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In the July issue of EGM, there is a brief article listing five of the "worst tv" video game adaptions (not just game shows, and apparently another were five listed in the June issue). Among the ones listed was Fun House for the original 8-bit Nintendo (NES).
It wasn't anywhere near the format of the show itself--no questions, no Double Dare-like stunts. It was just a game of roller-blading through one room of the "Fun House," and completion of the obstacle in that room, advanced you to another room.
Though I didn't see the June issue, a very brief summary of the previously listed five "worst" tv games included a version of Wheel of Fortune, featuring Vanna White.
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[quote name=\'Bob Zager\' date=\'Jun 4 2005, 03:27 PM\']Though I didn't see the June issue, a very brief summary of the previously listed five "worst" tv games included a version of Wheel of Fortune, featuring Vanna White.
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The version that used only three colors! But AFAIK, it was the only NES version to have actual wheels from the show, and it used the "RSTLNE" and "W-H-E-E-L" bonus rounds.
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Three colors? That must have been the Windows 3.1 version; pink, yellow, green and black. As long as you beat the computer, you could keep building up your total. I think I was up to $87,000 in 13 wins by the time we updated the computer.
On the NES side, if it was a game show and a video game port, I probably rented it at some point. As a maze game, "Fun House" was mildly fun, though I'm not sure if it could have sold on it's own without a big name behind it. As a TV version, not even close, which has been said.
"Double Dare" also comes to mind. Trivially easy questions, coupled with challenges that consisted of setting a 'speed' and 'angle,' then a 'commit' button to fire...meh. The obstacle course would have been the saving grace except you had to do what amounted to a 50-yard dash between each obstacle. (and the brief instructions from the rental company don't tell you how to run fast, either)
"Wheel of Fortune" is probably the hardest one to mess up, but it's been done.
And the less that's said about "Talking Super Jeopardy!", the better....
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[quote name=\'TLEberle\' date=\'Jun 4 2005, 03:36 PM\']Three colors? That must have been the Windows 3.1 version; pink, yellow, green and black. As long as you beat the computer, you could keep building up your total. I think I was up to $87,000 in 13 wins by the time we updated the computer.
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The four-color pallate was a CGA thing. Windows (and definitely by the time 3.1 shipped) always required at least 16-color graphics, I'm fairly sure.
(Now, it could have been "Windows 3.1" compatible in that it included a PIF to run the game, but make no mistake, the game still woulda been running in DOS mode if the graphics were that bad. :))
And the less that's said about "Talking Super Jeopardy!", the better....
Whoof. 30 bones and a few hours out of my life I won't get back. I think I played it all of twice. It was THAT useless.
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[quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Jun 4 2005, 05:58 PM\']Whoof. 30 bones and a few hours out of my life I won't get back. I think I played it all of twice. It was THAT useless.
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Thirty bucks?! I paid $45 bucks when it came out. It was okay, I guess. The host just had an unusually big head. And he sounded robotic. I didn't take much to appease an 8 year old die hard game show fan.
Brandon Brooks
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[quote name=\'Brandon Brooks\' date=\'Jun 4 2005, 06:57 PM\']The host just had an unusually big head. And he sounded robotic. I didn't take much to appease an 8 year old die hard game show fan.
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Gee, how authentic some 15 years later.
I never heard the host "talk".
Three colors? That must have been the Windows 3.1 version
As we noted in a conversatoin off board, I was refering to the wheel and the contestant's attire--it consisted strictly of red, yellow, and blue.
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[quote name=\'TLEberle\' date=\'Jun 4 2005, 05:36 PM\']Three colors? That must have been the Windows 3.1 version; pink, yellow, green and black. As long as you beat the computer, you could keep building up your total. I think I was up to $87,000 in 13 wins by the time we updated the computer.[/quote]
Would you rather it had 1.5 MILLION colors? :-)
"Wheel of Fortune" is probably the hardest one to mess up, but it's been done.[snapback]87832[/snapback]
Some would argue it's currently being messed up on TV....
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I find it ironic that the best graphics are found on the games that are text based: J!, WoF, FF and WWTBAM! If only the time and effort had been put had been put into Classic Concentration or TPiR!
CC's puzzles were no real challenge and poorly drawn. Those comments apply to both NES and PC versions but at least the PC version kept score and adjusted the car round clock for failed attempts. TPiR looked as if it was programmed by someone trying to remember the game he hadn't seen in twenty years. I played The Dice Game for a $14 prize once.
