Games That Got "Smarter" (Though The Contestants Did Not)

[TimK2003]

What shows in the past had started out slow, due to their newness but gradually played quicker because strategies and patterns had formed and players/celebrities found a rhythm.

To be more specific, heres two classic examples:

1) The $xx,000 PYRAMID.  In the $10,000 era, rarely did you see games get even close to a full 21-21 tie.  When the 25K Pyramid came back to CBS, the 21-21 ties were so commonplace that there were bonus incentives if games ended in 21-21.

2) WHEEL OF FORTUNE.  In the Woolery days, letter calling was more at random (i.e. calling for P's was nearly as frequent as S's).  The predictable N-L-R-S-T-E's near the start of each puzzle did not really surface until the Sajak era.

Any other good examples???

[Jimmy Owen]

Fleming's J! was originally intended to be a comedy game.  

Jackpot went from riddles to straight Q&A.

[Neumms]

On the original Password, they hit a groove with the lightning round after a while. Part of it was that there was a pattern to the words--the 5th became almost always an easy one you could get with an opposite.

It took Match Game '73 some time to figure out the pattern, first with funny fill-in-the-blanks, then with first round questions being wide open, second round with one definitive answer.

TPIR didn't start out with the "bid one dollar more than the person ahead of you" ploy. In fact, Cullen's version had rules for how close you could bid to another player.

[Clay Zambo]

[quote name=\'Jimmy Owen\' post=\'153670\' date=\'May 29 2007, 10:15 AM\']
Jackpot went from riddles to straight Q&A.
[/quote]

I'm not sure I'd say that was a smartening-up.  There's nothing dumb about the wordplay involved in solving a good riddle.

[beatlefreak84]

One I thought of was Blockbusters...on the early episodes, people weren't really paying attention to picking blocks that might actually help their opponents out should they block.  Later episodes show people staggering their picks to not allow their opponents to get that advantage.

I don't know if this counts or not, but how many people actually voted "Friend" in the second season of Friend or Foe?

A couple more from TPIR that I thought of:

1.  $1 bids
2.  The famous "ends in 0" rule in Ten Chances

Anthony

[TLEberle]

[quote name=\'TimK2003\' post=\'153666\' date=\'May 29 2007, 06:49 AM\']What shows in the past had started out slow, due to their newness but gradually played quicker because strategies and patterns had formed and players/celebrities found a rhythm.[/quote]

1) The $xx,000 PYRAMID.  In the $10,000 era, rarely did you see games get even close to a full 21-21 tie.  

Of all of the answers I've seen, this is probably the best example, but I'm not sure why. Did the players not know what all they could do, or not understand that the idea was to finish in under 30 seconds? My ignorance here is due more to not having been around to see the $10k and $20k versions, but obviously the kinks were ironed out by the 80s, so I just figured that it always moved at a good clip.

(And for that matter, why the groans and fearing of "The Dreaded Name Category"? "He's the guy who was Hawkeye on MASH!" "Uh...uh...uh...")


[quote name=\'Jimmy Owen\' post=\'153670\' date=\'May 29 2007, 07:15 AM\']Fleming's J! was originally intended to be a comedy game.  

Jackpot went from riddles to straight Q&A.
[/quote]I call shenanigans on both of these. Jeopardy! was only a comedy game during the run-throughs, and the lateral thinking aspect of riddles has been covered.

[quote name=\'Neumms\' post=\'153673\' date=\'May 29 2007, 07:44 AM\']TPIR didn't start out with the "bid one dollar more than the person ahead of you" ploy. In fact, Cullen's version had rules for how close you could bid to another player.[/quote]Which has been a "strategy" of auctions for years, if you think of "winning" an auction as not only getting the item, but paying the least amount possible. If you're willing to pay $1,000 for a painting, and the price is at $400, why bid $1,000?

[quote name=\'beatlefreak84\' post=\'153682\' date=\'May 29 2007, 09:19 AM\']I don't know if this counts or not, but how many people actually voted "Friend" in the second season of Friend or Foe?[/quote]Only players who were willing to happily leave with nothing, I assume.

[Joe Mello]

[quote name=\'TLEberle\' post=\'153688\' date=\'May 29 2007, 01:08 PM\']
[quote name=\'beatlefreak84\' post=\'153682\' date=\'May 29 2007, 09:19 AM\']I don't know if this counts or not, but how many people actually voted "Friend" in the second season of Friend or Foe?[/quote]Only players who were willing to happily leave with nothing, I assume.[/quote]
So nearly everybody unhappily left with nothing because nearly everyone voted Foe.

