Most confusing? How about Play the Percentages. Just when you think you had it figured out, they either change the rules/format/set or tinker with the bonus round every so often, I could never get it squared down permanently.
It's been said that Jay Wolpert games took seemingly forever to understand. But I was able to understand Whew!, Hit Man, and Shopping Spree in no time.One of these is not like the others.
I was watching "Wheel of Fortune" with a friend who hadn't seen the show in about five years. When a contestant landed on the $1,000,000 wedge, we had to pause for nearly a full minute while I explained how it worked. Pause again for the Free Play wedge. Pause again for the Mystery Round. If one of the newer categories had come up, we would have had to pause again.I can understand for the Free Play wedge since it isn't explicitly called out or explained during the show; but really? You had to explain the $1m wedge and the Mystery Wedge? You couldn't just say "That's a special case, it'll get explained when it happens?"
The Debt Bonus Round still Confuses me to this day. I get winning the front part (get all 10 in 60secs). But it's when you lose that part is where things get confusing.It does? "You won $4,000 in the first two rounds of the game. You can bet that amount on a question from your Specialty Subject. Get it right and you double that amount to $8,000. Get it wrong and you leave with the $1,000 consolation. Or you can choose to pass on that and keep the $4,000 that you've won to this point."
How is that hard?You're saying this to a person who's still employing random capitalization.
I didn't See that. You're right, I shall learn to temper my expectations in the future. ;)How is that hard?You're saying this to a person who's still employing random capitalization.
The Debt Bonus Round still Confuses me to this day. I get winning the front part (get all 10 in 60secs). But it's when you lose that part is where things get confusing.
You're saying this to a person who's still employing random capitalization.And the same person who crapped his pants over the existence of Michigan J. Frog...
I thought the rules of "Whew!" were massively confusing for a while and honestly tempered my enjoyment of it until I could finally nail them down.What brought you over the hurdle? For all the times that I read the blurb in the Encyclopedia and the rule-by-rule sheet on Randy's web site, the whole thing didn't coalesce into a pile of awesome until I actually saw the game played on video. (That applies for Instant Reaction/Go, as well.)
the whole thing didn't coalesce into a pile of awesome until I actually saw the game played on video. (That applies for Instant Reaction/Go, as well.)That was it, watching the shows and paying closer attention to the game.
It's been said that Jay Wolpert games took seemingly forever to understand. But I was able to understand Whew!, Hit Man, and Shopping Spree in no time.One of these is not like the others.
IMO the bonus round of WTYHK was the only exciting part, and Jay Wolpert knows how to do awesome bonus games."Heads or Tails?"
I think there's a difference, though, between watching a game that's hard to follow and reading an explanation that doesn't make sense until you see the show. I show my students Go every year, and they instantly get it. It is not a hard game to understand.the whole thing didn't coalesce into a pile of awesome until I actually saw the game played on video. (That applies for Instant Reaction/Go, as well.)That was it, watching the shows and paying closer attention to the game.
The Debt Bonus Round still Confuses me to this day. I get winning the front part (get all 10 in 60secs). But it's when you lose that part is where things get confusing.
the whole thing didn't coalesce into a pile of awesome until I actually saw the game played on video. (That applies for Instant Reaction/Go, as well.)That was it, watching the shows and paying closer attention to the game.
Would it be fair to say Wolpert had a bad tendency to make game shows for game show fans and not really the general public?
I think there's a difference, though, between watching a game that's hard to follow and reading an explanation that doesn't make sense until you see the show. I show my students Go every year, and they instantly get it. It is not a hard game to understand.I strongly suspect that the explanation most people are going on is the official-rules-by-legal-release that Randy posted on his site way back when, which absolutely would make the game confusing to someone who knew nothing about it otherwise, 'cuz legalese. I remember asking Mom to explain it to me ('cuz I was in school, of course) after the premiere, and she was able to get the point across in about two minutes.
I know where you're going with this statement, but it was not a random event like a coin toss. There was reasoning behind why a situation was OK or not OK.IMO the bonus round of WTYHK was the only exciting part, and Jay Wolpert knows how to do awesome bonus games."Heads or Tails?"
"Heads!"
"No, wrong, Tails. Heads or Tails?"
I think there's a difference, though, between watching a game that's hard to follow and reading an explanation that doesn't make sense until you see the show. I show my students Go every year, and they instantly get it. It is not a hard game to understand.the whole thing didn't coalesce into a pile of awesome until I actually saw the game played on video. (That applies for Instant Reaction/Go, as well.)That was it, watching the shows and paying closer attention to the game.
