The Game Show Thread!

[All My Shadows]

RIP TAYLOR! Yes. Exactly. I'll never forget him yanking that toupee off on Super Password like Aretha Franklin.

But yeah, there's nothing better than an episode of Match Game were you have (in my Johnny Olson voice) From VEGA$, Bart Braverman! Brett Somers! Charrrrles Nelson Reilly! Elaine Joyce! Rich'd Dawson!! And Joyce(!) Bulifant!! I watch with friends and they don't know who the hell any of these people are.

[alphanguy74]

you guys are so right about missing a good celebrity game show. the last really good attempt was Whoopi's Hollywood squares, which I enjoyed quite a bit. I think Rosie O'Donnell should have tried to host such a show instead of going on The View... I think it's more in line with her talents, and her reputation wouldn't have taken such a hit with her discussing such hot button issues. I think Jim J. Bullock would be GREAT as a host for a revival of Match game, IF you got the right celebs. We so need a show that just makes you laugh till you pee:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4mlAQMaQts0&feature=related

[All My Shadows]

Bumping this thread back up because I've been on one of my game show kicks for the last couple of days. I watched several late 70s episodes of TPIR last night, and damn, it really just highlights how much Drew sucks. Of course, it's not allll his fault, but dang...the host is a HUGE part of this show, and he just doesn't cut it at all.

I wish we had something like The Gong Show on today. Something just absolutely crazy and lively and hilarious...not the dry, bitter version with Dave Attell that aired a few years back.

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[Max]

In 1986-87, CBS used the "Rumor Has It" campaign to promote its soaps. What I didn't realize until recently was that they also used this campaign to promote its game shows.

Here is a Card Sharks promo:

<iframe width="425" height="349" src="http://www.youtube.c...bed/RwL4yX7Nb_I" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Here is a TPIR promo:

<iframe width="425" height="349" src="http://www.youtube.c...bed/RwL4yX7Nb_I" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

There was a third promo for the $25,000 Pyramid, but the person who posted these promos on YouTube doesn't have that particular promo in his collection.

[Max]

I apologize for my rudeness, by the YouTube clips that I embedded are not the promos, but rather look like the strange things above. I know that I did something wrong, but I can't figure out what it is, given that I followed the same procedures for posting YouTube clips on the former server.

Any explanation on this situation would be greatly appreciated.

[All My Shadows]

http://www.youtube.c...bed/RwL4yX7Nb_I

http://www.youtube.c...bed/RwL4yX7Nb_I

The easiest way to embed YouTube clips is to just copy and paste the URL of the video into your post with no codes or anything. It'll automatically embed, but you can only do up to three clips that way.

Or, rather, that used to be the easiest way to do it nuSON's gonna take some getting used to.

[Max]

All My Shadows, thank you for trying to help me. I believe that I finally figured out how to solve this problem, however. Previously, if one wanted to embed a video, all one needed to do was paste the embed URL and choose the "HTML On - Auto Linebreak Mode" post option. Now, in order to embed, one has to click the "Link" toolbar button and past the embed URL link there. (As before, the "HTML On - Auto Linebreak Mode" post option has to be selected.)

Here is the Card Sharks promo I referred to above:

<iframe width="425" height="349" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/RwL4yX7Nb_I" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

And here is the TPIR promo:

<iframe width="425" height="349" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/M9tuunw1jBI" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

[DRW50]

The rumor is Bob Barker had a bad dye job.

Wow, Rod Roddy making "o" faces in closeup. That's...different.

[Max]

Carl, this is so true, given that these promos were made just before Barker stopped dying his hair and let it go gray. (His first show with gray hair was 10/15/87.)

[Max]

While Drew Carey still sucks, I do think that he's improved quite a bit, at least to the point where TPIR is at least watchable. It is unfortunate that it took four years of on the job training for him to reach this point.

Amazingly, TPIR is still going neck and neck with Y&R as the number one network show in daytime (just as when Bob Barker was host). Here is a list of ratings for the week of March 7-11, 2011 (posted at golden-road.net, who got these numbers from SON):

(Note: As instructed by Toups, the folks at golden-road.net did provide a link to these ratings at SON. I myself would have done the same thing, but the link no longer works. I sincerely apologize for not following proper protocol.)

