'Second Chance'

[WarioBarker]

Or maybe he didn't want to be associated with such a crude urban legend. I'd think a punchline like that would be pretty difficult to forget, esp. when viewers constantly bring it up.

Quite possible, but he later offered $10,000 to anybody who could prove it happened.

Kinda like "She came on down and they came on out"...except THAT Bob was proud of that story.

Barker was even proud of his misunderstanding what was going on!

[Jeremy Nelson]

[quote name=\'Sodboy13\' post=\'237089\' date=\'Mar 7 2010, 02:21 PM\'][quote name=\'MikeK\' post=\'237075\' date=\'Mar 7 2010, 11:40 AM\'][quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' post=\'237074\' date=\'Mar 7 2010, 12:37 PM\']Do we know for sure that this Second Chance Larsen incident really happened?  Urban legend?[/quote]
At one of the homegrown GSCs, Jim Peck said someone pulled a Larson, winning over $70,000.
[/quote]

Can that really be attributed to pattern memorization, rather than a hell of a run of luck, though?  That Second Chance board moved so fast, I would think that someone would have to have incomparable reflexes, along with some pretty high-speed brain power, to pull it off.  The only way I could see that as feasible is if the board only had one pattern (Wiki, FWIW, says there were 9 at the outset), and even then, I think you'd need to have incredible trigger-finger reflexes to hit the big spaces with any consistency.
[/quote]
Yeah, the board moved waaay too fast for somebody to win off skill, rather than luck. If I remember correctly, there were 3 devils on the board, so with a 5/6 chance of hitting a good square, chances are pretty good of avoiding it.

[quote name=\'Dan88\' post=\'237111\' date=\'Mar 7 2010, 05:42 PM\'][quote name=\'fostergray82\' post=\'237109\' date=\'Mar 7 2010, 05:41 PM\']Or maybe he didn't want to be associated with such a crude urban legend. I'd think a punchline like that would be pretty difficult to forget, esp. when viewers constantly bring it up.[/quote]
Quite possible, but he later offered $10,000 to anybody who could prove it happened.
[/quote]
Link? You've stated a lot of facts in this thread, but you aren't backing anything up.

[Joe Mello]

[quote name=\'MikeK\' post=\'237075\' date=\'Mar 7 2010, 12:40 PM\'][quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' post=\'237074\' date=\'Mar 7 2010, 12:37 PM\']Do we know for sure that this Second Chance Larsen incident really happened?  Urban legend?[/quote]
At one of the homegrown GSCs, Jim Peck said someone pulled a Larson, winning over $70,000.[/quote]
With the qualifier that all I know of SC is via the Internet, I'm willing to consider this a small fish story.

Big win?  Sure.  $70k or pattern recognition? I dunno

[Bill Neuweiler]

[quote name=\'Dan88\' post=\'237078\' date=\'Mar 7 2010, 01:02 PM\'][quote name=\'MikeK\' post=\'237075\' date=\'Mar 7 2010, 12:40 PM\']At one of the homegrown GSCs, Jim Peck said someone pulled a Larson, winning over $70,000.[/quote]
...Wow. I knew it was high, but not that high (I thought it was about $25-30K). Wasn't the limit on ABC at the time about $20,000 or so? Looking at this, is it any wonder that ABC paid for more patterns on a stopgap series?

/If it's spoken by the emcee or producer (who are the most likely to remember something like that), it's likely true.
//If it's Chuck Barris, on the other hand...
[/quote]

This to me is very interesting.  Firstly, does anyone out there recall anymore information on this topic.  And secondly, are there other people out there, like myself, who have never before heard of this pre-Larson Larson?

[GrandGame1440]

[quote name=\'rollercoaster87\' post=\'237120\' date=\'Mar 7 2010, 09:50 PM\'][quote name=\'Dan88\' post=\'237111\' date=\'Mar 7 2010, 05:42 PM\']Quite possible, but he later offered $10,000 to anybody who could prove it happened.[/quote]
Link? You've stated a lot of facts in this thread, but you aren't backing anything up.
[/quote]

I know I'm not Dan, but here is what a quick search brought up.

http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/tv/newlywed.asp

[WhammyPower]

[quote name=\'Bill Neuweiler\' post=\'237124\' date=\'Mar 7 2010, 09:56 PM\']And secondly, are there other people out there, like myself, who have never before heard of this pre-Larson Larson?[/quote]
Yep; I'm one of them.

[WarioBarker]

Quite possible, but he later offered $10,000 to anybody who could prove it happened.

Link? You've stated a lot of facts in this thread, but you aren't backing anything up.

I know I'm not Dan, but here is what a quick search brought up.

http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/tv/newlywed.asp

Thank you. I remember hearing it from a trusted source -- I just forgot what it was.

[Craig Karlberg]

The only exposure I got of SC was a rather fuzzy one from the summer of 1977 I think it was.  Since WPVI in Philly was carrying the news at noon, I was flipping through the channels & found WABC-TV 7 out of New York.  The show was on at the time.  Even though the picture was a bit fuzzy, I was able to make out the images of the game.  The audio packages were simply amazing back then compared to what PYL had.  The board was super speedy which made following the patterns very difficult to meorize.

And if there was a $70K winner, without actual video evidence to back it up(videotape wasn't really widespread in the late 70's), we'll just have to leave it as a "claim" for now.

