(Non-Celebrity) Hot Potato Episode Guide

[TLEberle]

.I remember watching one of the Celebrity episodes during one of those GSN marathons, and thought it dragged, esp. since you had to get to $2,000.

Just to tamp down an oft-repeated bit of logic about Bullseye's format - the values on the wheels doubled when they went to the $2,000 goal. So the game was as slow as it ever was, just richer

They also had to win two games out of three. Plus you have the potentiality of celebrities goofing around instead of playing the game, which is how you can have a game start at the top of the show and smack dab into game three as Charlie O'Donnell tells us about Paul Mitchell hair care products.

[Adam Nedeff]

I also wonder if Barry & Enright had tried this, say five years earlier, whether it would have lasted longer.  From what Richard Dawson said during his speech on the Feud was on its last legs, even then.  Perhaps people had tired of the team vs team format by this point.

I talked to Allen Koss while I was writing Quizmaster. To hear him tell it, B&E had specifically avoided doing a "Feud" knockoff when "Feud" was at its zenith because the feeling was that "Feud" was so white hot that any remote attempt at doing one would be rejected by the viewing audience immediately. "Oh, it's just like Family Feud, lame." But by late 1983, "Feud" was so established and the audience was so accustomed to it that the feeling was it was finally safe to do a ripoff of it.

[JasonA1]

They also had to win two games out of three.

Very true, I had forgotten about that. The comments about the doubling-to-$2,000 misnomer still stand for the civvy version though

My quick fix to Bullseye (short of just not doing the damn show...) was to re-spin if both players missed a question, so at least the fun visual thing that dominates the set design would be used more, and break up some of the monotony. Why make it take a backseat, especially to an almost-nothing game where player 1 banks, and player 2 plays catch-up until they win or lose?

-Jason

[TLEberle]

My quick fix to Bullseye (short of just not doing the damn show...) was to re-spin if both players missed a question, so at least the fun visual thing that dominates the set design would be used more, and break up some of the monotony. Why make it take a backseat, especially to an almost-nothing game where player 1 banks, and player 2 plays catch-up until they win or lose?

Since we're here, from what I've seen from Double Cross I think I'd prefer that on with the Bullseye motif (because of course you're right, you have the spiffy and beautiful prop that is used far too little) than Joker's Wild melded with the Bataan death march.

[BrandonFG]

Just to tamp down an oft-repeated bit of logic about Bullseye's format - the values on the wheels doubled when they went to the $2,000 goal. So the game was as slow as it ever was, just richer

Somehow, this did escape me, so thanks.

I talked to Allen Koss while I was writing Quizmaster. To hear him tell it, B&E had specifically avoided doing a "Feud" knockoff when "Feud" was at its zenith because the feeling was that "Feud" was so white hot that any remote attempt at doing one would be rejected by the viewing audience immediately. "Oh, it's just like Family Feud, lame." But by late 1983, "Feud" was so established and the audience was so accustomed to it that the feeling was it was finally safe to do a ripoff of it.

To me, what's really interesting about this is that Play the Percentages premiered when Feud was hot, and one of its bonus rounds seemed like a reverse Fast Money. The front game had some reverse Feud elements too, IMO, but wasn't as heavily derivative as Hot Potato.

[TLEberle]

To me, what's really interesting about this is that Play the Percentages premiered when Feud was hot, and one of its bonus rounds seemed like a reverse Fast Money. The front game had some reverse Feud elements too, IMO, but wasn't as heavily derivative as Hot Potato.

For what it's worth, I had always compared Play the Percentages to Card Sharks. Loved the original article, and even the second-iteration was OK but nothing to write home about. And you're right, the end game of "here's six answers, which five were given by the polling group?" absolutely felt like Slow Money.

