A Brit's take on Jeopardy and Wheel

[Brig Bother]

I'm just watching these now. Some observations:

1) Ken Jennings is a brilliant player, no doubt about that. However from what people say on here, I was expecting the questions to be a little more difficult. Actually, I'm currently finding the questions down the bottom which are worth more are fairly easy whilst the lower value questions are stumping me a bit more. These are the non-US centric categories, at any rate.

2) Way too much clapping on Wheel of Fortune. I've always said that the Brit version would have been improved with a live audience but even so.

3) And what's with buying all the vowels? This just didn't happen on the UK show. It's most frustrating when it's patently obvious what the puzzle is when there are just three or four blanks left and they go ahead and waste their cash anyway.

Anyway, interesting stuff.

[TimK2003]

[quote name=\'Brig Bother\' date=\'Jul 19 2004, 06:46 PM\'] I'm just watching these now. Some observations:

1) Ken Jennings is a brilliant player, no doubt about that. However from what people say on here, I was expecting the questions to be a little more difficult. Actually, I'm currently finding the questions down the bottom which are worth more are fairly easy whilst the lower value questions are stumping me a bit more. These are the non-US centric categories, at any rate.

2) Way too much clapping on Wheel of Fortune. I've always said that the Brit version would have been improved with a live audience but even so.

3) And what's with buying all the vowels? This just didn't happen on the UK show. It's most frustrating when it's patently obvious what the puzzle is when there are just three or four blanks left and they go ahead and waste their cash anyway.

Anyway, interesting stuff. [/quote]
 1) I can't agree/disagree with you on this point -- I rarely get the chance to watch much J!.

2) I agree with your clapping point.  At least on J!, you can see each of the player's personalities and traits throughout the gameplay.  Whereas on Wheel, it seems that the contestant coordinators try too hard to turn them into homogenized robots with the constant hand claps, "Big Money" chants and cheerleader-ish letter calling.  

3) Maybe it's the lights, the 200+ people in the audience watching your every quiver, those contestant coordinators, or something else that makes too many people buy too many vowels, but some of those partially revealed puzzles are just too obvious, yet they buy 'em anyways.  (Maybe because buying 'obvious' vowels keeps them on the camera longer).


I do have to say that as far as finally seeing the BBC version of "Weakest Link", Anne's UK hosting and contestants seems to me to flow better than those on the US version seen on GSN.

However, George Gray's syndie version is still my fave!

[Robert Hutchinson]

Buying obvious vowels near the end of a round does something far more important than give one extra camera time--it gives one extra time to figure out what in heaven's name that last consonant could be. And buying obvious vowels early on should be Rule #1 for any Wheel player. The E is not bought because they're not sure what TH_ is, it's bought because it's easier to figure out what the word _HEE_E is after the E is placed.

[tommycharles]

Thoughts from a half Brit half American:

1) I dunno... the whole "it's only easy if you know the answer" thing comes to mind here - some days I can clear the board, some days I struggle to get more than 4 or 5 answers.

2) That's about *any* American game show, which I've always guessed to be a byproduct of using "professional audiences." Even if you watch eps of Super Millionaire, you can see what seems to me a more fake audience than the original ABC run. I can't quite put my finger on it, but it seems different in a bad way. Even British canned crowds sound more "honest".

[Brandon Brooks]

[quote name=\'tommycharles\' date=\'Jul 20 2004, 12:28 AM\'] I can't quite put my finger on it, but it seems different in a bad way. Even British canned crowds sound more "honest". [/quote]
 So you mean the whole audience is like Anne Robinson?

Brandon Brooks

[Brig Bother]

On reflection:

1) I think I was expecting J! to much more academic in nature than it actually is. This isn't a complaint, incidentally, just an observation.

2) I'm not entirely convinced this is endemic in most American gameshows. I've seen loads, but Wheel has more claps and 'alriiiiiights!' per minute than any other show ever. I think my favourite version regards to this sort of thing is probably the Australian version, which is nicely loose and relaxed.

3) This is probably culture shock more than anything else, as nobody ever bought vowels over here ever, mainly because with clever picking of consonants it's fairly easy top work out what words are in the wider context of the puzzle.

What really bugs me is when it's quite clear they know what the answer to the puzzle is because they're picking their consonants very deliberately, and for no particular reason they go and buy a vowel or two. Or in yesterday's show the guy bought an O for DIRECTIONAL COMPASS when it was just the O and one letter in COMPASS left as his last move before solving (why not spin once more and get the final points for that, eh?). It's just baffling and frustrating, really.

[Millionaire76]

Well Wheel of Fortune has alot of clapping because some of the time, they are in huge theatres, because they travel alot around the country. You can't really can't except a huge audience in a these huge theatres to be quiet 75% of the time.

[Don Howard]

[quote name=\'Brig Bother\' date=\'Jul 20 2004, 06:00 AM\'] 3) This is probably culture shock more than anything else, as nobody ever bought vowels over here ever, mainly because with clever picking of consonants it's fairly easy top work out what words are in the wider context of the puzzle.

