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Author Topic: Citytv succumbing to Mind Control  (Read 4770 times)

Lirodon

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Citytv succumbing to Mind Control
« on: May 08, 2015, 02:43:10 PM »
City, or the Canadian network formerly known as Citytv, is going to be broadcasting a new game show called Mind Control on May 12, which appears to be based around "games" that you "control" with brain activity. The ads are promoting this as a "television event", which might as well be a synonym for "pilot" in this case. Former MuchMore personality Matt Wells is going to host.

There's not much information about this show beyond a press release, promo, and an on-stage photo of what is presumed to be a game in progress, unless I haven't digged hard enough.

clemon79

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Re: Citytv succumbing to Mind Control
« Reply #1 on: May 08, 2015, 02:49:19 PM »
City, or the Canadian network formerly known as Citytv, is going to be broadcasting a new game show called Mind Control on May 12, which appears to be based around "games" that you "control" with brain activity.

Been there:

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weaklink75

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Re: Citytv succumbing to Mind Control
« Reply #2 on: May 08, 2015, 05:03:00 PM »
The photo looks like it's a larger version of Mindflex:

http://www.cnet.com/news/moving-objects-with-mattels-brainwave-reading-mindflex/

Lirodon

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Re: Citytv succumbing to Mind Control
« Reply #3 on: May 12, 2015, 10:19:39 PM »
Okay, so I dared watch this. It was, well, odd. The mechanic of this show involves getting into what they call "the zone", with your mind! On-screen, it is designated by a "mind meter" (in some cases it was an actual set piece, but sometimes it was just a graphic instead). There were five teams of two; four of them had an obligatory "let's introduce ourselves" video, while the last were "selected" from the audience. The last-place team in each challenge was eliminated.

The first challenge, "Initiation", was somewhat of a relay. First half of the team has to get in the zone to turn on a blender. Then the other half has to turn on a set of incandescent bulbs doing the same thing, then both have to go to a screen and fill in bars in sync with eachother to advance. It's merely a tutorial level, and its very tedious to watch. Watching people turn on blenders with their minds and fill up progress bars is never going to be compelling television.

The second game was "Spin": now this one is actually pretty clever. There's a spinning platform, and one of the team members must retrieve pieces hanging above it: the platform's speed depends on how focused the partner is. The puzzle itself is a little tricky (basically the pieces have to be arranged in such a way that a certain number of two specific symbols are showing); maybe this was a rejected Canada's Smartest Person challenge? One team almost managed to lose a piece in the pit of soft cubes surrounding the platform.

The third game is called "Fear", and I don't know where to begin. The controller has to lower their partner towards a box with glowing orbs and snakes in it. Then they push a button to raise their partner back up, and then they have to throw the orbs into a net to score. Oh, and the controller's head is inside a box with a tarantula or hissing cockroaches.

The final game is "Sabotage"; admittedly, this one was actually pretty cool. The final three teams were placed different distances away from what I'm going to refer to as the "cyber fire pit": one half of the team had to get to this central fire pit thing by crossing a drawbridge controlled by their partner's focus, light their virtual torch (it basically looked like a giant glowstick), then get back to light one of their three torches with actual fire. Each team could "sabotage" another team once by pressing a button to blow out one of their flames. When a team got all three flames, the player could then go over to another station to unlock a metallic ball (which, of course, had to be done by maxing out a mind meter themselves). Once obtained, the player took their ball back, and then went back to the center to place their ball in the platform above the fire pit to win.

The overall production was about as cliche as you can get nowadays: tons of ADR lines from the host, "confession cam" cutaways and commercial break cliffhangers. There were some legitimately clever moments here and there, but how it was put together needs work. Matt Wells was not a bad host, but it just felt like he was just "there" and not really showing a personality aside from trying to shoehorn "mind control" into as many relevant sentences as possible.

Or in other words, 5.5/10, you probably won't like it.

TLEberle

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Re: Citytv succumbing to Mind Control
« Reply #4 on: May 12, 2015, 10:58:03 PM »
Watching people turn on blenders with their minds and fill up progress bars is never going to be compelling television.
And yet that's essentially the whole hour, isn't it?

What happened to Amazing Canadian Race?
If you didn’t create it, it isn’t your content.

nowhammies10

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Re: Citytv succumbing to Mind Control
« Reply #5 on: May 12, 2015, 11:09:13 PM »
Airs on CTV.  I think it's coming back this summer????

/still waiting for Survivor: Algonquin