GSN 2016 upfront news:

[weaklink75]

http://corp.gsn.com/press/releases/gsn-heads-its-2016-upfront-with-new-ambitious-programming-slate-new-series-include-sk

Basic points:

-Skin Wars and Idiotest start their new seasons in April

-Hellevator has been picked up for 4 eps that will air in October

-WinSanity will air later in the year, as will Window Warriors (competition based show based on department store window displays)

-two pilots have been announced: Breaking App (app developer competition) and The Investigation (teams of amateur detectives try to solve a crime)

-three shows are in development- Divided (this aired in the UK and other countries- a team of three strangers have to agree on answers to questions, and if they do well, have to decide how three unequal pieces of their winnings will go to who- the longer they take, the less they win); Run and Buzz (Q&A show where you have to run to the buzzer to answer the question); and Glass Wars (about the art of glassblowing).

-no word on US Chase, so I suspect it's officially canceled

[TLEberle]

Yay to Idiotest getting renewed. boo for the wording "competition based show."

VERY boo to Divided. Run&Buzz will probably look very similar to The Whole 19 yards.

Glass Wars sounds like a treat if you tried to get tickets to the Dale Chihuly museum but just couldn't make it. Happily $25,000 Pyramid has started over in 1985, so that's nice.

[Chief-O]

Run&Buzz will probably look very similar to The Whole 19 yards.

Or the original "Name That Tune", with the famous bell.

Glass Wars sounds like a treat if you tried to get tickets to the Dale Chihuly museum but just couldn't make it.

1) I'm sure most of the folks here have had to put up with my mentions of art glass on my Facebook timeline, so this one will definitely grab my attention. I'll be giving it a chance should it be green-lighted......but it may not take much for me to tune out.

2) I'm a little bummed in not being first on this forum to name-drop Chihuly.

[clemon79]

2) I'm a little bummed in not being first on this forum to name-drop Chihuly.

I could swear I mentioned him at least once in the last decade. Probably within five words of the word "asshole."

[TimK2003]

Heaven forbid all these planned game shows cut down the number of Harvey Feud airings!!!

/"We've got a good one for you today".
// How do you know, Steve?  You haven't played the damn game yet!

[TLEberle]

Thanks for that, Tim. That was informative and added to the conversation. Yeesh.

[Thunder]

Personally, I enjoyed "Divided" up until the horrible endgame to split the money.

[TLEberle]

Personally, I enjoyed "Divided" up until the horrible endgame to split the money.

Vigorous co-sign. I loved the different kinds of questions, (they had a lot of interesting questions for what amounted to multiple choice) and the £75,000 question that had some undisclosed number of right answers, plus the money drain and requiring unanimity to bug out.

What I'd change, and I realize that you would now need a new title is to give each winner a keypad and allow them to withdraw however much money they felt they had earned during the game, and the player who asked for the least gets to grab from the till first which might mean that the greediest person is left with twenty bucks.

[weaklink75]

Personally, I enjoyed "Divided" up until the horrible endgame to split the money.

Yeah- the UK version had some real uncomfortable moments (IIRC, one team had almost £100,000 in their bank and because one person- who had actually helped the least in the game- refused to even consider taking the low share they lost it all)

[Vigorous co-sign. I loved the different kinds of questions, (they had a lot of interesting questions for what amounted to multiple choice) and the £75,000 question that had some undisclosed number of right answers, plus the money drain and requiring unanimity to bug out.

What I'd change, and I realize that you would now need a new title is to give each winner a keypad and allow them to withdraw however much money they felt they had earned during the game, and the player who asked for the least gets to grab from the till first which might mean that the greediest person is left with twenty bucks.

I'd go with something like that- have them punch in what they think their fair share is; but then they total the amounts the three asked for- if it's less than or equal to the total banked, everything's fine (each get what they asked for, the remainder is split evenly)- but if it's higher than the total banked, they lose it all. They get to talk to each other before they punch in their amounts, which could cause some interesting things (they could all agree to put in $1 so they can split the rest evenly, then when the actual amounts are revealed, one person puts in a bid of almost all the bank, while the other two get a few bucks each).

[TLEberle]

I'd go with something like that- have them punch in what they think their fair share is; but then they total the amounts the three asked for- if it's less than or equal to the total banked, everything's fine (each get what they asked for, the remainder is split evenly)- but if it's higher than the total banked, they lose it all. They get to talk to each other before they punch in their amounts, which could cause some interesting things (they could all agree to put in $1 so they can split the rest evenly, then when the actual amounts are revealed, one person puts in a bid of almost all the bank, while the other two get a few bucks each).

Thing one, I find the phrase "fair share" loathsome.

Thing two: no. Just no. The point of changing the paradigm is to reward people who are happy to be team players and punish rank greed over teamwork. Your way is just a different way to do the awful thing that Divided did (and frankly, letting the team talk to each other before the final decision is just silly) so why change it at all if you're just going to keep the same headbutting dynamic?

[rebelwrest]

My idea for a different endgame for "Divided" is you keep the undivided shares, but each player now selects in secret which share they want.  If a player is the only one that goes for that particular share, they take that money home.  If two or all three players goes for the same share, then the remaining players must play one more question.  That share dwindles down until they decide on an answer.  If they are right, they split whatever remains of the share.  If they are wrong, the remaining players leave with nothing. 

[TLEberle]

Run&Buzz will probably look very similar to The Whole 19 yards.

Or the original "Name That Tune", with the famous bell.

Since it's 2016 and not 1950-whatever, I would happily bet a Steak Point that it is closer to what I mentioned as opposed to Exercise Jeopardy.

My idea for a different endgame for "Divided" is you keep the undivided shares, but each player now selects in secret which share they want.  If a player is the only one that goes for that particular share, they take that money home.  If two or all three players goes for the same share, then the remaining players must play one more question.  That share dwindles down until they decide on an answer.  If they are right, they split whatever remains of the share.  If they are wrong, the remaining players leave with nothing. 

why reward their gluttony? Back when I was a youngster if my sister and I were not able to agree on how to share a thing, we got None Of That Thing, not the chance to come to terms on how to divide 72% of that thing. In your case there's no reason to choose the B share--either you choose the C share if you're risk averse or the A share if you believe that you can answer the final question correctly in a small amount of time.

[Kniwt]

One of the more, um, "entertaining" endgames from Divided. Feel free to pronounce "entertaining" however you wish.

[TLEberle]

I don't recall how long it took for me to realize that the divisions in the Divided logo mirror that of the decision that the players must make, but I thought it was clever.

When there's three alpha-personalities going for the large share I don't mind seeing them get nothing out of greed (though I am very tired of "I came with nothing so I'll leave with nothing," it absolutely needs to die in a fire.); I don't like it when someone who would willingly take a smaller share doesn't win any money because the two other players couldn't agree.

[JonSea31]

I did learn on GameShowNetworkNews that the median age is now 50 as opposed to 65 a few years back, and is skewing younger demographics.

If anything happens to pre-1990s material, the least that might happen is the demise of Match Game on GSN.  No wonder it airs at 5:00 a.m. in the Pacific, when a lot of people are probably still in bed.  There is speculation from someone on said blog that the lease to air The $25,000 Pyramid might expire later in May.  Should be very interesting to find out what's in store for the surviving classics fans in the coming weeks or months.

The only programs I can see replacing pre-1990s material someday are Woolery's Lingo, Whammy! and Deal or No Deal.  We might get Louie's Feud, but that is just speculation.