played for, winning that amount of money is hard, but not impossible; what contestants have to do is complete the final level in order to win the money and that’s it, and that can be achieved by answering the final question correctly, completing the final stunt game successfully, solving the final word puzzle correctly, or whatever else needs to be done involving knowledge or skill, depending on what the game show is. The challenge in those game shows is that the levels get increasingly difficult as a contestant goes further into the game. However, in this show, not only does a contestant have to complete the final level, but they also must choose one of twenty-four envelopes, one of which contains the $1,000,000 cash prize. It’s obvious that this show was made to capitalize on the success and popularity of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?, but it’s done very badly. Also, each word game has only one way to solve word puzzles, but this one has two ways, and they don’t really mesh well together. It has contestants unscrambling words and making words out of longer words, and there’s no consistency in how and when each way of solving a word puzzle comes in during the game.

Now, as I put together this edition, I came up with a way to make the game better. Here’s what I got:

1. Each episode will be self-contained, with one contestant playing for the entire episode.
2. There will be one rack of fifteen envelopes instead of two racks of twenty-four envelopes each, with all the envelopes containing cash prizes ranging from $100 to $1,000,000–specifically, the exact same fifteen cash prizes as those on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? at the time.
3. All the word puzzles will be scrambled words, and there will be fourteen words for the contestant to unscramble, with the first two words being four letters long each, the next two words being five letters long each, the two words after those being six letters long each, the two words after those being seven letters long each, the two words after those being eight letters long each, and the last four words being nine, ten, eleven, and twelve letters long, in that order.
4. Each specific length of word has a specific amount of time for a contestant to solve that word, with each four-letter word, each five-letter word, each six-letter word, each seven-letter word, each eight-letter word, the nine-letter word, the ten-letter word, the eleven-letter word, and the twelve-letter word having a time limit of 20 seconds, 25 seconds, 30 seconds, 35 seconds, 40 seconds, 45 seconds, 50 seconds, 55 seconds, and 60 seconds, respectively, with the clock shown, of course, since it was never shown on the show itself.
5. Each time a contestant unscrambles a word, an envelope is automatically eliminated, specifically the one with the lowest remaining cash prize in it.
6. The contestant is given three forms of assistance, just like the lifelines in Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?, to use if they get stuck on a word. Each time the contestant chooses to use one of the forms of assistance, the clock stops, and it continues counting down after that form of assistance is used. One of the forms of assistance is “Place A Letter”, which has one of the letters in the word currently in play randomly selected by a computer and placed in its proper position of that word. Another is “Define The Word”, which gives the contestant the definition of the word currently in play. One more is “Replace The Word”, which replaces the word currently in play with another word of the same length. Each form of assistance can be used only once.
7. After all fourteen words have been played, the contestant will choose one of the remaining envelopes, and whatever cash prize is in that envelope is what they win. But if the contestant correctly unscrambles all fourteen words, they automatically win the $1,000,000 cash prize, as there will be only one envelope left remaining.

That’s all the things I would do to make the gameplay better. Also, to make the show overall better, I’d have it made for an by networks and companies with actual budgets behind them, even big enough budgets for a game show where $1,000,000 is played for. Also, I’d have a set, a graphics package, a music and sound package, and a set of lighting, all professionally done. All that’s obvious, definitely, but it’s all worth pointing out. I would also have someone who is actually competent and capable of what to do or say as the host, as Ian Jamieson is very dull and incompetent. He sounded kinda sleazy, especially when he talked about things one would be excited about, and he laughed a lot to fill in the gaps he could’ve filled with something witty to say during conversations he had with contestants. That really made him come off as annoying. I also heard that he flirted with female contestants, which would’ve been a bad thing to do, even during the third third of 1999, but in the only full episode that can be found on YouTube, it didn’t look like he was flirting with the female contestants there.

The biggest problem with this show is that it promised what it couldn’t deliver. Being an overly cheap game show, it couldn’t deliver big money, and it was promised in a few different ways in the episode I found on the Internet. One way was that on the next season—or “series of tapings”, as Ian put it—there would be $5,000,000 to play for. Yes, $5,000,000. Another way was that there was to be a tournament between the United States and Canada, with twenty-four people in each country competing in it, but it never came through. One more way was that there was an online tournament that was to take place sometime after the show’s run ended. The cash prize offered was $10,000,000. Yes, that’s right! $10,000,000! What the participants had to do was pay $100 each to enter, with all the money going into the prize fund, and the winner of the tournament would have to fly to the Caribbean to collect the prize money. Not enough people entered the tournament to get a cash prize to $10,000,000. In fact, the number of people that entered the tournament was just under 8,000. If you couldn’t tell from all this, this tournament is definitely a scam.

The Million Dollar Word Game is a prime example of how not to produce a game show, especially one where big money is played for. It also serves as a reason why there are some people who shouldn’t be working in game shows, or in television in general. This show is just plain awful, scummy, and wrong, just like Shopper’s Casino, and because of all this, also just like that show, this show can be seen, has been seen, and forever will be seen as the worst game show of all time. That’s why I considered The Million Dollar Word Game to be a game show turkey and chose this show to cover in the final edition with the game show turkey theme here on Game Show Corner.

So, now, I’m done with The Million Dollar Word Game, and I’m done with the game show turkey theme for good. Now, next month is December, and for next month’s edition, I’ll be covering a game show that aired around Christmas and had annoying Christmas voiceovers. Not only that, but it’s also a US adaptation of an Israeli game show that many people have considered as a rip-off of Wheel Of Fortune and Russian Roulette, and it was also hosted by the person who hosted Cash Cab. See you next month.

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a great day.

[Flowgli]

Season’s greetings, everyone! This is Festive Flo, and welcome to this month’s edition of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

Last month, I covered The Million Dollar Word Game, a very, very cheap game show made to piggyback on the success and popularity of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? that promised millions more than it actually had. This month, I’ll be covering a game show with a big budget made to piggyback on the success and popularity of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? that combined elements of Wheel Of Fortune and Russian Roulette, the latter of which I already covered back in year three. Get ready to celebrate post-Christmas Christmas with this little holiday quizzer called Who’s Still Standing?

Who’s Still Standing? is the US adaptation of a game show from Israel called La'uf al HaMillion. It aired on NBC from December 19, 2011 to January 30, 2012, having lasted one season consisting of nine episodes. It was hosted by comedian and Cash Cab host Ben Bailey, created by Lisa Shiloach-Uzrad and Amit Stretiner—both of whom executive produced it with Craig Plestis, Tim Puntillo, and Avi Armoza—and packaged by Smart Dog Media, Armoza Formats—which are the production companies of Craig Plestis and Avi Armoza, respectively—and Universal Television.

The game is played by eleven contestants, one of whom is the central contestant referred to as the “Hero”, and the other ten of whom are opponents referred to as “Strangers”. Each contestant stands on a trap door, with the Hero standing on the trap door in the center of the stage, and the Strangers standing on trap doors circling the center trap door, one Stranger on each trap door, of course.

The Hero plays against the Strangers, one at a time, and they choose which Stranger they want to play against in each match. After the Hero chooses a Stranger to play against, the two contestants take turns answering questions, with each turn lasting twenty seconds. The correct answer to each question is shown in the form of a partially-revealed word puzzle, and the contestant in turn gets to make as many guesses as they can and think out loud as to what the correct answer is. If the contestant in turn gives the correct answer while thinking out loud on a question, they’re given credit for answering that question correctly.

The Hero is allowed to pass a question if they are stuck, at which point the Stranger whom they are playing against will have a fresh twenty seconds to answer that question. The Hero is given two passes in some episodes and three passes in other episodes. In either case, the Hero earns an extra pass by defeating five Strangers. Regardless, the Strangers are not allowed to pass any questions to the Hero whatsoever.

At least two of the matches in the game are “specialty rounds” and each of them has a theme, whether all the questions in it are related to that theme, or all the questions or answers in that match have a specific keyword in them.

