The Game Show Forum
The Game Show Forum => The Big Board => Topic started by: aaron sica on December 23, 2021, 07:26:41 AM
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This could possibly be an interesting thread.
Narzo's post about the infomercial he taped long ago made me think of something - were there any tapes of game shows you recorded over the years that you wish you'd kept, so that they could have been used in tape trades, or later, sharing online?
I had, from their original broadcasts, all with original commercials:
1983 PYL premiere
1/2/89 USA Network game show lineup
First 6 shows of MG90
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I had a good chunk of the (short) run of 5432Run tape from CTV. Great game mechanic for a show. Taped over it with Fun House when I discovered that show later that year.
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For a very brief period in time, my Dad made a habit of taping The Challengers and a few years later after I found a.t.g-s I wished he hadn't taped over it multiple times over.
Of my own taping, the Sneak Preview special The Family Channel did of their 1996 afternoon game show lineup which I somehow misplaced or taped over. If memory serves me right, it only aired once or twice at odd hours and has never popped up anywhere. A shame since when I did start trading it would've become good trade bait in time.
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Audio tapes only, but I had one episode each of The Big Showdown, The Moneymaze, and a few others. In 1975, the only option was holding your Take 'n' Tape up to the TV and hope your family members don't interrupt.
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“Hit Man” and “The New Battlestars.” That coincided with my first VCR.
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In 1975, the only option was holding your Take 'n' Tape up to the TV and hope your family members don't interrupt.
Indeed, after I got my first cassette recorder in, I think, 1969, I recorded a bunch of shows on C60s and, like most everyone else, recorded over nearly all of them. In painstakingly going through the tapes decades later, I found half of a Who What or Where and the last couple minutes of a Kelly Sale of the Century (both of which I posted a while back).
Perhaps unsurprisingly, more of my radio captures survived than did the TV ones: My collection of radio news/talk from the Miami "snowstorm" of 1977 is intact.
My VHS collection survived somewhat better, but there's not much that either hasn't already been posted elsewhere, or is so prone to DMCA claims (looking at you, early MTV game shows) that I dare not post them again.
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I had a good chunk of the (short) run of 5432Run tape from CTV. Great game mechanic for a show. Taped over it with Fun House when I discovered that show later that year.
I feel like I may have told you this before, Ryan, but I saw 5-4-3-2-Run on cable - WPHL-17 in Philly ran it for a short time. It bumped "The Flintstones" out of its 7am slot. Didn't take long before Fred and company were back. :)
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Back when I got GSN in early '97, I recorded it almost around the clock and would regularly tape over any of the originals I captured.
I now wish I would've kept more Super Decades and Trivia Track...even Throut & Neck! I also recorded over a lot of Feud '94. C'est la vie.
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When my family purchased a VCR for the first time in 1983-84, I would take a few blank tapes and record episodes of game shows while I was at school -- admittedly, the technology was primitive, so I would record two-hour blocks during the day. That didn't last long, as my parents quickly set a rule -- the only shows we can record on the VCR are shows the whole family can watch.
Over time, the rule subsided, and I started paying closer attention to the TV listings, particularly what was on post-midnight. I would record syndie fare that was broadcast overnight and watch it the next morning before school. WLD, Relatively Speaking, New Liar's Club, Davidson Pyramid, and Tomarken Wipeout were the ones usually taped.
Back in 1994, I competed on a College Bowl-type series called "Campus Challenge" that featured colleges from the U.S. and Canada competing for scholarships and school pride. Production was a disaster on numerous levels, but I had fun doing it. We were told the shows would air on "PBS stations nationwide," but most of the stations that allegedly agreed to air the episodes never did -- just a handful. I reached out to the production company, and they sent me a tape of two of the four episodes I was on. Unfortunately, my family recorded over the episodes a few years later, and I've never seen the show again.
JD
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Probably had a lot more of the USA block(s) than I actually kept.
Didn't someone back in the day talk about taping at least one Cullen Pyramid rerun (when WLIG reran it) and erasing it?
Now this is stretching as I really only remember one GS clip on it, but there was a Before They Were Stars special that included Kirstie Alley on PW+ (first time I saw the show again since it was originally aired, and before I'd see full episodes in tape trades then GSN). Even when I catalogued my tapes when I officially joined the trading circuit, that show never turned up on any of them.
(Said special was also the first time I saw Willard Scott as Ronald McDonald)
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Back in the late-90s I used to record the premiere eps. of whatever syndicated show. I think I might still have some VHS recordings of Dating/Newlywed Game and Bzzz! from 96, Pictionary from 97, Match Game/Hollywood Squares 98, and Feud 99.
I wanna say I recorded The Hollywood Game from 1992, but if I did that tape’s long gone.
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When we first got a VCR at Christmas 1982, I started recording shows like Sale of the Century, Hit Man, daytime Wheel of Fortune - all with original commercials. Over the years I also had Dating Game reruns that aired in '85, but were from the '70s with the fee plugs intact (not like GSN's versions that cut them out), Dating Game '80s w/o/c, plus a Press Your Luck from '84 where they let a very bad edit get to air (this was corrected when USA and GSN ran the show), plus several of Pop N Rocker Game. I also recorded a bunch of early GSN stuff that I taped over once I saw it.
I just didn't think of saving very many of them back then...and blank tapes were kind of expensive in the early '80s and didn't start getting cheaper until the early '90s. Regrets...this is definitely one of them!
As soon as I started seeing those game show trading sites in fall 1996 I realized that maybe I should have saved a lot more of those shows than I did. Who knew?
At least with what I did manage to save it was enough to get started trading and sharing with others.
