21

[Don Howard]

It's time for your input about a quiz show which was a part of the Brief Prime Time Game Show Renaissance Of 2000.
If it were up to you, what would the rules have been for Twenty One? A certain set dollar amount per win or would the payout have been determined by the difference in the point score? Keep or dump the bonus game? Would winnings have been risked to continue? Who's your host choice? Announcer? What should the $$$ payout have been in your judgment?

[BrandonFG]

Now that the big money game fad has passed, a decent revival can be done with a practical budget.

Winner gets $1,000 for every point between (s)he and opponent. Maybe even offer an incentive for getting 21. After all, in Blackjack, there's a bonus...so, maybe an escalating jackpot, a la Gambit, start at $2,000, increases by $500 every game. In the event of a tie game, each contestant will play their own individual question. Higher score wins, still $1,000 per point.

I liked the format of "Perfect 21," except make it $1,000/2,000/3,000/4,000/5,000/6,000 for a possible $21,000.

[Matt Ottinger]

[quote name=\'fostergray82\' date=\'Mar 15 2005, 01:18 PM\']I liked the format of "Perfect 21," except make it $1,000/2,000/3,000/4,000/5,000/6,000 for a possible $21,000.[/quote]
While I admire your budgetary restraint, this still doesn't address the biggest problem with the Perfect 21 bonus, which is that the risk doesn't equal the reward.  If you've got $15K in your pocket, risking it to win another $6K doesn't make much dramatic sense, to the player or to the viewer.

[clemon79]

[quote name=\'Matt Ottinger\' date=\'Mar 15 2005, 10:26 AM\'][quote name=\'fostergray82\' date=\'Mar 15 2005, 01:18 PM\']I liked the format of "Perfect 21," except make it $1,000/2,000/3,000/4,000/5,000/6,000 for a possible $21,000.[/quote]
While I admire your budgetary restraint, this still doesn't address the biggest problem with the Perfect 21 bonus, which is that the risk doesn't equal the reward.  If you've got $15K in your pocket, risking it to win another $6K doesn't make much dramatic sense, to the player or to the viewer.

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[/quote]
And did ANYBODY run the 21? (Sit down, Zach, I have you gagged, and you're irrelevant anyhow.)

A potentially more interesting situation might be to pay the players $1,000 per point (even though I still maintain that the "per point" concept is going to be foreign to a TV viewer in 2005), and then offer $1,000 per point to bolt from Perfect 21 after any right answer, with six right answers paying fifty grand. A player with ten or fifteen grand in their pocket might make the leap if the end of the rainbow is fifty large.

(And for 50K, feel free to change the format of the questions to something a little less dippy than true-false, too.)

[BrandonFG]

[quote name=\'Matt Ottinger\' date=\'Mar 15 2005, 12:26 PM\'][quote name=\'fostergray82\' date=\'Mar 15 2005, 01:18 PM\']I liked the format of "Perfect 21," except make it $1,000/2,000/3,000/4,000/5,000/6,000 for a possible $21,000.[/quote]
While I admire your budgetary restraint, this still doesn't address the biggest problem with the Perfect 21 bonus, which is that the risk doesn't equal the reward.  If you've got $15K in your pocket, risking it to win another $6K doesn't make much dramatic sense, to the player or to the viewer.

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[/quote]

It didn't even hit me until I read your response. Somehow I forgot that on the show, they would've risked $60,000 instead of an additional $6,000. :-)

Off the top of my head, I came up with a different system. Give the contestant a board of 21 spaces (3 rows of 7). Behind each space is a number (say between 3-5, and seven of each number). Give a correct answer, win the points, if wrong, the space is void. Get 21 points in less than, say, :45, win grand prize.

[Little Big Brother]

While I admire your budgetary restraint, this still doesn't address the biggest problem with the Perfect 21 bonus, which is that the risk doesn't equal the reward. If you've got $15K in your pocket, risking it to win another $6K doesn't make much dramatic sense, to the player or to the viewer.

I see your point completely and agree with it.  However, currently on Millionaire you risk 15K for another 9K on Question 10, and somehow that hasn't seemed to  factor into a player's strategy any differently than when they went for $32k.

[Ian Wallis]

Personally I'd have liked to have seen tougher questions.  For a show giving away that much money, the questions weren't really all that hard.  

For the bonus game, how about this:  each of the first five questions worth $2100.  Get them all right for $10,500.  The last question is worth double for a $21,000 payout.  To make more people go for it, maybe make the first five questions no risk.  The risk would be on the last question only, with anything earned in the first five being doubled with a right answer; the whole pot forfeited with a wrong answer.

[Matt Ottinger]

[quote name=\'Little Big Brother\' date=\'Mar 15 2005, 04:29 PM\']

While I admire your budgetary restraint, this still doesn't address the biggest problem with the Perfect 21 bonus, which is that the risk doesn't equal the reward. If you've got $15K in your pocket, risking it to win another $6K doesn't make much dramatic sense, to the player or to the viewer.