OTOH, Card Sharks and the obscure Talk About come off pretty well in their computer versions although the graphics are not particularly good.
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OTOH, Card Sharks and the obscure Talk About come off pretty well in their computer versions although the graphics are not particularly good.
I thought the graphics were decent with what they had to work with. 4 color CGA can only look so good. The c64 and Apple II versions of games generally looked better.
I think that many of the old games are still very playable today. With only one floppy disk or cartridge, the focus was more on gameplay rather than cut scenes, telling you unnecessary information, and other things that just get in the way, IMHO.
-Greg
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[quote name=\'pyl85\' date=\'Jun 7 2005, 06:16 PM\']I thought the graphics were decent with what they had to work with. 4 color CGA can only look so good. The c64 and Apple II versions of games generally looked better.
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Actually I thought the PC version of Card Sharks was vastly superior to the Apple version, if only because they would "zoom in" on the gameboard when flipping cards, while everything on the Apple version was done as a wide shot.
The PC version of Blackout was vastly superior to most other versions, too.
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There's something I've always wondered about the "Card Sharks" computer game, maybe someone can answer.
Obviously, in games like WoF and J!, and FF, there are only so many puzzles, categories, questions, etc., before it starts to repeat and the fun of the game is gone.
With CS........The questions obviously will repeat, but the cards themselves - are the 5 row layout of cards completely random, or are they drawn from a bank too with a number of set "patterns"? Same question applies for the money cards, too.
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[quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Jun 7 2005, 08:32 PM\']The PC version of Blackout was vastly superior to most other versions, too.
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Blackout had a PC game??
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[quote name=\'Modor\' date=\'Jun 7 2005, 08:55 PM\'][quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Jun 7 2005, 08:32 PM\']The PC version of Blackout was vastly superior to most other versions, too.
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Blackout had a PC game??
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Wipeout did, he might be thinking of that.
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I must've played several different PC and Nintendo game show games
A few brief thoughts on some of them...
WOF- 1st Edition, NES
Differences- 2 full rounds, and the third round is a "speed up" round. Dollar values on the wheel do not change. Other than that, very faithful to the TV show. Has a decent rendition of the classic WOF theme, complete with the audience chanting WHEEL OF FORTUNE. To me, the puzzle solve cue sounds like a remix of the Thicke puzzle solve cue. A 2nd edition followed, with different color schemes, and a forgettable new theme.
J!- First edition, NES
Exactly as the TV show. Podiums look similar to as they looked in the 85 season.
Definitely fun to play.
Classic Concentration, NES
The "gay nineties" style music in the background is pretty cool... but after a while it gets repetitive and a little annoying. Very faithful to the original
Hollywood Squares- NES
3 rounds played. Decent graphics and music for NES. The jokey answers the stars give are mildly amusing at best. The bonus round is also very cool.
Super Jeopardy- NES
The talking element is minimal, but for NES, it was groundbreaking. The host looks like Wink Martindale.
Anticipation- NES
Ok, it's not a TV game show, but it played like one. A blatant ripoff of Pictionary with its color coded board and drawing element. The gameboard pieces echo Monopoly. Kinda fun, but the game repeats a lot of puzzles after just 4 or 5 playings.
Remote Control- NES
Pretty much captures the zaniness of the TV show, with snack breaks, and odd categories. Game ends with "Think Real Fast" round... there is no bonus round.
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I had a Apple II version of High Rollers...
It was ok, but instead of the questions repeating, the rolls of the dice would. I rolled a 9 just about every roll in the first round. All in all though, I've played a lot worse.
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[quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Jun 4 2005, 05:58 PM\'][quote name=\'TLEberle\' date=\'Jun 4 2005, 03:36 PM\']Three colors? That must have been the Windows 3.1 version; pink, yellow, green and black. As long as you beat the computer, you could keep building up your total. I think I was up to $87,000 in 13 wins by the time we updated the computer.
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The four-color pallate was a CGA thing. Windows (and definitely by the time 3.1 shipped) always required at least 16-color graphics, I'm fairly sure.