Each match is played until a contestant fails to give the correct answer to a question within the allotted twenty seconds, at which point that contestant loses the match, the trap door that they stand on opens, and they fall through it, exiting the stage and entering the room below. If the Stranger loses the match, the Hero wins money and chooses another one of the remaining Strangers to play against. But if the Hero loses the match, the game is over, the Hero loses all their money, and the Stranger who has just won that match wins money.

After each win in the first seven matches, the Hero gets a pre-determined amount of money added to their winnings, with that amount of money revealed when Ben goes over to the trap door which the just-defeated Stranger has just fallen through and turns over the monitor there. The amounts range from $1,000 to $20,000 in each of these matches. However, in at least one episode, the amounts range from $1 to $50,000 in each of these matches. Winning the eighth match increases the Hero’s winnings to $250,000, winning the ninth match doubles their winnings to $500,000, and winning the tenth and final match redoubles their winnings to $1,000,000. Also, starting after winning the fifth match, the Hero has the option after winning each match to stop and take the money or play another match against one of the remaining Strangers.

If the game ends by the Hero choosing to stop and take the money, they have the option of how they will like to exit the stage, whether through the door or through the trap door—or through “the floor”, as how it is referred to as. Also, the amount of money a Stranger wins for winning against the Hero is $10,000 from the first match to the seventh match, $25,000 in the eighth and ninth matches, and $50,000 in the tenth and final match.

If there is still time left in the episode after the game is over, the remaining Strangers—including the one who has defeated the Hero if the game has ended with the Hero being defeated—play a speed round. In the speed round, the remaining Strangers take turns answering crossword-style clues, with each correct answer adding $1,000 or $2,000 to a pot, depending on the episode. Each turn lasts ten seconds instead of twenty. If a Stranger fails to answer a clue correctly within the allotted ten seconds, they fall through their trap door, being eliminated with nothing—unless that eliminated Stranger is the one who has defeated the Hero in the game earlier, at which point they are eliminated with the money they have won for defeating the Hero in the game earlier. The speed round is played until only one Stranger remains, with that Stranger winning all the money in the pot and choosing whether to leave through the door or through the trap door they stand on.

That’s the show. I guess you can make a game show where contestants stand on trap doors and fall through them when they get eliminated from the game that isn’t Russian Roulette. Who’s Still Standing? is not a bad game show with this idea, but the decisions made for it aren’t really that good. I mean, it’s got a good set, a good music and sound package, a good host, and big money played for. The gameplay, however, has things wrong with it. First of all, the gameplay can be somewhat of a drag, for each turn lasts 20 seconds, meaning that a match can go on for too long if too many questions are asked in that match. Second of all, the winnings structure is pretty much similar to Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? during its years with the shuffle format, as not only does it have $1,000,000 as the top cash prize, but it also has random amounts of cash added to the bank for each success within two thirds of the way to the top cash prize and total cash augmentations to the highest cash prizes for each success within the last third of the way to the top cash prize. Speaking of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?, third of all, it has not only $1,000,000 as the top cash prize, as well as a winnings structure that is a rip-off of the shuffle format of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?, but also passes that work in a similar manner to lifelines, one contestant playing for the big money, that contestant choosing whether to stop and take the money or continue playing for more, and that contestant having their game over and losing their winnings if they fail once. Fourth, there’s inconsistency in the gameplay. It’s not much, but it’s still there. There are episodes where the Hero is started off with three passes and episodes where they are started off with two passes, there are episodes where the cash prizes for the first seven matches range from $1,000 to $20,000 and at least one episode where the cash prizes for the first seven matches range from $1 to $50,000, and there are episodes where each correct answer in the speed round is worth $1,000 and episodes where each correct answer in the speed round is worth $2,000. There’s even an episode where two speed rounds are played, the first of which takes place before the game, with each correct answer in the first speed round worth $2,000 and each correct answer in the second speed round worth $1,000. And fifth, whether someone chooses to stop or continue playing the game, loses the game, or wins a speed round, they are given the option to walk out the door or fall through the trap door they’re standing on. What’s the point of giving that contestant a choice of how they want to leave the show? That option shouldn’t be given to anyone. Contestants who lose should fall through the trap doors that they stand on, and contestants who end up winning money should walk out the door, no questions asked. I actually like the speed round, and I wished that the entire game was played like that.

While Who’s Still Standing? has a number of flaws, it’s not beyond redemption. There is a good game show in it, and it can be changed to be made a much better game show. Cyndi Seidelman explained what she would do to make the show better in her video induction on this show, and now, I’m gonna do that right here in this edition of Game Show Corner.

So, what I would do to make Who’s Still Standing? a better game show would be the following:

1. Get rid of the Hero/Stranger distinction and have all the contestants earn the right to play for the money.
2. Have the game last exactly ten matches, with each match lasting two minutes.
3. Have a contestant be randomly selected to stand on the central trap door and play for the money at the start of the show and whenever a match ends with the previous central contestant eliminated.
4. On each match, have a contestant be forced to keep their turn in answering questions until they have answered one correctly, at which point their opponent will be forced to have a turn in answering questions.
5. Add money to the pot for each correct answer, with each correct answer in the first match worth $1,000, and have the dollar value increased by $1,000 in each new match if the match before it is won by the central contestant.
6. Have a contestant be eliminated from the game by having ran out of time while it’s their turn. If the central contestant wins a match, they remain on the central trap door as the central contestant and keeps playing for the money in the next match. If the opponent wins a match, they stand on the central trap door as the new central contestant and play for the money in the next match.
7. Have the last contestant standing after ten matches win the game and receive all the money in the pot. If the winning contestant has been the central contestant at the beginning of the game and has won all ten matches, that contestant wins double the pot.
8. With all the changes stated, there will be no passes, no option to stop or continue playing, and no option of how they will like to leave.

Those are the changes I would make to make the show better. And yes, I know that this show is an adaptation of a game show from another country, and making this many changes would probably make it unfaithful to that foreign game show, but maybe that foreign game show wasn’t all that good, to begin with. Well, it actually seems to be all that good, because it’s been airing since 2010, it’s still airing to this day as of the release of this edition, and it has many international adaptations, including the United States—obviously, since I just covered it, now—Germany, France, China, Hungary, Brazil, Turkey, Italy, Panama, Thailand, Uruguay, Vietnam, Greece, India, and the Arab World. The US adaptation even had acceptable ratings, though it didn’t get renewed for a second season due to high production costs. With the game being played the way it was, maybe having the show cancelled after one season was for the best.

Now, there’s a reason why I chose this show as the subject for this year’s December edition. You see, four episodes of this show were collectively referred to as a “Four Night Holiday Event”, and those episodes had music, sound effects, and graphics all in a Christmas theme, but the episodes themselves are not Christmas-themed, as there’s no mention of Christmas or anything Christmas-related on the set. All that Christmas stuff was added to those four episodes in post-production. The unidentified announcer doing a Santa Claus impression was something tacked on, as well, and it just comes off as annoying.

Speaking of annoying, while a match is in play, the show would go to a commercial break while a contestant is struggling to figure out the correct answer to a question, and when the show returned from the commercial break, the question before that one would be played again, and the question that just got interrupted by the show going into the commercial break ended up being played all over again after that! It’s really annoying that something that was shown right before the commercial break ends up being repeated after the commercial break was over. Another thing that I find annoying is that the rules of the game and the Hero’s progress in it were explained by the unidentified announcer and not Ben himself, all while graphics that show exactly what’s being explained are being played out. Shouldn’t it be the host’s job to explain all this?

Also, about the one episode I said that had two speed rounds, well, I strongly believe that the show was doing everything it could to make each episode self-contained. But at least one episode ends with the game having ended with the remaining Strangers still on stage and no time to play a speed round. When that happens, the next episode begins with the speed round played by those remaining Strangers. Maybe if the show went with the format that I just shared here, then all the episodes would actually be self-contained.

