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Author Topic: Final Answer, Interrupted: The Delayed Demise of WWTBAM  (Read 15308 times)

Kevin Prather

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Re: Final Answer, Interrupted: The Delayed Demise of WWTBAM
« Reply #30 on: September 12, 2015, 06:48:49 PM »
That's a great fix. Risking $15,000 for $6,000 more isn't quite as foolish as risking $150,000 for $60,000 more, especially if there's a 10x multiplier lying ahead.
I beg your pardon; I didn't mention it but there would be no risk. Think of it like the Body Language Sweepstakes: pile up money in the first half and either keep it or multiply it in the second.

Ok. Surely if these questions are free to guess for, you would eliminate the True/False aspect, yeah?

TLEberle

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Re: Final Answer, Interrupted: The Delayed Demise of WWTBAM
« Reply #31 on: September 12, 2015, 07:48:57 PM »
Ok. Surely if these questions are free to guess for, you would eliminate the True/False aspect, yeah?
I think the early ones could be T/F, then multiple guess and then short answer. I envision the last question being similar to the Big Fat Bonus Question on Paranoia.

The problem I'm seeking to solve is that the Perfect 21 game gave away big piles of money in a very uninteresting way. Most everyone won $60,000 because that's the last place where a sight unseen gamble makes sense. Some chickened out with $30k and a few pushed it to $100k, but those who won money typically won $60,000. The repetition of it makes it all the more uninteresting.

Looking at statistics on the primetime version of Millionaire (because after all that's why the topic began), out of nearly 900 contestants about a quarter won $1,000; another quarter won $32,000 and about another quarter won $64k or $125k combined. (I don't know if Jeff's statistics include the Super Millionaire winners.) Basically, even though it felt like there was a period where everyone and his dog was winning $125,000 it wasn't the case. While there's only eleven outcomes (and really, you don't go on a show with the name Millionaire to win $2,000 or $4,000) any one of them could happen every time. On Twenty-one you knew that the winner was taking home at least $25,000 and then having a chance to win lots more money. The four times I can remember non-game show fans talking about primetime game shows it was about: Millionaire, Greed, The Chamber and Money Drop: each cases where it felt like anything could happen. Twenty-one and Winning Lines may have been fun or interesting games, but you were seeing another verse of the same ol' song.
Travis L. Eberle

brianhenke

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Re: Final Answer, Interrupted: The Delayed Demise of WWTBAM
« Reply #32 on: October 04, 2015, 10:37:22 AM »
  The article said that Survivor was put on Wednesday to avoid conflict with WWTBAM.

  ABC decided to use the "neutron bomb" on Survivor (like they did against Twenty One et al) by scheduling special episodes of Millionaire against Survivor on May 31 and June 7, 2000 (the first two episodes of Survivor ever). Survivor beat them up in the ratings, IIRC; afterwards, the neutron bomb was seldomly used (if ever) again.

   Brian
 
Johnny Cash sang "I Have the Wine"?

tomobrien

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Re: Final Answer, Interrupted: The Delayed Demise of WWTBAM
« Reply #33 on: October 04, 2015, 09:41:04 PM »
  ABC decided to use the "neutron bomb" on Survivor (like they did against Twenty One et al) by scheduling special episodes of Millionaire against Survivor on May 31 and June 7, 2000 (the first two episodes of Survivor ever). Survivor beat them up in the ratings, IIRC; afterwards, the neutron bomb was seldomly used (if ever) again.

I'd differ slightly with the "beating up" description; Survivor did indeed top the Wednesday, June 7 episode of WWTBAM (11.7 Nielsen rating for Survivor vs. 10.6 for the Wednesday Millionaire;) but I'm not sure I'd term that as "beating up."  Remember, also, that this Wednesday show was a last-minute drop-in in the schedule; even up until a day or two before, ABC wasn't divulging if they were going to run a Wednesday episode or not. Regis did a "tune in tomorrow night" announcement at the end of the June 6 show but they were taping multiple show closings ("tune in tomorrow," "tune in Thursday," and so on) for most of the episodes that ran that week.