I will admit here, for the first time ever, that when 16-year-old me watched the premiere of Family Feud, I didn't understand how Fast Money worked. For someone who understood the bonus round to the 1975 version of Password, this was infinitely embarrassing.
Just a minute... you got the 1975 Password end-game rules right off the rib? My hat's off to you, sir.Well again, reading about it and seeing it in action are two different things. Let's not lose sight of the bigger point here: I didn't understand how Fast Money worked. This is not a hat-tipping moment.
From personal experience, for a 12-year-old boy who read encyclopedias and did long-division problems just to pass the time, taking about 3 or 4 read-throughs of Chris Lambert's writeup of the 1975 Password rules to get them to sink in, was a bit of a humbling moment for me.
As said above, I tip my hat to you, Mr. Ottinger.
Just a minute... you got the 1975 Password end-game rules right off the rib? My hat's off to you, sir.Well again, reading about it and seeing it in action are two different things. Let's not lose sight of the bigger point here: I didn't understand how Fast Money worked. This is not a hat-tipping moment.
From personal experience, for a 12-year-old boy who read encyclopedias and did long-division problems just to pass the time, taking about 3 or 4 read-throughs of Chris Lambert's writeup of the 1975 Password rules to get them to sink in, was a bit of a humbling moment for me.
As said above, I tip my hat to you, Mr. Ottinger.
You had to explain the $1m wedge and the Mystery Wedge? You couldn't just say "That's a special case, it'll get explained when it happens?"The contestant actually landed on the $1,000,000 wedge, and since my friend reacted, "A million dollars?!?", I had to explain all the hoops (because Pat doesn't have time to talk through the full process, and to the casual viewer's eyes, the wedge is just sitting in front of the contestant like any other prize wedge).
Most confusing? How about Play the Percentages. Just when you think you had it figured out, they either change the rules/format/set or tinker with the bonus round every so often, I could never get it squared down permanently.There might have been some confusing bits regarding money and winning, but in each case the game was easy to follow: what percentage of a polling group correctly answered the question, and the other version became Twenty-Five.
I think there's a difference, though, between watching a game that's hard to follow and reading an explanation that doesn't make sense until you see the show. I show my students Go every year, and they instantly get it. It is not a hard game to understand.Over Thanksgiving, I hoodwinked my entire family into playing Go, and after ironing out the rules and procedures, everyone dug it. When I tried again on Christmas Eve with half the same people and half different, it went really badly. One never knows, do one.
I know where you're going with this statement, but it was not a random event like a coin toss. There was reasoning behind why a situation was OK or not OK.Aside from the credential thing, you're right, it was more than just dumb luck, but I didn't think it was all that exciting to watch those years ago, partly because you were trying to match an opinion, and you had nothing to go on. I suppose Match-Up would have been a better analogy.
Over Thanksgiving, I hoodwinked my entire family into playing Go, and after ironing out the rules and procedures, everyone dug it. When I tried again on Christmas Eve with half the same people and half different, it went really badly. One never knows, do one.One of the potential problems with party games that require any sort of pop-culture knowledge whatsoever is that if you have *one* person in the group who is pop-culture-blind, and the game requires any kind of individual effort (like Go and its variants do), the whole thing comes crashing down because that person basically turns into a huge pool of quicksand.
One of the potential problems with party games that require any sort of pop-culture knowledge whatsoever is that if you have *one* person in the group who is pop-culture-blind, and the game requires any kind of individual effort (like Go and its variants do), the whole thing comes crashing down because that person basically turns into a huge pool of quicksand.Since I had put together the material, I don't recall there being an inordinate amount of cards devoted to pop culture. I think some people just didn't buy in or couldn't wrap their brain around the premise. But everyone else understood it, and my cousin will probably want me to bring it to the next familial deal.
I think some people just didn't buy in or couldn't wrap their brain around the premise.Well, same problem. We played Catch Phrase last Friday, and one of our number just freezes up under any kind of time pressure. So the beeping disc got to them, and there it usually stayed.
You had to explain the $1m wedge and the Mystery Wedge? You couldn't just say "That's a special case, it'll get explained when it happens?"The contestant actually landed on the $1,000,000 wedge, and since my friend reacted, "A million dollars?!?", I had to explain all the hoops (because Pat doesn't have time to talk through the full process, and to the casual viewer's eyes, the wedge is just sitting in front of the contestant like any other prize wedge).