In closing, Who’s Still Standing? is a mediocre adaptation of a foreign game show with problems that could be easily fixed to make what could’ve been a good game show. But because those problems weren’t even dealt with, it didn’t last, thus proving that there will never be another good game show involving contestants standing on trap doors and falling through them when eliminated after Russian Roulette.

That’s it for Who’s Still Standing? The year 2022 is coming to an end really soon. So, what game show will I be covering in January 2023? Well, it’s actually a predecessor of Hollywood Squares, and when I cover it, you’ll see why it didn’t last, while its successor lasted not just for many years, but also for many runs and many spin-offs, all for many decades. See you in the New Year for that.

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a Happy New Year.

[Flowgli]

Hello, celebrities and fans! Flo here, and welcome to this month’s edition of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

Hollywood Squares is a panel game show based on a children’s game called Tic-Tac-Toe, where two contestants win cash and prizes by claiming squares by agreeing or disagreeing with the celebrities in those squares on their answers to questions. It lasted for many runs in several years—no, decades—and it had several spin-offs, international adaptations, and other game shows—whether or not they were produced by Merrill Heatter and Bob Quigley, the people who produced it—that had gameplay similar to it, most particularly the fact that contestants had to correctly decide whether to agree or disagree with celebrities on answers given by them to answers. Back in year one, I covered a game show where Hollywood Squares was combined with Match Game called The Match Game-Hollywood Squares Hour, and later, in year five, I covered a children’s spin-off of Hollywood Squares called Storybook Squares. Even later, in year seven, I covered a Scott Sternberg-produced game show called Everything Goes!, which has that “agree-or-disagree-with-celebrity-on-their-answer-to-a-question” mechanic! However, before Hollywood Squares was ever a thing, there was its predecessor that was short-lived, and that’s what I’ll be covering today. The predecessor of Hollywood Squares is…The Celebrity Game.

The Celebrity Game aired on CBS Primetime from April 5, 1964 to September 13 on that same year—with reruns airing until January 24, 1965—and again from April 8, 1965 to September 9 on that same year. It was hosted by Carl Reiner, announced by veteran announcer of Heatter-Quigley-produced game shows Kenny Williams, produced by Merrill Heatter and Bob Quigley in their production company Merrill Heatter-Bob Quigley productions in association with Four Star Television and CBS Television Network, and taped at CBS Television City in Los Angeles, California.

The game is played by three contestants, who face a panel of nine celebrities, with four of the celebrities on the top tier and the other five on the bottom tier. The contestants play three rounds, and in each round, a yes-or-no question on a popular topic, such as “Do romantic screen heroes tend to make wives dissatisfied at home?”, is asked, and each of the celebrities locks in “Yes” or “No” by pressing a button that corresponds to their choice of answer. Then, the contestants must predict how the panel has answered that question, and each panelist reveals their answer and explains why they have chosen that answer. Each contestant who correctly predicts the panel’s answers wins money.

In each of the first two rounds, the contestants take turns choosing celebrities and predicting whether those celebrities have answered the question with “Yes” or “No” and why they have made that prediction. On a question, the contestants have three turns each, and each celebrity can be chosen only once. After each set of turns, each contestant who makes a correct prediction in that set of turns wins money. If all three contestants have predicted correctly, they all win $25 each. If two of them have predicted correctly, those two contestants win $50 each. If only one contestant has predicted correctly, that contestant wins $100.

In the third and final round, the contestants each predict how the majority of the panel has answered the question. Each contestant chooses a card with their choice of prediction on it and places it on a card holder, with the side that has their prediction on it facing away from the panel. The celebrities each reveal their answer and explain why they have chosen it. After the entire panel have revealed their answers and explanations, the contestants each turn their card around, revealing their prediction. The question in this round is worth $300, with one contestant winning all that money if only that contestant has predicted correctly and the contestants splitting it equally if more than one contestant has predicted correctly. So, if two of the contestants have predicted correctly, those two contestants win $150 each; but if all three contestants have predicted correctly, they all win $100 each.

All three contestants keep the money they have won, but the contestant with the most money after three rounds wins the game.

And that’s The Celebrity Game. After checking out this show, I can safely say that it’s very easy to see why it’s gone, long-forgotten, and succeeded by Hollywood Squares. The fact that each round in this game has one question being dragged on for so long by having all nine celebrities reveal their answers and explain their reasons why on the subject matter at hand just makes it a drag. With each of the first two rounds being played in three sets of turns, there might as well be a different question on each set of turns, with the dollar values doubled in round two. The scoring is okay; the way it’s done in the first two rounds is like how it’s done in the first two rounds of Split Second—which I already covered back in year one—and the way it’s done in the third round is like how it’s done in TattleTales and All-Star Secrets. It should be kept in mind that this show aired years before any of those shows aired. I will say, though, that the amounts of money won are good for 1964 and 1965. If there’s a problem I really have with what contestants win in this game, it’s what one of the contestants doesn’t win for winning the game. Yeah, the winning contestant doesn’t win a prize for winning the game, which is unusual, since in game shows, particularly those with no bonus round, contestants win prizes for winning the game. In this show, however, all that happens is that the contestant with the most money wins the game, all three contestants keep their money, and that’s it. All I have to ask about this is “Why?”

There’s a pilot episode for a revival that never got off the ground. It was taped on an unknown day in February 1968 for CBS, and it was hosted by Miss America and veteran game show host Bert Parks, who, coincidentally, also hosted the pilot episode of Hollywood Squares in 1965. In this pilot, the game is played the same way as before, except two contestants instead of three face a panel of six celebrities instead of nine, each contestant wins $25 for each correct prediction in round one and $50 for each correct prediction in round two, and the third round is replaced with a bonus round, where the winning contestant wins whatever amount of money they have won in the main game more for each correct prediction, and wins a car for correctly predicting five of the celebrities’ answers.

The Celebrity Game also had an Australian adaptation, which had two separate runs, each one having a different format. The first run’s format is the same as that of the US run, it aired on Nine Network in 1969, and it was hosted by Bert Newton, who would later host a revival of the Australian adaptation of Family Feud under the name Bert’s Family Feud. The second run’s format is basically a game of charades, it aired on Network Ten from 1976 to 1977, and it was hosted by Mike Preston. There was also a UK adaptation of the show, having lasted thirteen episodes in 1964, hosted by Clive Goodwin, and announced by Redvers Kyle.

There’s one more thing I have to say about The Celebrity Game, and that’s that it, the predecessor of Hollywood Squares, has a predecessor of its own. Yes, that’s right. There’s a game show that’s the predecessor of the predecessor of Hollywood Squares. You want to know about it? Well, join me in next month’s edition when I cover that game show, which people don’t talk about and definitely won’t talk about anytime soon.

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a great day.

[Flowgli]

Hey, people! This is Flo, and welcome to this month’s edition of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

Last month, I covered a game show called The Celebrity Game, which is the predecessor of Hollywood Squares. Now, can you believe that this predecessor of Hollywood Squares has a predecessor of its own? Yeah, this game show I’m covering today is a predecessor of a predecessor. Looks like this show is one of those that doesn’t have anybody talking. Well, except me, of course, because I’m covering it, right now. So, have a seat and enjoy as I talk about People Will Talk.

People Will Talk aired in black and white on NBC July 1, 1963 to December 27 on that same year. It was hosted by veteran game show host Dennis James, announced by veteran game show announcer for Heatter-Quigley-produced game shows Kenny Williams, produced by Merrill Heatter and Bob Quigley in their production company Heatter-Quigley Productions in association with Four Star Television, and taped at NBC Studio 3 in Burbank, California.

The game is played by two contestants, both of whom are among members of the general public who are interviewed by a reporter on a certain topic, such as “Should a wife be a stay-at-home mother?”, with one contestant having answered “yes”, and the other contestant having answered “no”.

In the game, the two contestants face a panel of fifteen celebrities, with the panel split in three tiers of five celebrities each. Each contestant speaks their opinion on the topic, explaining why they have answered “yes” or “no” to it.

