To not include a rebus for a player to solve would be like having \"The Price is Right\" without the Showcase Showdown or the Showcases at the end of the show. The rebus was the essential part of this game. It was an awesome added play-along feature, in addition to playing along from home trying to make matches on the board. Watching 30 minutes of people doing nothing more than making matches would lead to a very quick demise. The rebus is absolutely essential.
Matching prizes only worked for the \"Classic\" format from 1987-91 for the bonus game. Still, I would liked to have seen it where rather than have 8 cars, have 1 car to play for, have 8 different money amounts on the board to match in 35 seconds. For each match made, it would reveal 2 parts of a 15 part rebus. To win the car, you would have to solve the bonus round rebus. Obviously, the more matches made in 35 seconds, the more of the puzzle that would be revealed. At the end of 35 seconds, if the player couldn\'t solve the rebus, if I produced the show, I would give them the option to forfeit any bonus cash accumulated during matches made in the bonus game in exchange for revealing one more piece of the 15 square puzzle, and that piece would be the square that hid the one unmatchable money card.
One variation on that bonus round that I dreamed up had the 25-part board, with dollar amounts ranging from $100 to $5000, plus a Wild Card. The contestant would have 60 seconds to make as many matches as possible; more matches meant more of the puzzle is shown. Revealing the Wild Card stops the clock; after the \"natural match\" is revealed, the clock restarts on the contestant\'s next pick. After time runs out, the contestant gets 15 seconds to guess what the puzzle says for a new car plus the total cash that was matched. Clearing the board in 60 seconds results in a guaranteed $25,000, but the contestant can still get to solve the puzzle for that new car.