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The PC at the time was weak for video games mostly. CGA was in the ol DOS days with ISA video cards that barely did 2D. When the original WOF came out for the PC, Windows 3.1 was still a pipe dream. I played that version many times and although the game is pretty good, the gfx make Vanna look like she has permanent liver disease :)
The C64 at the time by far was better and even the NES was beating the PC in the graphics and sound dept. Not until the early 90's where the PC could start surpassing game consoles for graphics and sound quality around the time Wolfenstein 3D came out. Then, the PC surpassed for good with Windows 95 being released and 3D graphics cards. Since then, Wheel of Fortune, Family Feud, and Jeopardy as examples have been faithfully reproduced. It would've been great if this to have happened 10 years prior.... games like Let's make a deal, High Rollers, Gambit and Card Sharks would've had nice high quality CD-ROM versions released for us to play and treasure (and I know some of the games I listed were never released or done). Now those game shows are so old since the original air dates that there's no drive for anyone to produce a game for them for the PC or console. I guess GSN or a 3rd party may want to look into the gameshow software market?? Problably not a viable option.
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[quote name=\'Modor\' date=\'Jun 7 2005, 06:55 PM\'][quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Jun 7 2005, 08:32 PM\']The PC version of Blackout was vastly superior to most other versions, too.
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Blackout had a PC game??
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'Scuse me. Wipeout.
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[quote name=\'saussage\' date=\'Jun 7 2005, 09:23 PM\']Not until the early 90's where the PC could start surpassing game consoles for graphics and sound quality around the time Wolfenstein 3D came out.
(yammer yammer wonk deleted)
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Yes, the VGA graphics standard and the Sound Blaster (well, the AdLib tried, but it was really the SB that took hold) sound card were the saving graces of the IBM-PC as a gaming machine. If you'd have told me in 1988 that the PC would be the preeminent gaming platform inside of ten years, I'd have laughed at you.
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[quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Jun 8 2005, 04:32 AM\']Yes, the VGA graphics standard and the Sound Blaster (well, the AdLib tried, but it was really the SB that took hold) sound card were the saving graces of the IBM-PC as a gaming machine. If you'd have told me in 1988 that the PC would be the preeminent gaming platform inside of ten years, I'd have laughed at you.
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So...you don't like PC speaker beeps?
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[quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Jun 8 2005, 04:32 AM\']If you'd have told me in 1988 that the PC would be the preeminent gaming platform inside of ten years, I'd have laughed at you.
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It's a good thing that I didn't seriously have a PC until 1992. I would've turfed it if I had it even a couple of years earlier. Problably would've grabbed a C64 instead.
A Tandy 3-voice with dithered ultra low-res graphics... delicious :)
It's so funny: Vanna's puzzle touch-board has problably more processing power than PC's in the late 80's and the puzzle board still does next to nothing. Common, show me a dragon or something :) I was going to say red letters but that was already done on the old puzzle board :)
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[quote name=\'saussage\' date=\'Jun 8 2005, 04:07 PM\']It's a good thing that I didn't seriously have a PC until 1992. I would've turfed it if I had it even a couple of years earlier. Problably would've grabbed a C64 instead.
A Tandy 3-voice with dithered ultra low-res graphics... delicious :)
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That's when I got my first PC. (Well, second half of 1991.) VGA graphics and a Sound Blaster. First game I bought for it: Wing Commander. Good times.
It's so funny: Vanna's puzzle touch-board has problably more processing power than PC's in the late 80's and the puzzle board still does next to nothing. Common, show me a dragon or something :) I was going to say red letters but that was already done on the old puzzle board :)
Um...yeah.
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[quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Jun 8 2005, 07:19 PM\']That's when I got my first PC. (Well, second half of 1991.) VGA graphics and a Sound Blaster. First game I bought for it: Wing Commander. Good times.
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Considering most games on the consoles have speech and kick-ass graphics now, it's no big deal to anyone when that happens in a game.
But in 1991, toss a Sound Blaster and Wing Commander into a PC and you actually have a) decent sound and b) real speech*, that's something big. IMHO, Wing Commander/'Wing Commander 2 were the quintessential "show off your IBM PC" games.
*The speech might have started with WC2? My memories are foggy if a speech pack was made for the first one.
ObGameShows: A few years later, science fiction met game shows in "Lexi Cross" (to this day, one of my favorites).
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[quote name=\'aaron sica\' date=\'Jun 8 2005, 05:13 PM\']*The speech might have started with WC2? My memories are foggy if a speech pack was made for the first one.
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Speech pack was WC2, which took up a whopping _TWENTY_ megabytes of hard drive space when everything was installed.
I remember the night that was released, we went over to a buddy's place who worked at the software store and sat there with jaws agape as we watched the opening sequence. :)
(And to those of you who complain about the price of video games, I paid eighty bucks for WC2 and the speech pack. Gladly.)