After both contestants have spoken their opinions and their explanations behind them, the panel locks in their votes on which contestant to agree with by pressing a button that corresponds to either “yes” or “no”. Then, the contestants take turns choosing celebrities who they hope will agree with their opinions on the topic. If the contestant in turn and the chosen celebrity agree, that contestant wins $25; but if they disagree, the other contestant wins the money.

The first contestant to win $100 wins the game and a prize package.

And that’s People Will Talk. Now, do you see why it didn’t get people talking? This game show is a lot more of a debate and a lot less of a game show, which doesn’t make for a good game show. There’s just no fun or any enjoyment in a game show like this, not that anyone today could watch an episode of it on the Internet, since there’s not one single episode of it on the Internet at all. I think it’s because the show was destroyed due to network practices at the time, possibly with the exception of one or two episodes, with at least the pilot episode taped at CBS and hosted by Arthur Godfrey still in existence. It wouldn’t be fair, though, to say that this show shouldn’t have existed in the first place, because this was how Hollywood Squares got its start, and it wouldn’t have existed or even spawn many spin-offs, international adaptations, and merchandise if it weren’t for the existence of this show and The Celebrity Game So, at least something good came out of People Will Talk, though they could’ve had more than one question topic in the game and choosing celebrities whom they hoped would agree with them.

There’s really nothing left to say about People Will Talk, aside from the fact that the title is also the title of the 1951 romantic comedy/drama film starring Cary Grant and Jeanne Crain, but that’s completely irrelevant to what’s being discussed here. So, that’s it for People Will Talk, and next month, I’m moving away from Hollywood Squares and Merrill Heatter and Bob Quigley altogether. What I will be covering in next month’s edition will be a game show that aired on PBS. No, it’s not either of the Carmen Sandiego game shows. I’m gonna need a lot more time to prepare editions for those. No, it’s gonna be a very short-lived game show that, sadly, not many viewers of that channel probably even bothered to think twice about.

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a great day.

[Flowgli]

Hello, everyone! Flo here, and welcome to this month’s edition of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

It’s time to grab a teammate and put your information, imagination, and intuition to the test. And forget about Think Fast, where you don’t have time to think twice. This is the game show where you do have time to think twice. That’s because the game show that I’m covering today is called Think Twice.

Think Twice was a primetime game show that aired on PBS on the weekends from October 10, 1994 to March 6, 1995. It was hosted by Monteria Ivey, announced by Chris Zito, produced by and taped at WGBH-TV in Boston, Massachusetts, executive produced by Nancy Linde, directed by Hugh Martin, and created by game show veterans Mark Maxwell-Smith, Michael Bevan, and Bob Bodin. Also, because this is a game show on PBS, it’s only fitting that I also say that funding for this show was made possible by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and by the annual financial support of viewers like you.

The game is played by two teams, each one consisting of two members. The teams play three rounds in which their information, imagination, and intuition is put to the test, in that order. Correct answers score a team points, which they can also score by the opposing team guessing incorrectly or giving an illegal clue, or by making a successful challenge, depending on the round.

Round one is the Information Round. In this round, the teams are asked two-part questions, with both correct answers to a question needed in order for a team to score. The first contestant to buzz in must give only one answer, and if they’re correct, their teammate gets to give another answer; but if the contestant who has buzzed in with an incorrect answer, the other team gets to guess either answer. If a team guesses both answers correctly, they score 10 points, but if a contestant guesses incorrectly after their teammate has buzzed in with a correct answer, the other team gets to guess the remaining correct answer.

The teams are asked as many questions as possible in an unspecified time limit. When time runs out, a cuckoo sound effect—referred to by Monteria as the “dying quail” or anything else similar to that—goes off.

After this round, Monteria gets to know the teams, and they all go to a different area of the set for the next round.

Round two is called the Imagination Round. Before the show, each team is shown nine words or phrases that serve as clues to a subject, with each member of that team given one minute to look them over. In this round, each team—with the trailing team going first—must improvise in telling a story using as many of the clues as possible, with each member of that team having 30 seconds to tell their part of the story. Both members can tell different parts of the same story, or each member can tell a different story. In either case, though, the story told can’t be about the subject that the other team must try to guess, and the subject itself can’t be revealed in the story. Each clue to the subject mentioned in the story appears on one of the nine spaces of a monitor board, which is turned away from the guessing team at the start of the subject so that they won’t see the clues to that subject appearing on it.

After both members of the storytelling team have told their story, the guessing team gets to guess the subject using the clues that they have heard from the storytelling team. If less than six clues have been revealed, another clue is revealed on the board; but if six clues or more have been revealed, no more clues are revealed on the board. After the guessing team makes their guess, they are revealed the clues used by the storytelling team first, they are revealed the unused clues after that, and they are finally revealed the correct subject.

If the guessing team correctly guesses the subject, they score 50 points. They also score the points by default if the storytelling team says the subject in their story. But if the guessing team guesses incorrectly, the storytelling team scores the points.

After both teams get to tell a story and guess a subject, the round is over, and Monteria and the teams go to another different area of the set for the final round of the main game.

Round three is called the Intuition Round. In this round, the teams are asked questions with lists of hidden answers, just like in Family Feud and the already-covered Hot Potato, and they take turns giving answers and deciding to accept or challenge each other’s answers, with the trailing team answering first on the first question. The number of answers to each question range from five to nine. On each turn, one member of the team in turn gives an answer, and each member of the opposing team individually chooses to either accept that answer or challenge it by pressing a button that corresponds to their choice, causing a light corresponding to the color of that button to light up to show the choice made by that team member. A team member chooses to accept an answer by pressing a green button, while they choose to challenge by pressing a red button. Both members of the opposing team must agree on a decision, but if a split decision is made by that team, the captain of that team makes the final decision, still using the buttons.

If the opposing team chooses to accept an answer, the team in turn scores points if that answer is revealed on the board or doesn’t score points if it’s not revealed on the board, with the answer ranked at number one worth 50 points and an answer ranked anywhere else worth 10 points. But if the opposing team chooses to challenge an answer, the remaining answers are revealed on the board, with 10 points for each remaining answer awarded to the opposing team if the challenged answer is not on the board or to the team in turn if the challenged answer is on the board. Also, if the challenged answer is ranked at number one on the board, the team in turn scores a bonus of 40 points on top of the points scored from the challenge.

The teams play as many questions as possible until time for the round runs out, once again signified by a cuckoo sound effect going off. If time runs out while a question is in play, that question becomes the last question of the round, and that question is allowed to be played until its end.

After three rounds, the team with the most points wins the game. If the game ends in a tie, one more question is played to break the tie. On the tiebreaker question, the teams buzz in using their green buttons and give their answers. After one contestant buzzes in and gives an answer, the members of the opposing team gives an answer. The team whose answer is higher-ranked on the board wins. However, if a team gives an answer that is ranked at number one, they win automatically.

The winning team receives a Kenwood mini-audio system and a $500 gift certificate from Borders and advances to the bonus round, while the losing team receives a $250 gift certificate from Signals and $500 worth of Microsoft home products.

In the bonus round, the winning team is asked a series of two-part questions, with each member giving one answer on each question, just like in the Information Round. Before the round begins, the team chooses which member will answer first on each question. Both members of the team have to answer correctly on a question in order to be credited for it. Either member can pass if they get stuck on a question, and they will be asked the next question if they do pass.

What the team must do is give both correct answers to six questions within 60 seconds. Doing so wins each member a $2,500 mutual fund from Keystone America, while failing to do so wins the team nothing extra.

