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Author Topic: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows  (Read 12342 times)

jlgarfield

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The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« on: December 03, 2020, 04:02:18 PM »
I was going to make this Price is Right-centric, but this could apply to ANY game show that offered cars as a prize.

What do you think are some of the worst car model(s) offered on ANY game show? Me, the Cadillac Cimmaron and Catera; those two were just lousy. The former for it being just a glorified Cavalier, and the latter..... had too many reliability issues.

Bryce L.

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Re: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« Reply #1 on: December 03, 2020, 04:06:20 PM »
Pretty sure the winner has to be the Yugo, which AFAIK only ever appeared as a prize on Classic Concentration.

Chief-O

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Re: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« Reply #2 on: December 03, 2020, 04:06:46 PM »
Chevy Vegas.

There was also a Fiat model I saw on an ep. of TPIR on YouTube; I'm forgetting which model, but it sure wasn't a 124 Spider.

/if anyone sees a 124 Spider on any of these retro TPIRs, let me know

Casey Buck

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Re: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« Reply #3 on: December 03, 2020, 04:27:02 PM »
The new Barker TPiR YouTube page features a Five Price Tags playing for a 1982 Fiat Strada. Fix It Again Tony.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2vo3S9hFVSQ&t=1m39s

There was also a Super Ball playing in one of the episodes for a really ugly electric car.

When they get to Season 12's episodes, we're going to see the Zoe Zipper! :P

calliaume

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Re: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« Reply #4 on: December 03, 2020, 04:37:15 PM »
Not sure TPIR or any other game show gave away Plymouth Horizons/Dodge Omnis (they were made between 1978 and 1990), but if those were offered as prizes, they should have come with a disclaimer: "Guaranteed to slowly fall apart after 60,000 miles. Oh, and don't drive this much above 60 MPH, either. Actually, just get something else."

BrandonFG

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Re: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« Reply #5 on: December 03, 2020, 04:47:58 PM »
Not a "car" that you could take on the Interstate per se, but those Gem cars that TPiR offered about 20 years ago were pretty fugly.

"I just wanna give a shoutout to my homies in their late-30s who are watching this on Paramount+ right now, cause they couldn't stay up late enough to watch it live!"

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WhammyPower

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Re: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« Reply #6 on: December 03, 2020, 04:59:02 PM »
Surely nothing can beat a 1958 Chevrolet Chevette...?

Bryce L.

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Re: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« Reply #7 on: December 03, 2020, 05:07:05 PM »
Surely nothing can beat a 1958 Chevrolet Chevette...?
Except possibly the 1968 Chevrolet Chevette.

Casey

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Re: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« Reply #8 on: December 03, 2020, 05:22:29 PM »
Not sure TPIR or any other game show gave away Plymouth Horizons/Dodge Omnis (they were made between 1978 and 1990), but if those were offered as prizes, they should have come with a disclaimer: "Guaranteed to slowly fall apart after 60,000 miles. Oh, and don't drive this much above 60 MPH, either. Actually, just get something else."
Not to start a debate - but I had a 1989 Plymouth Horizon and it was great.  Sold it when it has 153,000 miles and it only ever needed an alternator.  If you’d said Chevrolet Chevette/Pontiac 1000, I could have agreed with that, though. :)

My thought was the little electric car TPiR offered on occasion as the Door #3 prize on Superball! as a terrible “car”. 

knagl

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Re: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« Reply #9 on: December 03, 2020, 05:24:33 PM »
Not a "car" that you could take on the Interstate per se, but those Gem cars that TPiR offered about 20 years ago were pretty fugly.

Those were up for grabs on Whammy!, too.

I remember being less than impressed with the pair of Pontiac Fieros that were up for grabs a few times on Sale of the Century.

chrisholland03

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Re: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« Reply #10 on: December 03, 2020, 05:26:37 PM »
https://jalopnik.com/murder-transsexuals-and-the-price-is-right-the-story-464820740

I believe I have the episode as well.  Contestant was SOL if they had won.


Chief-O

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Re: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« Reply #11 on: December 03, 2020, 07:01:38 PM »
The new Barker TPiR YouTube page features a Five Price Tags playing for a 1982 Fiat Strada. Fix It Again Tony.

That *might* be the car........and yes, I'd suppose "Fix It Again Tony" would apply moreso to that than the 124 Spider (unless, of course, the rust bugs have taken to the latter).

Not to start a debate - but I had a 1989 Plymouth Horizon and it was great.  Sold it when it has 153,000 miles and it only ever needed an alternator.  If you’d said Chevrolet Chevette/Pontiac 1000, I could have agreed with that, though. :)

My brother had a Plymouth Horizon as his first car. I seem to recall it dying some horrific mechanical death one day.

Re. the Pontiac T1000: I just saw one get described on the ep. they're running right now as I read that (Card Game Pauline, if anyone's seen it yet).
« Last Edit: December 03, 2020, 07:14:54 PM by Chief-O »

splinkynip

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Re: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« Reply #12 on: December 03, 2020, 07:15:16 PM »
Daihatsu Charade hatchbacks on Classic Concentration

Casey

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Re: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« Reply #13 on: December 03, 2020, 07:22:12 PM »
The new Barker TPiR YouTube page features a Five Price Tags playing for a 1982 Fiat Strada. Fix It Again Tony.

That *might* be the car........and yes, I'd suppose "Fix It Again Tony" would apply moreso to that than the 124 Spider (unless, of course, the rust bugs have taken to the latter).

Not to start a debate - but I had a 1989 Plymouth Horizon and it was great.  Sold it when it has 153,000 miles and it only ever needed an alternator.  If you’d said Chevrolet Chevette/Pontiac 1000, I could have agreed with that, though. :)

My brother had a Plymouth Horizon as his first car. I seem to recall it dying some horrific mechanical death one day.

Re. the Pontiac T1000: I just saw one get described on the ep. they're running right now as I read that (Card Game Pauline, if anyone's seen it yet).
A good friend of mine had a Horizon that met a similar fate, so maybe I was just lucky.  :)

Of course, my family replaced a Chevette with the Horizon (!) so it was a low bar to cross.

calliaume

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Re: The Worst Car(s) Ever Offered As Prizes on Game Shows
« Reply #14 on: December 03, 2020, 07:40:07 PM »
Not to start a debate - but I had a 1989 Plymouth Horizon and it was great.  Sold it when it has 153,000 miles and it only ever needed an alternator.  If you’d said Chevrolet Chevette/Pontiac 1000, I could have agreed with that, though. :)

My brother had a Plymouth Horizon as his first car. I seem to recall it dying some horrific mechanical death one day.

Re. the Pontiac T1000: I just saw one get described on the ep. they're running right now as I read that (Card Game Pauline, if anyone's seen it yet).
A good friend of mine had a Horizon that met a similar fate, so maybe I was just lucky.  :)

Of course, my family replaced a Chevette with the Horizon (!) so it was a low bar to cross.
Maybe they got better. All I know is by 1985, I had to put one foot on the brake and one on the accelerator when stopping to avoid it stalling out. It was around 72,000 miles at that point. My father had let me have that Horizon, and unfortunately bought a 1984 model, which started dying at a similar juncture.

Cars in that era were different than now. Consumer Reports pointed out in a recent report that it's very unusual for true lemons to make it to the market. And the expectations are different; it used to be after getting a car over 100,000 miles anything after that was a bonus, but that bar is now a lot higher.

(I drive a rustbucket 2002 Nissan Sentra with about 162,000 miles and the Check Engine light always on due to an electronics issue, so my expectations are low.)

Were there any cars on Wheel of Fortune that were considered particularly bad?