 [/quote]
Oh, yeah, baby. You nailed it. Especially the part about "clever picking of contestants". Do you they scream their letters and puzzle solutions over there? Bet your version doesn't have 1.5 million colors of light, though.

[Brig Bother]

[quote name=\'Don Howard\' date=\'Jul 20 2004, 12:36 PM\'] [quote name=\'Brig Bother\' date=\'Jul 20 2004, 06:00 AM\'] 3) This is probably culture shock more than anything else, as nobody ever bought vowels over here ever, mainly because with clever picking of consonants it's fairly easy top work out what words are in the wider context of the puzzle.

 [/quote]
Oh, yeah, baby. You nailed it. Especially the part about "clever picking of contestants". Do you they scream their letters and puzzle solutions over there? Bet your version doesn't have 1.5 million colors of light, though. [/quote]
 Ironically, you've confused "consonants" with "contestants".

We don't actually have a version over here at the moment.

[Don Howard]

[quote name=\'Brig Bother\' date=\'Jul 20 2004, 07:41 AM\'] [quote name=\'Don Howard\' date=\'Jul 20 2004, 12:36 PM\'] [quote name=\'Brig Bother\' date=\'Jul 20 2004, 06:00 AM\'] 3) This is probably culture shock more than anything else, as nobody ever bought vowels over here ever, mainly because with clever picking of consonants it's fairly easy top work out what words are in the wider context of the puzzle.

 [/quote]
Oh, yeah, baby. You nailed it. Especially the part about "clever picking of contestants". Do you they scream their letters and puzzle solutions over there? Bet your version doesn't have 1.5 million colors of light, though. [/quote]
Ironically, you've confused "consonants" with "contestants". [/quote]
Ah, so I did! To the Rolf Room I go. See you tomorrow.

[vtown7]

Brig -

As a wheel of fortune contestant you are given many "strategical" tips before appearing on the show.

I do notice since my appearance that there are many more high fives and everyone generally is very 'chummy'... but trust me, you get lessons on the clapping.

Ryan

[rmfromfla]

For the UK Game Show Page's review of Jeopardy:

www.ukgameshows.com/atoz/programmes/j/jeopardy/index.htm

[Brig Bother]

[quote name=\'rmfromfla\' date=\'Jul 20 2004, 01:45 PM\'] For the UK Game Show Page's review of Jeopardy:

www.ukgameshows.com/atoz/programmes/j/jeopardy/index.htm [/quote]
 Embarrasingly, I wrote that when I was younger and stupider.

I am enjoying the US version though, possibly it's the novelty, I don't know. In the same way that I dislike our Wheel of Fortune but am quite receptive to other versions.

Besides, you messed up The Krypton Factor and Fort Boyard

[Brandon Brooks]

[quote name=\'Brig Bother\' date=\'Jul 20 2004, 06:00 AM\'] 2) I'm not entirely convinced this is endemic in most American gameshows. I've seen loads, but Wheel has more claps and 'alriiiiiights!' per minute than any other show ever. I think my favourite version regards to this sort of thing is probably the Australian version, which is nicely loose and relaxed. [/quote]
 I can think of two good examples right of the bat in Hollywood Squares and The Price is Right.  We like to clap and holler.

Brandon Brooks

[adamjk]

2) I'm not entirely convinced this is endemic in most American gameshows. I've seen loads, but Wheel has more claps and 'alriiiiiights!' per minute than any other show ever. I think my favourite version regards to this sort of thing is probably the Australian version, which is nicely loose and relaxed.

Incidentally, I am curious as to your thoughts to the Australian version as a whole. From what I have seen and heard about it, I don't like it.  To me, the rules are too confusing. Here's a few things I found at a webpage about the show:

For the bonus round here is how the number of letters the contestant gets is determined:
The first two consonants and one vowel are given free. For every $2000 scored, another consonant is allowed. For contestants who win more than one show, the number of letters is calculated from the scores from ALL shows on which they appear, until they win a major prize. Then calculating starts from scratch again there.

That to me is too confusing. Why can't they just have something set in stone like Wheel here does?

Another thing I don't like is that unlike here,  each dollar amount is a flat amount. By that I mean if you spin $500, call a T and get 4, instead of getting $2000, you would only get $500. Also, each round isn't self contained. By that I mean, you do keep whatever earned in previous rounds, but your scores carryover to other rounds, and whatever is spun there, gets added to your total. Not to mention you play for points, which you use to get prizes.

And the way they determine a tie at least according to the page I am looking at, is by a spin off, who ever gets the highest spin wins. Though they have a toss up round, and a computerized board now, so that might have changed.

Another thing I don't like, is that for most of their bonus prizes put on the wheel(sans the surprise space), all you have to do to win them, is land on them, and get a letter in the puzzle. So overall, I don't like Aussie Wheel, rules are too confusing, and the scoring rules are terrible.

Here's a link to that page I referenced BTW:
http://members.ozemail.com.au/~cedar95/moreinformation.htm

You can also find video from the show in the multimedia section there.