So, that’s Think Twice. It’s a fascinating game that puts a different mind skill of the teams to the test in each round. Round one is a Q&A round that tests both members of a team’s knowledge and ability to work together in answering each two-part question, round two is a round that really puts the teams’ improvisation skills to the test and gets them to use their imagination, and round three is a round where following their instincts can really come in handy for the teams, especially when it comes to challenging an opponent’s answer. Each round has higher stakes to be played for without making the previous round pointless. I must say, though, that with the Imagination Round, because the teams have to improvise when they tell their stories, it could also be known as the Improvisation Round. Also, I don’t see the point of revealing any more clues in that round if a team uses less than six when they tell their story, as not only do I believe that every clue should be earned, but the guessing team also isn’t revealed what the clues are that they have earned, whether shown or told to them, until after they have made their guess anyway, along with the clues they haven’t earned, and I believe part of the whole point of the round is for a team to just simply pay attention to what the other team is saying and recapping on their own what they just heard. The bonus round, though, is a speed version of the Information Round, and it works. This round involves not only both members of the team using their knowledge and ability to work together in answering two-part questions, but it also involves them having to do it all as fast as they can, as the are against a 60-second clock. And I don’t know a bit about mutual funds, but for a game show that aired on PBS, they’re not that bad of grand prizes. Speaking of prizes, the prizes the teams receive at the end of the game are good for a PBS game show in the 1990s. The values of the gift certificates are good, and the other prizes, which are a mini-audio system and Microsoft home products, including a digital multimedia encyclopedia called Encarta, are really cool for the time.

The set, while not impressive, looks okay for a PBS game show in the 1990s. It’s passable for a game show of that kind, especially with it being split into three sections, one for each round of the main game. The theme music, music cues, and sound effects fit well with the atmosphere of the show. This is one of the game shows whose theme music and music cues have lyrics. The lyrics here were provided by Ellis Hall, who would later go on to play the organist in Big Momma’s House, and the sound effects used here were also sound effects used on The Price Is Right.

Think Twice lasted only twelve episodes before it got cancelled due to low ratings, and that’s really a shame, because it’s a good game show that really challenges contestants’ minds.

There’s just one more thing about this show that I want to talk about before I bring this edition to a close. In the premiere episode, the first question asked in the Intuition Round was a 1994 list from Entertainment Weekly of the six most-watched films of all time in the US, including those watched on home video. One of the answers to that question was 101 Dalmatians! Yes, 101 Dalmatians was on the list of answers to that question, and it was ranked at number three. Now, be grateful that that movie was on that list at all, and on the higher half of it, too! You can’t expect anything 101 Dalmatians-related ranked at number one on every single positive list, you insane 101 Dalmatians fanboys! But seriously, if you must know what the rest of the answers to that question were, they were E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial ranked at number one, Gone With The Wind ranked at number two, Star Wars ranked at number four, Fantasia ranked at number five, and Jaws ranked at number six.

All right. That’s all I gotta say about Think Twice. For the game show that I’ll be covering next month, well, let’s say that while there are many game shows, past and present, where contestants can win brand new cars if they win at a game, this one had contestants lose cars that they have if they lose at a game. It may be hard to believe, but a game show like that existed, and I’ll tell you all about it in next month’s edition.

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a great day.

[Flowgli]

Hey, people with cars…or without cars. I’m Flo, your friendly neighbor who prefers getting around places by flying freely over driving, and welcome to this month’s edition of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

I’ve never driven a car, nor have I ever owned or even rented one, and I don’t ever plan to. There’s just too much responsibility when it comes to cars, most of which cost a lot of money, and if what’s needed to be done with the car isn’t done for some time, it’ll be taken away. For example, if you’re renting a car, and you don’t make your monthly payments, then that car will be repossessed. That’s something that can happen to some people, but they could try to prevent it from happening if they were contestants on Repo Games.

Repo Games aired on weekly basis on Paramount Network—known at the time as Spike—from April 26, 2011 to August 21, 2012, lasting for two seasons consisting of twenty episodes each. It was hosted by actual repo men Josh Lewis and Tom DeTone, produced by SallyAnn Salsano in her production company 495 Productions—best known for producing shows like Jersey Shore and The Real—and taped at Phoenix, Arizona; Las Vegas, Nevada; and Dallas, Texas, depending on where the contestants’ vehicles were parked, with Indiana and South Jersey included in season two.

Each episode has multiple games played in it, and each game is played by one contestant, whose vehicle is in danger of being repossessed due to that contestant having defaulted on their loan. The show’s crew goes to where that contestant’s vehicle is parked—usually the driveway of that contestant’s home—and lifts that vehicle up using the hook of a tow truck, having the vehicle ready to be towed away. The contestant is told by Josh what they must do to keep their vehicle and have it paid off entirely by the show, and the game begins.

The contestant is asked up to five questions by Josh. After the contestant gives an answer to that question, they are told if that answer is correct or incorrect. If their answer is correct, their vehicle is lowered by one level. But if their answer is incorrect, the correct answer is revealed—with Josh sometimes giving an explanation of the correct answer—and their vehicle is raised by one level.

The contestant must answer three questions correctly out of the five in order to win the game. If the contestant wins, their vehicle is placed back down and unhooked from the tow truck, they keep their vehicle, and all the payments for their vehicle are made for them by the show. But if the contestant loses, their vehicle is towed away.

And that’s Repo Games. The idea of a game show where contestants keep their vehicles and have it paid off entirely if they win is a good one, and it’s good to see that one like that existed in Repo Games. The gameplay is very easy to understand, and that’s to answer three questions correctly out of five in order to keep your vehicle and have your car bills paid for you, otherwise the vehicle will be towed away, and not a single car bill will be paid for you. But if that’s all that happens in the show in terms of gameplay, then shouldn’t the show be called Repo Trivia instead of Repo Games? If they’re going to stick with the name Repo Games, then what they could’ve done for the gameplay was have a contestant play a game against one of the hosts, with a variety of content in the games, such as puzzle games, stunt games, things like that. It’s funny, though, how the contestants react when they see that their vehicles are being prepared to be towed away, and how they get stumped on questions that are simple enough for even a fifth-grader to be able to answer correctly. Yeah, most of the questions asked on this show are so simple that I myself can answer them correctly without having to look up information relevant to the content of the questions.

But what’s not funny about this show is that there was an incident during filming of an episode in Las Vegas, Nevada. What happened there was that the show’s crew was shot at by a then-forty-year-old man named Carlos Enrique Barron due to the show’s production van being parked outside his home. This was said to have happened on the night of April 25, 2011, and that he believed that the show’s crew was trying to repossess his car, when in fact they were looking for another car to try to repossess. The car that Carlos had was a Toyota FJ Cruiser, and he walked outside his home with a 9mm Glock handgun and fired two shots in the air with it when he heard the alarm for his car go off. At least that’s what he told a jury at trial. Nobody at the filming got hurt, but Carlos did get arrested later on for attempted murder. He was sentenced to ninety days in jail and five years of probation on June 24, 2014.

Now, I don’t know what Carlos did for a living that required him to have a gun, but I don’t think he was a police officer judging by the information I found and presented here about him. Whatever he did, though, I hope he had that gun confiscated and his gun license revoked, that is, if he had a gun license, to begin with. Yes, it can be annoying to some that someone else parks their vehicle outside their home and do something to their property that they believe is illegal, whether actuality or supposedly, but confronting them with a gun or any other weapon is not a way to resolve the situation.

Well, I think I’ve said enough about that incident, and about Repo Games altogether. For the next game show that I’ll be covering, we’re going to stay outside the game show studio and get around places to find people that we can show to that a good game show actually can be made using what I still think is the weakest game show mechanic. Yes, it will be a hidden camera game show. It’s going to be a game show for the same channel, except we’re going to go back to when that channel was known as The National Network, or The New TNN, but that channel did later become known as Spike TV in the middle of the show’s run. But yeah, this game show that I’ll be covering next month shows that a hidden camera game show can actually work. And if you’re oblivious to know what that game show is, then maybe it’s better that way until next month when I cover it.

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a great day.