[TimK2003]

[quote name='Neumms' date='May 29 2007, 10:44 AM' post='153673']
On the original Password, they hit a groove with the lightning round after a while. Part of it was that there was a pattern to the words--the 5th became almost always an easy one you could get with an opposite.
/quote]


Password is another great example.  Not sure if voice inflections for opposites (up/down), pairs (pots/pans), orders (penny/nickel), etc... were part of the game from the get-go or if that slowly evolved (never saw enough of the old B&W Passwords) as the years went on.

I'll also throw in another example...The Joker's Wild.

Toward the end of the Barry run, if say a contestant had $450, their opponent had $300, and the contestant spun a triple worth $200.  More contestants toward the end of the run would either reduce the triple, or they could go off the board for a question worth $50 (if they had at least a joker).  That way they could win on the question while their opponent could not.

In the earlier days, most contestants would play the question for the maximum amount shown on the board.

[SRIV94]

[quote name=\'TimK2003\' post=\'153694\' date=\'May 29 2007, 12:39 PM\']
Toward the end of the Barry run, if say a contestant had $450, their opponent had $300, and the contestant spun a triple worth $200.  More contestants toward the end of the run would either reduce the triple or go off the board for a question worth $50.  That way they could win on the question while their opponent could not.
[/quote]
That wasn't an option if you got a natural triple, though, was it?

[clemon79]

[quote name=\'SRIV94\' post=\'153695\' date=\'May 29 2007, 10:42 AM\']
That wasn't an option if you got a natural triple, though, was it?
[/quote]
Pretty sure it was. Nothing said you had to use all three (or even two) of what you spun. If you called it for $50, you were just throwing away the other two windows, is all. I could be wrong, tho.

[dzinkin]

[quote name=\'clemon79\' post=\'153699\' date=\'May 29 2007, 01:53 PM\']
[quote name=\'SRIV94\' post=\'153695\' date=\'May 29 2007, 10:42 AM\']
That wasn't an option if you got a natural triple, though, was it?
[/quote]
Pretty sure it was. Nothing said you had to use all three (or even two) of what you spun. If you called it for $50, you were just throwing away the other two windows, is all. I could be wrong, tho.
[/quote]
Actually, no -- if you got a natural triple, it was $200, period.  Same as if you got a double; you had to take it for at least $100.  You could go for less only if one of the instances was a Joker.

[clemon79]

[quote name=\'dzinkin\' post=\'153704\' date=\'May 29 2007, 11:08 AM\']
Actually, no -- if you got a natural triple, it was $200, period.  Same as if you got a double; you had to take it for at least $100.  You could go for less only if one of the instances was a Joker.
[/quote]
Huh. Shows you what I remember. Fair enough. I guess the logic was that you had to take a question for the maximum displayed value, but if you wanted to make a Joker into Fast-Forward Podiatry in order to take Sports for $50, you could.

[Jimmy Owen]

With "Pyramid" during the '80s, it seemed you had to play at tournament level every week, so you started getting only a small pool of celebrities that could play at that level. Mary Cadorette and Charles Siebert every couple of weeks got monotonous for me as a viewer.

[Neumms]

[quote name=\'Jimmy Owen\' post=\'153709\' date=\'May 29 2007, 01:19 PM\']
With "Pyramid" during the '80s, it seemed you had to play at tournament level every week, so you started getting only a small pool of celebrities that could play at that level. Mary Cadorette and Charles Siebert every couple of weeks got monotonous for me as a viewer.
[/quote]

Well, at least Charles Siebert.

I don't know if this is smartening up or not, but it's funny to me how on Peter Marshall's Hollywood Squares, the first player almost never went to the center square (usually starting with Charley Weaver or George Gobel in the lower left), while on Bergeron's they almost always did.

[BrandonFG]

[quote name=\'Neumms\' post=\'153712\' date=\'May 29 2007, 02:46 PM\']
I don't know if this is smartening up or not, but it's funny to me how on Peter Marshall's Hollywood Squares, the first player almost never went to the center square (usually starting with Charley Weaver or George Gobel in the lower left)
[/quote]
That's actually a good strategy...by taking a corner, you can set up the possibility of two different ways to win.