I see your point completely and agree with it.  However, currently on Millionaire you risk 15K for another 9K on Question 10, and somehow that hasn't seemed to factor into a player's strategy any differently than when they went for $32k.[/quote]
I see YOUR point completely and agree with it.  (Isn't it nice when we can all get along?)

I would say that the change to the syndicated game was made purely as a budgetary consideration, plus the lock-in 10th step has a value to it that transcends the monetary value.  In other words, the way Millionaire is set up, you might find that people are willing to take the risk from step 9 to step 10 even if they weren't offered ANY additional money, just the guarantee of the money you have and the continued possibility of a huge payoff.

[TonicBH]

I say that the Perfect 21 bonus seemed entirely out-of-place for that show. Get rid of it.

The rules should be $1,000-point per game and increase it $500 in case of tie games. Also, wrong answers = losing points. Don't give me any of this "strike" crap.

I know the 50's version was rigged, but it seems the best way to make a revival is go by the keep-it-simple-stupid rule. All these complications and unnecessary changes to the classic format just doesn't work.

[clemon79]

[quote name=\'fostergray82\' date=\'Mar 15 2005, 11:59 AM\']Off the top of my head, I came up with a different system. Give the contestant a board of 21 spaces (3 rows of 7). Behind each space is a number (say between 3-5, and seven of each number). Give a correct answer, win the points, if wrong, the space is void. Get 21 points in less than, say, :45, win grand prize.

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The problem is, a time-based endgame without a clear goal ends up confusing most people. "Oh, he won? Why?" (See Couch Potatoes or Your Number's Up to see what I mean.) Hit Man is an exception, because the folks at home can see the goal approaching, even if the player can't. "Oh, if he finishes this column, he'll win!" But generally timed endgames where the folks at home don't know if the player won until after it already happened don't work.

[RobertSearcy]

I would think of something along the lines of $2500 per point difference in the score......now, for the perfect 21 round........I'm not exactly sure what I'd do there.   lol  I do like the ideas that several people had for the bonus.

Maybe for the bonus......and yes, it's gonna be ugly-looking and sound like the worst bonus round in the history of game shows, so by reading this you hold me harmless for anything that happens to ya :-P j/k......start at $21 and add a 0 at the end for a correct answer......up to $210000 -- however, made the questions non-true/false (hell, don't make 'em multiple choice either -- BUT......do  make the difficulty increase with the value -- don't give a $1,000,000-type question for $210)

*runs from the riot that forms to chase me for such a bad bonus round idea for 21*

Now you see why I'm not in the biz of creating game shows. :-P

[BrandonFG]

[quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Mar 15 2005, 05:39 PM\'][quote name=\'fostergray82\' date=\'Mar 15 2005, 11:59 AM\']Off the top of my head, I came up with a different system. Give the contestant a board of 21 spaces (3 rows of 7). Behind each space is a number (say between 3-5, and seven of each number). Give a correct answer, win the points, if wrong, the space is void. Get 21 points in less than, say, :45, win grand prize.

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[/quote]
The problem is, a time-based endgame without a clear goal ends up confusing most people. "Oh, he won? Why?" (See Couch Potatoes or Your Number's Up to see what I mean.) Hit Man is an exception, because the folks at home can see the goal approaching, even if the player can't. "Oh, if he finishes this column, he'll win!" But generally timed endgames where the folks at home don't know if the player won until after it already happened don't work.

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[/quote]

I'm not sure if I explained it wrong, or if I'm just not following your point...what I guess I should've mentioned was that the point value would be stated before the question, but the values would still be randomly scattered.

If that still has the flaw you mentioned, then it's back to the drawing board. :-)

[clemon79]

[quote name=\'fostergray82\' date=\'Mar 15 2005, 03:54 PM\']I'm not sure if I explained it wrong, or if I'm just not following your point...what I guess I should've mentioned was that the point value would be stated before the question, but the values would still be randomly scattered.

If that still has the flaw you mentioned, then it's back to the drawing board. :-)

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It's a little better, but it still has that problem of "the host can't build up a win because he's working against the clock". Now you have the Couch Potatoes issue of "whoa, they can with with this puzzle they're working on RIGHT NOW."

[wschmrdr]

I agree with Tonic, and that they should play the plus-minus points. Though, to keep from having two dummies, if your score drops below 0 you get a warning light, and then if you drop below 0 again, you're done and lose.

I agree with the idea of a blackjack bonus. (10 pointer plus 11 pointer gets you a jackpot.)

I don't think 21 really needs a bonus round. I'd stick with the main game only.

[whampyl03]

Does 21 really need a bonus round?  Not just a "Perfect-21-esque" bonus game, but ANY bonus game at all? Frankly, I've always thought 21 was one of those formats that could do just fine without some sort of a bonus round gimmick. Could very well just be me, though.

I say bring back the rules for the 1952-1954 rigged version (without the rigging), and bump the $/per point ratio up a bit.  Maybe $1000/pt. for the first game, and add $1500/pt. for every tiebreaking round played. Give the champ a car after every 10th successful championship defense for the heck of it as well.