[Flowgli]

Hello to all of you who don’t know I have hidden cameras watching you…or maybe you do. This is Flo, your host of a hidden camera game show of her own, and welcome to this month’s edition of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

Over the years I’ve been doing this series, I have covered a number of hidden camera game shows. And at some points in this series, I have expressed that I felt that the hidden camera situations is one of the weakest game show mechanics ever, if not the weakest game show mechanic ever. Game shows with this mechanic that I have covered here are Hold Everything!, All About Faces, Anything For Money, You’re On!, Game Show In My Head, Instant Recall, and Hidden Agenda. The first three involved contestants predicting outcomes of scenarios, the next two involved contestants going out and getting unsuspecting people to do tasks provided by the hosts, and the last two involved unwitting contestants doing tasks provided to the shows’ actors by the hosts and not knowing they’re in a game show until the end when they are revealed this fact by the host and the crew. This one that I’ll be covering involved what Instant Recall and Hidden Agenda did and, to an extent, what You’re On! and Game Show In My Head did. You’ll see how it does as I cover it. So, here it is. Prepare to be no longer…Obliviou$. And yes, it’s spelled with a dollar sign, which is appropriate, since contestants play for money on this show.

Obliviou$ is a US adaptation of the UK game show of the same name by Tiger Aspect Productions and Mast Media. It ran for two seasons, airing weekly from August 12, 2002 to May 4, 2004 on Paramount Network—known at the time as The National Network, or The New TNN, and later Spike TV—with reruns airing until June 1 on that same year. It was hosted by actor and comedian Regan Burns, who would later go on to play the role of Bennett James in the Disney Channel comedy show Dog With A Blog. It was also created by Mark Baker and Steve Harris, produced and executive produced by Scott A. Stone and David G. Stanley in their production company Stone Stanley Productions—known today as Stone & Company Entertainment after David G. Stanley left the company—co-executive produced by Scott Friedman and Robert Taylor, and directed by Pete DeLasho.

Each episode has multiple games played in it, each one played in a different specific location, such as a mattress store, an Italian restaurant, or a video store. Each game is played by one contestant, with the exception of one game per episode. On each game, Regan goes into the chosen place for a game in disguise that’s appropriate to the location in which the game is played. For example, in a game played in a mattress store, he hosts that game as a mattress salesman. He then interacts with one unsuspecting contestant and asks that contestant five questions. The contestant wins $20 for each question they answer correctly, for a possible $100.

After a game is over, Regan lets the contestant know that they’re on a game show that they don’t even know that they’re on, and he tells them to look at the camera and say “I’m oblivious!”

After one of the games in each episode, the contestant who has played that game is offered by Regan to take over as the host to a new contestant in the same location. As the first contestant takes on the role as the host to the second contestant, the first contestant is in the same disguise as Regan is in in their game, and the first contestant must follow instructions on what to do and what questions to ask the second contestant provided by Regan through an earpiece, all while Regan and the show’s crew are out of sight somewhere else in that location. Each question answered correctly by the second contestant wins them $20 and the first contestant $100, for a possible $100 and $500, respectively. The two games taking place in the same location are not shown consecutively in the episode.

One game per episode is a lightning round, which is played differently from the regular games. In the lightning round, a group of unsuspecting contestants unwittingly compete against each other in answering questions under a theme depending on the location the game takes place in within one minute. Sometimes, this game is played by only one contestant, and sometimes with no specific theme; in cases like this, it’s called the speed round. As usual, each correct answer is worth $20, with the first contestant to shout out the correct answer winning the money if the game is played by multiple contestants. After time runs out, the contestant is asked a bonus question worth $100. If this game is played by multiple contestants, only the contestant who has answered the most questions correctly in it is asked the bonus question.

Right before each commercial break, Regan approaches a person while not in disguise and asks them one question worth $20. Occasionally, the money in these parts of the show is refused. These one-question games also take place at the beginning and end of some episodes.

And that’s Obliviou$. After having checked out and covered a number of hidden camera game shows, this one seems to be the best example of how to do a hidden camera game show right, if not the only example of that. This one has the host and any members of the show’s crew pulling acts on contestants and having said contestants answer questions for cash, cleverly keeping said contestants from knowing that they’re on a game show until the end of the games. With the kind of game show it is, it’s fine. The situations that the contestants are put in can be funny and entertaining, and simply answering questions in these situations is all that the contestants need to do, which is fine, as there doesn’t need to be any more details in gameplay than that in order to make a good hidden camera game show. In fact, it doesn’t need flashy set props, big money, or over-the-top crazy stunts that come off as desperate for laughs in order to make a good hidden camera game show. It just needs to have simple gameplay and simple funny situations; those are all it needs to make a good hidden camera game show. Also, being the kind of game show that it is, the cash payouts are fine. They’re quick games where contestants unwittingly win quick bucks. It’s not everyday that someone gets approached by a game show host in a random public place and given the opportunity to win up to $100 by answering five questions. It’s also not everyday that a contestant on a game show, especially a hidden camera game show, gets offered to take on the role of host to another contestant. And while we’re on the subject, I like that they added some variety in gameplay to keep each episode from having every game being just answering five questions for $20 each. Taking on the role of host is a good opportunity for a contestant to win more money, and the lighting/speed round is a fun game where a contestant can win as much money as possible as quickly as possible within a one-minute time limit and then win a bonus on the final question afterwards, even more fun when it’s played by multiple contestants competing against each other, with the bonus question going to the contestant with the most money after the time runs out. The quick one-question games that take place before commercial breaks, and sometimes at the beginning and the end of the show, are okay. I just would’ve liked them better if they were done in a way that the money won by the contestants in those particular games for answering questions correctly is never refused, even though it’s only occasionally when it happens.

That’s it for Obliviou$, the game show that proves that there can be good hidden camera game shows if the people behind them know what they are doing. Next month’s edition will be the year nine finale and the final edition of Game Show Corner as a consistent series, and since I covered The Game Of Life at the start of this year, I will be covering the game show that was paired up with that show at the end of this year. And if you have checked out the year nine premiere and looked very carefully, you’ll know what that show is that I’ll be covering in the year nine finale. If you haven’t, though, you’ll have to look back at that other edition and wait for the show to be revealed in next month’s edition. Be ready for it, folks!

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a great day.

[Flowgli]

Hello, Scrabble players…as well as those who don’t even play that game. This is Flo, your word-scrambling travel companion, and welcome to the year nine finale of Game Show Corner, where we take a look at the obscure side of the world of game shows.

Well, everybody, it has been a good nine years of doing this series consistently, as a weekly series for the first five years, and as a monthly series for the last four years. But I gotta admit, doing this series consistently has been wearing me out and gotten me less motivated into doing it this way the further I continue on with it. So, this month’s edition of Game Show Corner is the final edition of it as a consistent series. After this, I’ll only be releasing editions occasionally. Until I start doing that, I’ll be doing stuff that will help cool my head down, like going and doing something out of town, relaxing at a beach, having fun at a theme park, eating out with some family and friends, listening to music and watching movies on my phone, and playing games, whether they be video games, card games, and, of course, board games. Board games like Scrabble. Yes, I’m gonna be covering a game show based on Scrabble today. No, it’s not gonna be the one from the 1980s and 1990s hosted by Chuck Woolery. Since I covered The Game Of Life at the start of the year, it’s only fitting that I end the year by covering the show that was paired up with it. So, get ready to travel with me as I cover Scrabble Showdown.

Based on the board game Scrabble by Hasbro, Scrabble Showdown aired on The Hub—known today as Discovery Family—on a weekly basis alongside The Game Of Life, even though this show premiered one or three weeks before that show premiered, though both shows’ runs ended on the same day. This show aired from September 3 or 17, 2011 to April 15, 2012. It was hosted by magician and future host of Disney Win, Lose Or Draw Justin Willman and announced by announcer of Hooked On Phonics and season two of the Chuck Woolery-hosted GSN run of Lingo Randy Thomas. It was produced by Rubicon Entertainment—Pat Finn’s production company—and Hasbro Studios, with Terry Finn, Joel McGee, Jana Morgan, and veteran game show producer and writer John Ricci, Jr. as the producers, and Kevin Belinkoff, Stephen Davis, and game show veterans Pat Finn and Bob Boden as the executive producers. Also, Sande Stewart, veteran game show producer and son of veteran game show creator and producer Bob Stewart, the creative consultant for this show.