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I taped USA's afternoon block on a daily basis to watch when I got home from school each day. Used the same tape over and over. Probably did the same with Family Channel as well.
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plus a Press Your Luck from '84 where they let a very bad edit get to air (this was corrected when USA and GSN ran the show)
I'd love to know the details of this....
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“Hit Man” and “The New Battlestars.” That coincided with my first VCR.
I've heard that someone had recorded the entire series of both shows. Was that you?
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I spent a snowy day home from school in January, 1977 taping game shows on a cassette recorder: Double Dare, Shoot for the Stars, Name That Tune, Family Feud, and the $20,000 Pyramid. The tapes were tossed out in a general house cleaning when I packed off for college. Sorry, gang.
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When we got our first VCR, I would tape PYL every day and watch it after school. I'd tape over viewed eps, unless it was a noteworthy ep. ($0 wins, ties, 11 whammy games,...ln the days BEFORE VCRs, our stereo somehow used to pick up our local Channel 8 (WJW) audio at the far left end of the dial, so I would record most of the game show themes off the FM onto cassettes during the latter half of the 70s....Most were taped over or lost over the years.
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In the mid-90s, my cable company in Michigan inexplicably carried TV5 for a short time, so I had a fair number of Pyramide and Des Chiffres episodes from the era. Emphasis on had.
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plus a Press Your Luck from '84 where they let a very bad edit get to air (this was corrected when USA and GSN ran the show)
I'd love to know the details of this....
It was in the second round when a male contestant seated on camera right was spinning. He had completed a spin, then the camera cut to Peter who was looking at the board, then to the camera with a puzzled look on his face, then around to the producers. The screen briefly went to black, the spin the contestant took was repeated, this time with the correct cut to Peter after he took it. At the time I remember thinking that it was surprising to see this on a CBS network show.
I'd imagine the board had probably gone to black or something, which would explain Peter's puzzled look.
I recognized the contestant when it ran again years later, and I may even have either the USA or GSN version in my collection - but at one time I had the original with this error.
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At one point, I had about 10-12 tapes that had most of the run of Face the Music from Family Channel. I also had one tape of the USA run with the fee plugs. Sure wish I had all of those now!
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I had various stuff from NY that would show up overnights (and be erased soon after) but the one that sticks out were reruns of '70s Treasure Hunt in the early 80s.
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While I've kept everything I recorded off of GSN since we first got it (back in 1997, right before the Dark Period), there are four tapes in particular that have long since been recorded over/disposed of that I'm disappointed I didn't keep:
-The first game show tape my grandmother ever made for me, as it featured most of the USA originals from the 80s and two episodes of Celebrity Bullseye. One episode in particular is one I've as of yet not been able to find again: it was Edwards Chain Reaction and featured a team of two ladies who end up winning the $6,000 jackpot after identifying the word "Nail" and screamed and jumped all over each other and Geoff. My grandmother talked about that episode for over two decades after it aired and was disappointed I had lost the recording! All I could remember was the above and it was from the first season.
-A 6-hour tape of all PYL episodes from near the end of the run (repeats from USA), which haven't been repeated since on either GSN nor Buzzr. I recorded over them because I didn't like the "cheapness" of the board.
-A 1993 tape of a week's worth of Scrabble and Scattergories, accompanied by a second tape that also featured Classic Concentration. I recorded over this tape because I liked the USA reruns of Scrabble better, and I thought Scattergories was "boring".
-I also used to make a tape each year called "199x Game Shows", where I'd record one episode each of the first-run game shows I could find, but would typically junk it as many of the shows got cancelled or were simply episodes of the "Big 4" game shows.
Once 1997 came along, and I had both the storage space and a private VCR I could use to record game shows that didn't tie up a family TV, I was able to hang on to the tapes for much longer and actually still have most of them. But, man; I'd love to see my pre-1997 tapes again!
Anthony
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I had a tape with a dozen or so season 1 episodes of That's My Dog that young William loved watching back in the mid-90s that seems to have just disappeared, unfortunately. I remember the first episode on the tape being a particularly low-scoring but amusing game between two dogs named Axel and Bear who were more interested in checking each other out then actually competing in the events.
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I vaguely remember taping Doug Davidson's TPIR because it aired at something like 3 AM on WDZL. I don't remember how much I taped, but after having looked through a ton of old VHS tapes it seems we never kept any of it.
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My first VCR was purchased in 1984 from Fretter Appliances in Saginaw, Mi. A $700 top loading model by Fisher. At the same time got 3 Fuji brand tapes at $14.98 each. First night taped Gone with the Wind on CBS. That took care of two tapes. The third tape I used to record the 84 Pillsbury bake off, a half hour TPIR (which is up on you tube) and an episode of mother and daughter week on Tattletales (also on YouTube). Very expensive hobby back in the day.
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If radio counts, I recorded the 1980 and 1982 semi-finals and finals of the College Bowl National Championship tournament, which was a CBS Radio show at the time (with Art Fleming as host), but got rid of them long before YouTube was a thing. I also had the 1981 tournament, but sent that to someone who went to the champion school; it turned out that, while he didn't know anyone on his school's team, he did know someone on the team it beat in the semi-finals.
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“Hit Man” and “The New Battlestars.” That coincided with my first VCR.
I've heard that someone had recorded the entire series of both shows. Was that you?
No—but I have heard that as well (at least the “Hit Man” part of it). While I did record every day, I usually (like Ian) ended up recording over them. (And like Ian, regretted it.)
Wasn’t until I got GSN (four years into its existence) that it ever occurred to me to save these things.