[alphanguy74]

Chuck Barris was a strange little man, wasn't he? do you know there was a straight porn movie made where they got a Chuck Barris lookalike to shtup all the contestants before the show? Strange but true.

[Max]

I thought it might be interesting to talk about each pricing game that was ever played on TPIR. I'll go in chronological order, starting with the very first game ever played, Any Number. Of course, I can't guarantee that I'll get to every game (out of a total of 105 games to ever get played). It all depends on the level of interest this generates among others as well as whether I have the time to continue to devote to such an undertaking. (In addition, there is the problem that some very short-lived pricing games don't appear at all on YouTube, so you can't see clips of them.)

As I just stated, Any Number was the very first pricing game to debut on the revamped version of TPIR, which premiered on 9/4/72. (This game is still in the active pricing game rotation.) The rules of the game are very simple: you can win one (and only one) of three prizes: a four-digit car (originally), a three-digit prize, or a three-digit piggy bank (in dollars and cents) that is less than $10.00. Each digit 0 through 9 is on the board (only once), and you win whichever prize you "light" up first. (While you are guaranteed to win something, Any Number is only considered to be "won" if the car is won.)

In addition to being the very first game ever played (it was won on 9/4/72), it was also the last game ever played during Bob Barker's tenure (unfortunately, only the piggy bank was won during that playing). Furthermore, Any Number was the first game played (and won) on the first Drew Carey show that aired. (However, the first Carey show that aired was not the first show he taped; CBS or Fremantle deliberately chose that particular show to be Carey's first to air because all pricing games were won on that show.)

The original game board lasted until the second half of 1986. (Although the pricing game's title did not appear on the board until around 1974 or 1975; this was usually the case with many pricing game titles during the first two years of TPIR.) Here is a playing from 1/20/86 where you can see it in use:

<iframe width="425" height="349" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/F_LCaS5NZFM" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Here's the radically different new gameboard (from TPIR's 5000th show, in 1998), which allowed for five-digit cars to be offered: (To accomodate five-digit cars, the first digit in the car was now given at the start of the game; then each digit 0-9 appeared on the board and gameplay proceeded as usual.)

<iframe width="425" height="349" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/jZeUu30xN4g" frameborder="0"

allowfullscreen></iframe>

(Sorry that the above video also contains a Showcase Showdown, but I was unable to find any other embeddable Barker playing that involved the second Any Number board.)

In 2010, another (much less dramatic change) was made to the game board: the colors were slightly changed, and there was a space (above the prizes) on the board where each digit (0 through 9) was displayed and then "crossed-out" after a contestant picked it (as a helpful reminder to the contestant). Here's what that board looks like:

<iframe width="425" height="349" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/VyFPj5R-gik" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

While the rules for Any Number are easy to understand, winning it is hard. The only "tips" I can give you is that (1) the digits in the piggy bank tend go in descending order and (2) that the first digit in the car (that is given for free) tends to also be one of the other four digits in the car. However, these tips are far from foolproof, and even if they were, this game is still a challenge to win.

On a scale of 0 to 10, I'd give Any Number a 6.5: It gets points for having a unique gaming concept and for being the very first pricing game ever played. However, this game is often boring (when it is not won) and is played a little bit too much.

[alphanguy74]

I'll be honest, I thought the "funnest" games of all time were the Race Game, Plinko and Cliffhangers. But then it BREAKS my heart to know that Janice would cry every time they played Cliffhangers. Lucky Seven SUCKED, it was so hard to win, nobody hardly ever did. I hated Safe Crackers for the same reason.

[Max]

It was an eerie coincidence that shortly before Cliff Hangers debuted (on 4/12/76), Janice's first husband went missing in the Alps.

While Lucky $even is a very difficult game to win, the same cannot be said about Safe Crackers, so long as you know the following trick: that the combination of the safe (which is the price of the three-digit prize offered) always ends in zero. When you combine this with the fact that there are no overlapping digits in the safe combination (which the host mentions in his explanation of the game), one has a 50/50 chance of winning. (Note that the "last digit must be zero" trick did not apply during the game's early years; therefore, it was much harder to win.)

[SFK]

I remember watching at my grandmother's house and hearing Bob do a voiceover at the beginning of the episodes, "Don't let the dark hair fool ya" letting us know that these were reruns and he'd still let himself go gray.