The game is played by two families, each one consisting of two members, one child and one adult. One family wears red name tags, while the other family wears blue name tags.

The two families compete against each other in four rounds. In each of the first three rounds, the families play Scrabble-based games, with a family winning a prize and two bonus Scrabble tiles each time they win one of those games. After the first three rounds, the two families play against each other in the final round, which determines which family will win the game and the grand prize, with that grand prize being a trip to anywhere in the world. At the start of the show, each family reveals their choice of location in the world they want to go and explain why.

The games played in the first two rounds change from episode to episode, but the game played in the third round is always Scrabble Flash, with the exception of one episode, where that game is played in the first round. In round one, the family that has won the coin toss before the show chooses whether to go first or second in the game in that round. In each round thereafter, the family that has won the game in the previous round has that choice. The games played in the first three rounds are as follows:

Scrabble Knockout - Two categories are shown, each having five words. The family playing first chooses one of the categories, while the family playing afterwards is left with the remaining category. With each category that comes into play, the family playing it is shown what it entails. For example, if the category is “Don’t Leave Your Bags Unattended”, the words in that category will be things that people don’t like about airports. The five words in a category each have three extra letters mixed in. With each word that comes into play, the family in turn must eliminate, or “knock out”, the three letters that don’t belong in that word. To do this, the child goes to the game board, the adult tells the child which letter to knock out of the word, one at a time, and the child knocks out each letter by touching it on the board. The first letter and the last letter always belong in the word. For example, if the word on the the board appears as SEJCURBITWY, then the adult must tell the child to knock out the J, knock out the B, and knock out the W so that the word is revealed to be SECURITY. After all the letters that don’t belong in the word are correctly knocked out, the adult says the word, and the next word comes into play. If a letter that does belong in the word gets touched, the board freezes, and the child must reset the board by pressing a plunger, allowing the family to start working on that word all over again. The first family’s turn ends after they have correctly knocked out all the incorrect letters of all five words, or until their time limit of 60 seconds have expired. Afterwards, the second family works on the words in the remaining category—in the pilot episode, though, each family is given two categories of their own to choose from—and they must correctly knock out all the incorrect letters of more words within 60 seconds or knock out all the incorrect letters of all five words in a faster time in order to win, otherwise the first family wins.

Scrabble Babble - Each family is given a set of words to describe and guess, with each word having a missing letter, and with the adult describing the words and the child guessing them. The letters are blanked out in a way that the parent has multiple options of what letters to fill in to make valid words. For example, if a word is shown as S_ARE, the adult can describe SPARE, SHARE, or SCARE to the child. If the family gets stuck on a word, they can pass it, and they will be given another word to work on, but they will return to the passed word if there is still time left on the clock. The child has to say the correct word exactly in order for the family to receive credit for that word. The words are three, four, five, six, and seven letters long, in that order. If the adult says any part of the word currently in play, that word is thrown out, and another word of the same length is given to the family later on. If the adult says the entire word in play, that family’s turn ends immediately. The first family’s turn ends after they have correctly described and guessed five words, or until their time limit of 60 seconds have expired. Afterwards, the second family works on a different set of words, and they must correctly describe and guess more words within 60 seconds or describe and guess five words in a faster time in order to win, otherwise the first family wins.

Scrabble Scream - Each family is given a set of scrambled words to unscramble, with each word split into two parts. The first part of each word is always three letters long, and the second part of each word is always either three, four, or five letters long. With each word that comes into play, the first scrambled part of it is revealed, and one member of the family must unscramble that part of that word by reciting the letters in the correct order—the first part of each word on its own always spells a valid word—and then, the second part of the word is revealed, and the other member of the family must unscramble that part of that word by reciting the letters in the correct order and shouting out the entire word. For example, if a word is shown as EST BKCA, the contestant working on the first part of it must recite “S-E-T”, and the contestant working on the second part of it must recite “B-A-C-K” and shout “SETBACK”. On the first word, the child must unscramble the first part of it, and the adult must unscramble the second part of it. After each word is correctly unscrambled, the two members of the family switch places for the next word, meaning that on the second word, the adult must unscramble the first part of it, and the child must unscramble the second part of it, and so on. If the family gets stuck on a word, they can pass it, and they will be given another word to work on. The first family’s turn ends after they have correctly unscrambled both parts of five words, or until their time limit of 60 seconds have expired. Afterwards, the second family works on a different set of words, and they must correctly unscramble both parts of more words within 60 seconds or unscramble both parts of five words in a faster time in order to win, otherwise the first family wins.

Scrabble Slam - This is the only game where both teams play together instead of one at a time. The four contestants stand in a line in a way that play alternates between members of both families. Each individual contestant has a button to lock in a guess with. Up to three sets of words are played, and all the words in each set is four letters long. Before each set of words comes into play, one contestant selects an amount of time from 10 seconds to 30 seconds at random by hitting their button. The clock is shown to the home viewers only, so Justin and the families don’t know how long play of each set of words lasts. After the first word in a set is shown, the clock starts counting down, and a new letter appears below the word. The contestant in turn must choose a letter in the word to “slam”—in other words, replace with the new letter—to make the word into a new word and lock in their guess by hitting their button. A correct guess passes play of the set to the next contestant in sequence, who is then given another new letter to work with. However, an incorrect guess forces the contestant in turn to make another guess, taking up time. For example, if the word shown is HOPE and the new letter is R, the contestant in turn must slam the H to make the word ROPE, and the next contestant in sequence is shown the letter S as the new letter and must slam the P to make the word ROSE. Contestants take turns slamming letters until time runs out, at which point the contestant in turn is eliminated from the game, and after which the remaining contestants move up to the buttons closest to Justin—if necessary—and the next contestant in sequence selects an amount of time at random for the next set of words. This game is played until both members of one family are eliminated, at which point the other family wins.

Scrabble Speedword - This game is played in only one episode, and it’s not played in the same way as the speed round portion of the main game in the other game show adaptation of Scrabble. Each family has the child stand at a podium with three rows of spaces, with three spaces on the top and bottom rows each, two spaces on the middle row, and five sliders on the spaces on the top and middle rows, with each slider having a tile on it. Each tile has a monitor with a letter displayed on it. The adult shouts out a three-letter word, and the child must spell out that word by maneuvering the appropriate tiles on their sliders to the bottom row. The three rows are connected to each other with tracks for the sliders to be moved on. For example, if the letters on the tiles on the top row are M, E, and C, and the letters on the tiles on the middle row are A and R, the adult and the child must say and spell, respectively, CAR, EAR, RAM, or ARE. The first family’s turn ends after they have spelled four valid three-letter words, or until their time limit of 60 seconds have expired. Afterwards, the second family works on the same five letters—for this reason, they are in an isolation booth offstage while the first family plays—and they must spell more valid three-letter words within 60 seconds or spell four valid three-letter words in a faster time in order to win, otherwise the first family wins.

Scrabble Flash - This game is always played in round three, except in the test pilot episode, where it’s played in round one. Each family stands at a table with five tiles on it. Each tile has a monitor with a letter displayed on it. The members of a family take turns spelling words using the tiles, with the adult going first, and they spell a word by rearranging the tiles and putting them close together to have the sides touching each other, causing the monitors to light up green if the word is valid or red if the word is invalid—in the pilot episode, the table lights up green for each valid word. All words must be three, four, or five letters long. For example, if the letters on the tiles are L, T, D, E, and A, the family must spell LET, TALE, or DEALT. Each valid word is worth one point per letter, and each family has 30 seconds to score as possible. After the first family’s time limit of 30 seconds have expired, the second family works on the same five letters—for this reason, they are in an isolation booth offstage while the first family plays—and they must spell more words within 30 seconds in order to win, otherwise the first family wins.

After three rounds, the families play the final round called Scrabble Lightning.