[Mr. Bill]

Press Your Luck only allowed a maximum of 20 spins total for each question round because only one player per question could score 3.  On Second Chance, each player had the possibility of scoring 3 spins per question, or a maximum of 27 per question round.  At least, on the pilot still existing, the board itself was static and the three Devils didn't jump around.  Two of them were bunched together top left and the third was bottom right corner.  Unfortunately, since I had to rely on good reception days to watch, I can't remember if the board did operate more like PYL toward the end.  Anyway, given the chance to amass a large number of spins to start with, plus the chance of getting even more passed to you, it was possible that somebody could have reached $20-25K.

I know there were some changes made during the run.  Aside from the previously mentioned square that could be anything between $1,000 and $5,000, bonus spins were introduced to the board (second round only I think).  The spin displays went to 15, with the last three on the bottom row right indicating bonus spins.  I know this because on the April 8 show (when I was in Georgia for my sister's wedding) one player already had 9 showing and was ambushed by another player who passed him 7 more, for a total of 16.  I remember Jim mentioning that they had to put the 16th spin in the bonus spin area and it couldn't flash with the others.  The contestant promptly managed to hit several Devils in quick succession and was gone taking 9 or 10 spins with him.

Other observations from re-watching the pilot -- the long version of the theme was used.  At the end you hear it start the keyboard solo.  Bumper music was from The Money Maze, sound effects came from the Double Dare/Card Sharks package.

[WarioBarker]

The spin displays went to 15, with the last three on the bottom row right indicating bonus spins.

I can provide proof of this -- a newspaper advert for the show's debut (on Game Show Utopia) has a picture of three contestants, presumably from the end of a show; the podiums have only 18 "spots" apiece.

[JasonA1]

[quote name=\'Dan88\' post=\'237177\' date=\'Mar 8 2010, 08:48 PM\'][quote name=\'Mr. Bill\' post=\'237173\' date=\'Mar 8 2010, 07:31 PM\']The spin displays went to 15, with the last three on the bottom row right indicating bonus spins.[/quote]
I can provide proof of this -- a newspaper advert for the show's debut (on Game Show Utopia) has a picture of three contestants, presumably from the end of a show; the podiums have only 18 "spots" apiece.
[/quote]

That shot's from the pilot. Another picture surfaced from the series that parallels what he's talking about.

-Jason

[WarioBarker]

[Picture from the series]

I knew there was another picture floating around somewhere, but I couldn't seem to find it. Thanks for the correction.

[JasonA1]

[quote name=\'Dan88\' post=\'237186\' date=\'Mar 8 2010, 09:55 PM\']//Why is it that every time I think I do something great, I'm wrong?! Q_Q[/quote]

Relax. You're trying so hard to redeem yourself, blitzing every subject here. Just slow down and contribute when you need to. Both pictures had "only" 18 spaces. The series picture had them in three rows of 6, and jived with everything Mr. Bill said.

-Jason

[Mr. Bill]

[quote name=\'JasonA1\' post=\'237184\' date=\'Mar 8 2010, 08:35 PM\'][quote name=\'Dan88\' post=\'237177\' date=\'Mar 8 2010, 08:48 PM\'][quote name=\'Mr. Bill\' post=\'237173\' date=\'Mar 8 2010, 07:31 PM\']The spin displays went to 15, with the last three on the bottom row right indicating bonus spins.[/quote]
I can provide proof of this -- a newspaper advert for the show's debut (on Game Show Utopia) has a picture of three contestants, presumably from the end of a show; the podiums have only 18 "spots" apiece.
[/quote]

That shot's from the pilot. Another picture surfaced from the series that parallels what he's talking about.

-Jason
[/quote]
Thanks for sharing the picture, Jason.  I've taken the liberty of downloading it to my library.

This shows some minor changes in the board layout from the pilot (the picture is from Round 2 but I would assume the position changes were also made for Round 1).  One Devil stayed in its original position at #3. the second moved from #10 to #8, and the third from #17 to #14.  While the Devil graphics remained the same, the prize slides were redone to a darker color with a bigger contrasting colored bow.  Also notice that the big money $5000 space at #4 is now also marked Free Spin, corroborating my earlier statement.  And, btw, the $2500 spot in #12 was moved to #17, with $1400 at #1.

Finally, it looks like this was taken after Round 2 ended judging from the positioning of Jim and the players in reference to the board.  And if that's right, here's one of your biggest winners, if not the biggest, with a total of $26,545!

Again, Jason, thanks for the picture -- and you can call me just Bill.  Somebody else had all the good user names, and I was a big Mr. Bill fan when he was on SNL.

[Sonic Whammy]

Every couple of years, this topic comes up, and I continue to live in a sense of regret and hope.

First, before I get to that, my knowledge of the mini-Larson run that I wrote on my site years ago (and I can only assume most everyone else got their info from) came from Randy when he was still with us. So for me, I only know as far as Mr. Amasia told me.

Now for the regret. I KNOW... there is a SC episode out there. I KNOW it exists. There's a girl in the Midwest who contacted me 9 years ago that says her dad was on the show, and still has a tape of his show. I have never been able to secure that tape for two reasons: 1) the first time, I was not able to round up what the girl wanted in exchange, and I lost contact, 2) I found the girl again on YouTube, and still have her name, but again, it's been a long time, and she lives far from her family now, so it's not immediately accessible.

It also doesn't help, of course, that the tape is likely beta. I know a former teacher I worked with that has all kinds of equipment to convert it, but I know that I would still have to get that master. NOT something I'm sure they'd be secure with if something goes wrong.

I wish I could offer more here. I'll try again soon. I hold no promises on success.

Update 5 minutes later: No sooner do I say it than it appears that the person in question no longer has their YouTube account. And naturally, I wasn't the only one asking to help convert. *sigh* Regret continues.