The "budget saver" episode

[Nick]

* The Price Is Right: Every time they play Stack The Deck (Honestly, I feel whoever created that game gave it that name just to rub it in).

It is definitely a budget-saver game, and they exploit that fact, though it seems to have a disproportionately high number of contestants who play it badly as well.  The GP pricing can be tricky, but if you're fortunate to land one or two of them and you're picking either of the first two digits for your freebies, then you're asking to lose.

[Neumms]

The Price Is Right: Every time they play Stack The Deck (Honestly, I feel whoever created that game gave it that name just to rub it in).

I love this game but, yes, it’s brutal. It’s hard even if you get all three grocery prices right, and that’s rare. They at least need to lose a digit from the assortment.

[Brian44]

Toward the end of most TPIR seasons in the early-mid '90s, I really started to notice whether they were over budget because the cars on offer were stripped down and ganes played for luxury cars such as Golden Road and 3 Strikes + went AWOL. And although it wasn't usually played for luxury cars, Dice Game also went on hiatus because, while they could still tighten the game and use more middle digits in the cars' prices, the contestants could still get lucky and roll the exact number, a 1 or a 6.

[Kevin Prather]

Dice Game also went on hiatus because, while they could still tighten the game and use more middle digits in the cars' prices, the contestants could still get lucky and roll the exact number, a 1 or a 6.

You tighten Dice Game by using more outside numbers, not middle numbers. If the digit is 3 or 4, you win it by rolling a 1, 6 or exact, and you also win on a 2 or a 5 if you're not foolhardy. If the digit is a 6, you win on a 1, 2 or 6, have to get lucky with a 3 or 4, and are hosed if you roll a 5.

[Brian44]

Dice Game also went on hiatus because, while they could still tighten the game and use more middle digits in the cars' prices, the contestants could still get lucky and roll the exact number, a 1 or a 6.

You tighten Dice Game by using more outside numbers, not middle numbers. If the digit is 3 or 4, you win it by rolling a 1, 6 or exact, and you also win on a 2 or a 5 if you're not foolhardy. If the digit is a 6, you win on a 1, 2 or 6, have to get lucky with a 3 or 4, and are hosed if you roll a 5.

Appreciate the clarification. You would also use more outside numbers in L7 to make it less winnable.

In any event, you'd still want to play Dice Game less often to save the budget due to the other aforementioned scenarios.

[steveleb]

Never ever forget how Mr. Stewart squeezed every last penny out of CBS with the post-cancellation episodes of Pass the Buck.

Top line: one human body part
The one you needed for 5000 fast bucks: the thyroid gland

I defy anyone—even a ned student—to name that in 15 hours, let alone 15 seconds

[Eric Paddon]

Watching the Narz Concentrations in sequence you can tell that they never wanted to give away more than two cars at most per week because so often the "Double Play" puzzles were impossible to get two of if you had only two or three seconds left after your first one and they would give you a long phrase for the second puzzle, "Gregory Peck was the star of Moby Dick" etc.     But whenever both puzzles tended to be shorter, you could tell they were going for an easy lay-up for the contestant (who wouldn't always necessarily get it).

[SamJ93]

Doing a mini-bump on this thread thanks to the Supermarket Sweep episode I just watched on Samsung TV Plus.

In the bonus round, the final item, a laundry basket, was placed on the shelf leaning on its side, instead of stacked parallel to the floor. This meant that the correct-item indicator mark was placed on the bottom of the basket, recessed and hidden in the shadows--in other words, virtually impossible to see unless you combed through every nook and cranny of the aisle.

Needless to say, there was no way in hell anyone was gonna win the $5K that day...

[Sodboy13]

Here's a fun little one I've seen from the same 84-85 season: On a couple of plays of Hole in One, one of the products is a pack of Trident gum. Now, it's a bigger pack of gum, but the pieces were stacked in two or three rows, so it looks about the same size as a normal pack. Both contestants were clearly and confidently like, pack of gum, that's a quarter(ish), that goes first. And so they both had to putt from the back line.

Coincidentally, the $14,000+ Toyota van (with built-in icemaker!) won in the showcase of the episode I started this thread with was in one of those Hole in One playings a few weeks prior.

[Long live Jeopardy!]

The bonus round on Double Dare was pretty easy to manipulate for this purpose--any time they put the dreaded "find the flag buried in a giant pool of glop" obstacle in the 2nd, 3rd or 4th slot, you knew they were in budget mode.

There were some 1990 Family Double Dare episodes where Inside Out, Toe Jam, and Pick It were in the same obstacle course that day.

[TLEberle]

There were some 1990 Family Double Dare episodes where Inside Out, Toe Jam, and Pick It were in the same obstacle course that day.

Having had this discussion with Jason A. I split things two ways--if you need three "find the MacGuffin" obstacles maybe your grand prize is too big, but I also understand that it becomes rote if teams win the obstacle course more than half the time. That doesn't excuse Sweep hiding the third item like that for a $5,000 win.

Part of the problem with offering a Mustang LX, Thunderbird or minivan as a grand prize is there's no way to back down from that without looking like the show was admitting a mistake (and even at age ten I noticed that a trip that stayed on the North American continent was less awesome than a car.)

[Loogaroo]

To Travis' point, I remember when VH1 made "Name That Video", offered a car as the grand prize, and then kept stacking videos of barely-hit songs from obscure bands like Wall of Voodoo and The Waitresses in order to make sure the car was practically never won.

[TLEberle]

To Travis' point, I remember when VH1 made "Name That Video", offered a car as the grand prize, and then kept stacking videos of barely-hit songs from obscure bands like Wall of Voodoo and The Waitresses in order to make sure the car was practically never won.

And My Generation gave away a long weekend at the Las Vegas Hard Rock Hotel/Cafe for a comparatively walk-in-the-park seven of ten.

I think this illustrates my consternation with the "Things That Are Incapacitated" situation. Because mom was a teacher she had custody of my sister and me during summers. I had Match Game '90 on and we get to the Super Match. For $some amount, the contestant is given the lay-up of BART ___. Mom said "That's easy!" (no fan of The Simpsons, even she knew it was the hotness). The contestant did not and won her Audience money.

Instead of having BART ___ and ___ JONES, find some phrases that are fifty-fifty propositions and let the law of averages let everything come out in the wash. Yes, it's more work but it feels to me like a fairer exercise where somebody is told "No ten grand for you, Bunky," because he happened to be on a particular time in the budget window.

[Jeremy Nelson]

The bonus round on Double Dare was pretty easy to manipulate for this purpose--any time they put the dreaded "find the flag buried in a giant pool of glop" obstacle in the 2nd, 3rd or 4th slot, you knew they were in budget mode.

There were some 1990 Family Double Dare episodes where Inside Out, Toe Jam, and Pick It were in the same obstacle course that day.

One of the DD interviews or oral histories said that the obstacle course was the same lineup for any given taping day- they'd just start in different places. So whenever I'd see Ant Farm in the opening set and the Sundae Slide at the end, my first thought was "I feel bad for the winners that have to run this course backwards".

[jcs290]

Sticking with kid's game shows, I always felt that Legends of the Hidden Temple was mostly budget saver episodes except about every 8th or 9th episode where the temple run was way shorter than most and nearly guaranteed a win.  No Shrine of the Silver Monkey located in the primary path, no dead ends, temple guards located mostly in the corner rooms, more unlocked doors for a straight shot to the room with the treasure.