In Scrabble Lightning, the families are shown sixteen Scrabble tiles, and each family selects at random two tiles per game that they have won, all at once, by hitting their buzzer to determine their head start. The tiles with a value of only one point are not included in this selection. In the pilot episode, families select large tiles out of a bag after each game in the first three rounds, with one tile chosen in round one, two tiles chosen in round two, and three rounds chosen in round three, and the letters and point values on the tiles are covered up until the start of this round. Either way, each family gets the total points from the tiles that they have chosen added to their score for this round. The families are then shown the Scrabble board on the game board, and scrambled words appear on the Scrabble board, one at a time, with the first word having one of the letters in it on the star space in the center of the board. On each word, two contestants—one member of each family—stand at their buzzers, and they are given a clue to that word. After the clue is read in its entirety, the contestants get to buzz in and unscramble the word. A contestant who buzzes in with the correct answer scores for their family the official Scrabble point value of the letters in that word, while buzzing in with an incorrect answer gives their opponent a chance to unscramble that word. The first word is played by the children, and contestants switch places with their teammates after each word for the next one. Each word after the first one uses one of the letters in one of the previous words in this round, with that letter always in the correct position of both words.

The word with one of the letters on the star space is worth double its point value. Also, on the board are red and orange bonus spaces that can double or triple the point values of the words on them, respectively, but the spaces that can double or triple the point value of only one letter in each of the words on them are not included on the board. If a contestant correctly unscrambles a word that has one of its letters on a double word space, they score double the point value of that word for their family. If a contestant correctly unscrambles a word that has one of its letters on a triple word space, they score triple the point value of that word for their family.

The round is played until one family reaches 100 points or more, with the first one to do so winning the game and the trip to the destination of their choice.

And that’s Scrabble Showdown! This show really is a lot of fun. It’s got great games based on Scrabble products, it’s got a fast pace, it’s got great energy, it’s got an amazing and colorful set, it’s got a great music and sound package, and it’s got great prizes for families to play for, including the grand prize of tickets to anywhere in the world. There’s no bonus round that decides whether or not a winning family wins their trip of their choice; the trip is automatically awarded to the winning family! Though, it really shouldn’t come as a surprise, given that this was done on another game show on The Hub called Family Game Night during its first two seasons, except that the families there don’t choose where they want to go. Speaking of Family Game Night, that show used Scrabble Flash as one of the games in it, though it stopped being used as one of the games in that show when it started being used as one of the games in this show. Going back to Scrabble Showdown, I like how all the games played in the first three rounds are made in a way that each and every one of them can be won by only one family. There has been some sources that say that each family wins the prize and gets one bonus tile if the game in any of the first three rounds ends in a tie, and that a family also wins their trip by being in the lead when time is called in Scrabble Lightning, but from what I saw in all the episodes I found on YouTube, neither of those have happened on the show at all. I have an idea as to why Scrabble Speedword was played only once in the entirety of the show’s run, and it’s that it was probably hard and time consuming for a child to maneuver the sliders on the tracks in order to spell a three-letter word. I guess that’s the reason why there’s a maximum of four correct words per family in this game instead of five like in Scrabble Knockout, Scrabble Babble, and Scrabble Scream. I think that Scrabble Speedword would’ve been better, and used more than once, if they just had families use the game board like in Scrabble Knockout. After all, isn’t the game board a touchscreen? What they could’ve done for Scrabble Speedword was have two rows on the game board, with five letters on the top row and three spaces on the bottom row, and have the child on each family drag letters from the top row to the spaces on the bottom row to spell three-letter words. That’s all they had to do. And since I just mentioned Scrabble Knockout, I have to say that they shouldn’t have changed the rule from the pilot episode of families choosing categories. Families should’ve still been allowed each to choose from two categories to make things fair rather than having the family playing first making the choice of category and just leaving the other family with the remaining category. Also, in Scrabble Babble, why is it when an adult passes on a word or says part of the word in their description, they’re not given another word of the exact same length right away and instead given a word of the next length as the next word? It may not seem much, but it’s just something that confuses me a bit. Scrabble Scream and Scrabble Slam are just fine exactly as they are with me. Scrabble Lightning is a great, quick-paced final round where families can score by simply unscrambling words to answer clues and score points, which I think is much better than how words are solved in the main game of the other game show adaptation of Scrabble. In fact, it’s so quick-paced that it also helps that the one-point tiles are not available to be chosen by the families for their head starts at the start of this round, and that the double-letter and triple-letter spaces are not on the board. That’s all good, since the whole point of the round is to be the first to reach 100 points or more as soon as possible in order to win the game. There’s also some inconsistency regarding the start of each game before Scrabble Lightning; most of the time, one of the families has the option of whether they want to go first or second, and other times, one of the families is obligated to go first and has no choice.

I will say, now, that even though I actually watched Scrabble Showdown when it was on television, I had to look up episodes of the show on the Internet to make sure I get the right information for this edition. It turns out that all the episodes are in a playlist on YouTube by Phanpy Ken, who also posted some of the episodes on there. John Ricci, Jr., one of the producers of the show, also posted some episodes of the show in his YouTube channel JohnRicci89. Even Wink Martindale, a veteran game show host whom John Ricci, Jr. frequently works with, posted an episode in his eponymous YouTube channel. Another person on YouTube called Dexulon posted some episodes, as well, and someone called Scrabble Speedword posted the episode where Scrabble Speedword is played—very appropriate due to the name—and it’s split into four separate videos. Great job on uploading full episodes, guys. This edition wouldn’t have been easy to make possible without this contribution from you.

I also must point out that just like Merv Griffin’s Crosswords and the already-covered Small Talk, the episodes of Scrabble Showdown didn’t air in the order they were taped. It’s not as big of an issue as it was with the other two shows, since those shows each had some format changes having taken place during its only season, causing some confusion to its viewers, but it’s still an issue I find with this show, and I can’t just let this go. For example, the first aired episode is the fourth taped episode, and Justin said at the beginning of that episode after the show’s opening spiel that it’s the very first episode of the show, and the word “PREMIERE!” was shown marquee-style on the walls of the set. There’s also a Christmas episode, which was the thirtieth taped episode but it was the sixteenth aired episode. I guess it makes sense in the case of the Christmas episode, since the air date of that episode was exactly one week before Christmas.

Speaking of Christmas, I’ll be celebrating Christmas in July starting tomorrow, since tomorrow is the start of July, and Christmas in July is an actual celebration. You know what else I’ll be celebrating? The fact that this edition is the last edition not just for year nine of Game Show Corner, but also for this series as a consistent one. Yeah, I have talked about this a lot already, so you guys know, if you have been checking out this series on a regular basis, that Game Show Corner is no longer going to be a consistent series. Having done this series consistently for nine years really took a lot out of me, so much so that, as of late, I had been slacking off when putting together editions for this series, and yet I managed to get them done and released on the days I intended to have them released. But now, starting the next time I release the next edition of the series, whenever that will be, I’ll no longer do this series consistently and instead just work on editions and release them whenever I feel like it. I have other things to do, most of which take more time than working on an edition of this series. Even when I switched from doing this series weekly to doing it monthly, I still gradually had trouble continuing to do this series consistently. Now, because of the change I recently made for this series, it’s possible that in the future, I’ll be covering game shows that really have a lot for me to talk about. It’s not a guarantee, though; it’s just a possibility. What is a guarantee, though, is that my other series, Game Show Graveyard, will still be a consistent series, since there’s only five editions to release each year, all being released on October each year, and I’ll have plenty of time to get the five editions ready each year before the time to release them comes.

Well, that’s it for Game Show Corner as a consistent series. I hope you guys have enjoyed it during the nine years I have been doing this series consistently. I’m now gonna go and do some other things, like relax and have some fun in the sun, since it’s summer anyway. So, I’m gonna go and enjoy the summer, and you guys go and do the same.

So, that does it for this month’s edition of Game Show Corner. Thank you, everybody, and have a great summer.