And by that point, since we had gone through pauses for the $1,000,000 wedge and Free Play, might as well take the time for the Mystery Round, too.
It does? "You won $4,000 in the first two rounds of the game.
It does? "You won $4,000 in the first two rounds of the game. You can bet that amount on a question from your Specialty Subject. Get it right and you double that amount to $8,000. Get it wrong and you leave with the $1,000 consolation. Or you can choose to pass on that and keep the $4,000 that you've won to this point."Ok from that I'd end up with $2,274 after that. Should I fail the first and win the second. Okay the way you put that, it seems more clear. Thank you sir.
How is that hard?
You're saying this to a person who's still employing random capitalization.....really?
And the same person who crapped his pants over the existence of Michigan J. Frog...
You're saying this to a person who's still employing random capitalization.....really?
You don't see me getting on someone Else's case for having a hate or love for an Object of some kind.Yes. Really.
Um, yes. Why would it surprise you that that would stand out?You're saying this to a person who's still employing random capitalization.....really?
By the time I finish it that they start calling random letters. As if was hard to comprehend.Actually, yes, that is hard to comprehend, because it's an absolutely horrible explanation. If I didn't know how Chain Reaction worked and you tried to use that hot mess to explain it to me, not only would I still not know how it worked, I'd think I did and be wrong.
For a game show that didn't have any visible score display on the set, you can see how that's a problem.Yeah, I had a huge problem with this too, especially since they didn't do score updates on the fly either, even with the Chyroned scores. Just a horrifically done show, top to bottom.
I remember asking Mom to explain it to me ('cuz I was in school, of course) after the premiere, and she was able to get the point across in about two minutes.
I fondly recall my mom explaining Whew! to me, too. It took her five minutes and some paper.Crazy childhood memories department: I still remember the example of a blooper she gave me: Peaches and cake.
I fondly recall my mom explaining Whew! to me, too. It took her five minutes and some paper.Crazy childhood memories department: I still remember the example of a blooper she gave me: Peaches and cake.
Ha! It's a shame Wolpert never tried the bloopers-as-format-for-questions idea again. Or that nobody swiped it.PAX's Balderdash bonus game and NBC's Singing Bee (at least the board game rendition of it) say "Yo."
Ha! It's a shame Wolpert never tried the bloopers-as-format-for-questions idea again. Or that nobody swiped it.Know how I know you've never seen Balderdash?
It also took me awhile to figure out the 90s version of It Takes Two's bonus round. I could never wrap my head around Dick's explanation of being within 20% (or whatever the percentage was)...
Had we gotten a second series, we had something different in mind, but we never got that chance.I don't think "be within a given range" is that bad, but I've been playing heaps of Wits and Wagers in the last month, and that game is all about questions like "how many employees does Google have?", plus I get along just fine with numbers, so the idea of being within 25% up or down of the correct answer isn't hard to get.
I don't think "be within a given range" is that bad, but I've been playing heaps of Wits and Wagers in the last month, and that game is all about questions like "how many employees does Google have?", plus I get along just fine with numbers, so the idea of being within 25% up or down of the correct answer isn't hard to get.While I typically don't like game shows simplifying themselves to appeal to a larger, dumber crowd, this sort of percentage-range thing is simply too mathy-weird for an average viewer. Especially, IIRC, in the case of It Takes Two, where the ranges weren't necessarily consistent from show to show. People are confused by Final Jeopardy wagering strategies, and that's just addition and subtraction.
1331541334[/url]]Two problems clashed here: 1) they showed the episodes out of order and 2) Clark ran the show as if it had been on the air awhile. Things that would normally be explained in greater detail in early airings of the show weren't.
I remember watching Clark's It Takes Two after school back in the day, and while I enjoyed the front game, I agree that the bonus round was completely baffling. I eventually sort of figured out the "within a percentage of the right answer" idea they were going for, but the lack of explanation the show gave made it far more confusing than it should have been. All they ever said was "If the answer is between X and Y you win" with no clue whatsoever as to how they came up with those numbers, and the fact that sometimes the X in that statement would be zero only made it feel more like they were just pulling numbers out of their asses until it happened enough times for me to eventually figure out it meant the contestants severely lowballed the answer.
(Semi-related: I recall years ago, on the long defunct MSN board that was the forerunner to Golden-Road.net, during a rather long losing streak for the Check-Out game, I suggested they could normalize the difficulty by making the difference you had to be within 10% instead of a flat amount like $2. I ended up coming to the conclusion that, even properly explained, that would be too confusing for "Joe Plinko" to understand.)