what game show had the best end game?

[xavier45]

[quote name=\'WhammyPower\' post=\'170472\' date=\'Nov 25 2007, 01:39 PM\']
I'm splitting mine up into categories, since I don't feel that there is one "great" bonus.

Best "play-along" factor: Now You See It
[/quote]
I disagree with this. To me, the best "Play Along" end game would be Feud's "Fast Money". NYSI has a good end game, but you don't have a pen to circle the answers with at home.

[Robert Hutchinson]

[quote name=\'xavier45\' post=\'170480\' date=\'Nov 25 2007, 06:28 PM\']I disagree with this. To me, the best "Play Along" end game would be Feud's "Fast Money". NYSI has a good end game, but you don't have a pen to circle the answers with at home.[/quote]
. . . really? I think you can trust yourself enough to know whether or not you were able to find the answers on the screen. Whereas with Fast Money, you often have no idea how well you would have done if you give several answers that aren't offered by the contestants.

[Neumms]

[quote name=\'tpirfan28\' post=\'170476\' date=\'Nov 25 2007, 02:44 PM\']
[quote name=\'deknaj\' post=\'170292\' date=\'Nov 23 2007, 01:06 AM\']
High Rollers Big Numbers
[/quote]
I personally disagree with this...way too much blind-assed luck involved.  You could say the same with Joker's Wild's endgame...but you had the opportunity to bail.
[/quote]

At least on High Rollers, the contestant did something that would impact play. And wins were more eventful because they were for higher stakes than a mattress set and happened less often.

[dale_grass]

I remember at a very young age getting into the Winner's Circle on Pyramid.  In fact, I dare say I learned a lot about the English language thanks to Dick Clark.

Alphabetics?  Never met any.  However, I hear Wilford Brimley just wrapped four commercials for alphabeetis medication.

Fast Money is second, mainly for it's playalongability.

[saussage]

Pitfall's end game is tops for me. Pyramid though would be the most gut-wrenching at times.

Worst end game: Tough call. All I can say is I don't want to be on Card Sharks if the deck has a pile of middle cards to choose from.... makes for a very frustrating contestant. It's definitely the most difficult to achieve perfection (max $$).

End game that I'd suck the most: Jeopardy (Trebek). I was always bad at Jeopardy. Gimme the Classic Concentration endgame anyday.

[Footix]

Let's see here:
-Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego, even though nobody ever won it.
-Winner's Circle
-Super Match
-Alphabetics
-Money Cards

and, I really like the Crosswords end game, even though I seem to be the only one here watching the show.

[Chuck Sutton]

[quote name=\'Footix\' post=\'170627\' date=\'Nov 27 2007, 02:37 PM\']
Let's see here:
-Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego, even though nobody ever won it.
[/quote]


I do remember a couple times when the game was the United States and the flags to place were the state flags the kids won.

It seemed there the kids had memorized the state flags and were not really waiting for the name of the location to be read.

[SamJ93]

[quote name=\'Chuck Sutton\' post=\'170630\' date=\'Nov 27 2007, 02:57 PM\']
[quote name=\'Footix\' post=\'170627\' date=\'Nov 27 2007, 02:37 PM\']
Let's see here:
-Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego, even though nobody ever won it.
[/quote]


I do remember a couple times when the game was the United States and the flags to place were the state flags the kids won.

It seemed there the kids had memorized the state flags and were not really waiting for the name of the location to be read.
[/quote]

And therein lay the major problem with the endgame--it varied too much in difficulty.  Kids who were lucky enough to get the US map almost always won it in a walk.  I think they changed this to include all of North America later on in the run, but it didn't help much.  Meanwhile, woe unto the ones who got the Africa map and had to discern where Mauritania or Lesotho were.

As far as my favorite endgames, Scrabble Sprint is up there for me, as is the first Ceasar's Challenge format.

--Sam

[parliboy]

[quote name=\'SamJ93\' post=\'170632\' date=\'Nov 27 2007, 02:29 PM\'] [quote name=\'Chuck Sutton\' post=\'170630\' date=\'Nov 27 2007, 02:57 PM\']
I do remember a couple times when the game was the United States and the flags to place were the state flags the kids won.

It seemed there the kids had memorized the state flags and were not really waiting for the name of the location to be read.
[/quote]

And therein lay the major problem with the endgame--it varied too much in difficulty.  Kids who were lucky enough to get the US map almost always won it in a walk.  I think they changed this to include all of North America later on in the run, but it didn't help much.  Meanwhile, woe unto the ones who got the Africa map and had to discern where Mauritania or Lesotho were.

As far as my favorite endgames, Scrabble Sprint is up there for me, as is the first Ceasar's Challenge format.

--Sam
 [/quote]

Many endgames can vary in difficulty as much as the production wants it to.  It was just that Carmen's was more blatant and up-front in its difficulty than most.  About the only other show where you can say "sucks to be you", before the bonus begins is Wheel of Fortune.  (For $25,000 -- one word, four letters, ends with an N)

Scrabble Sprint controlled its budget by using harder clues and words with more common letters.  Early on, Challenge didn't have the luxury of that control, save by changing the letter mix, and thus the need to the second bonus format.  And if want to tighen the coinpurse on, say, Family Feud, just make sure the number one answers score 20-25 instead of 40-50.

For all the harping about Carmen, I think that some people (including certain Wikipedia editors) are letting their memories be clouded by what's on Youtube.  The thing is, some of what's there is taken from early episodes, possibly even pilots.   Those early shows, they were still tweaking the format slightly, both in the front and the end.  You saw some weird stuff there, like the state flag thing (which only worked for the reason Chuck stated), and the clue reading.  You even saw one round where the bonus was 60 seconds instead of 45.  But this was a small portion of the shows in the very first season.  After that, the format was locked in for the rest of the run, save for adding the chase and making the end game slightly harder starting in the second season.

[uncamark]

To answer the question, there was no end game on ABC "Break the Bank."  If you won by regular means, you got a "surprise prize" with your $300/600/900 and went on to another game.  If you broke the bank, that's what you got.

The show didn't need an end game since you already had a good-sized for the time progressive jackpot in the front game.  It seems to me like Barry and Enright didn't want the nighttime show to just end (since there wasn't a cash total to award a car too like on "Squares"), so they added the end game to bring closure.

And to me, I now have memories of Lonnie Schorr whining because they didn't go to him because of a little matter of the player finding the third money bag, breaking the bank and winning the game.  If I were Kennedy, I would've spent the commercial break walking over to Schorr's slot and tearing him one.

[Ian Wallis]

And to me, I now have memories of Lonnie Schorr whining because they didn't go to him because of a little matter of the player finding the third money bag, breaking the bank and winning the game. If I were Kennedy, I would've spent the commercial break walking over to Schorr's slot and tearing him one.

That happened a few times on the episodes GSN ran a decade ago (...has it really been that long...)

GSN ran the first six weeks, and if you followed the show closely, you'll notice there were some celebrities rows that had no question cards in them (i.e. and money amount or the wild card).  So those celebrities couldn't get asked a question on that game no matter what.  On later episodes (the ones GSN was just going to get to before it disappeared forever), they spread out the board a bit better so that pretty well every game had money amounts or wild cards attached to each celebrity.

/Bitter...not me!  

[Neumms]

Lonnie Schorr! Little did he know that if he'd been called on that one day on "Break the Bank" and didn't complain, his obscurity would be utterly complete.