[gamed121683]

While we have a great discussion going on here about B&E's attempt(s) to cash in on Feud, I want to get back to what beget this thread in the first place. There's was plenty of talk in this thread about the Beekeepers winning streak on Hot Potato. Curious to find more info on it, I Googled "Hot Potato + game show + beekeepers". While surfing the results, I stumbled upon someone's game show's tape trading site that had a list of all the episodes of HP this person taped. It looks like it's in chronologically because their list is more or less going in the same order as mine. So assuming there's no skipped episodes (they didn't seem to be), here are episodes 42-65 of the regular version:

42. 3/20/84 - Beekeepers vs. Service Reps.

43. 3/21/84 - Beekeepers vs. Nurses

44. 3/22/84 - Accountants @ Bonus Game

45. 3/23/84 - Accountants vs. Pro Surfers

46. 3/26/84 - Accountants vs. Car Saleswomen

47. 3/27/84 - Accountants vs. Construction Workers 

48. 3/28/84 - Accountants vs. Circus Performers

49. 3/29/84 - Circus Performers vs. Navy Fliers 

50. 3/30/84 -Navy Fliers vs. Mailroom Clerks 

51. 4/2/84 - Mailroom Clerks vs. Calendar Makers

52. 4/3/84 - Mailroom Clerks vs. Candlemakers

53. 4/4/84 - Mailroom Clerks vs. Process Servers

54. 4/5/84 - Mailroom Clerks vs. Caterers

55. 4/6/84 - Mailroom Clerks vs. Preachers

56. 4/9/84 - Preachers vs. Beer Tasters

57. 4/10/84 - Hypnotists @ Bonus Game

58. 4/11/84 - Hypnotists vs. Monks 

59. 4/12/84 - Monks vs. Probation Officers

60. 4/13/84 - Rescue Team vs. Interior Designers

61. 4/16/84 - Rescue Team vs. Locomotive Engineers

62. 4/17/84 - 411 Operators @ Bonus Game

63. 4/18/84 - 411 Operators vs. Bartenders

64. 4/19/84 - 411 Operators vs. Reporters

65. 4/20/84 - Reporters vs. Auctioneers

With this finding, it could mean that the dates near the bottom of my first post might be inaccurate :-/.

/In other news, that is my Levis 501 post, woohoo!

[TLEberle]

While we have a great discussion going on here about B&E's attempt(s) to cash in on Feud, I want to get back to what beget this thread in the first place.

Wunderbar. It's a discussion thread. We discuss things. If anyone else can fill in the blanks I'm sure they will.

As to Chris Palmer's question, the "three of a kind" angle satisfies the "through-line" that Jason A. brought up over in the Idiot Savants thread. Without the teams that are linked by hobby or occupation (note that Only Connect is S-M-R-T enough to have teams connected by what they do for fun or profit) it's still a fun game but not something that breaks through when you have "The show where couples can win a house," or "The game show based on Scrabble," or "The game show where you answer questions and buy prizes at a bargain."

[gamed121683]

...it's still a fun game but not something that breaks through when you have "The show where couples can win a house," or "The game show based on Scrabble," or "The game show where you answer questions and buy prizes at a bargain."

Well, that and the fact that it had the NOON time slot in most markets didn't do the show any favors, either.

[TimK2003]

//how in the hell do you not time the show properly enough to where you have to end DURING the bonus round? (Hi original Lingo!)

Speaking of bad timings: On the newly-posted YouTube Cross-Wits/Tic Tac Dough video on the Audio/Video thread earlier this week had not one but TWO oddly played "Beat The Dragon" rounds.  One TTD episode begins in the middle of the bonus game, and another bonus game breaks for a commercial in the middle of the bonus round.  For the life of me, I don't recall any of those two scenarios happening before on TTD -- especially since you should be able to mow one of those rounds down, with a prize package description, in under 4 minutes.

[aaron sica]

Well, that and the fact that it had the NOON time slot in most markets didn't do the show any favors, either.

That's debatable - the next game show to air on NBC in the noon slot (Super Password) lasted there for a little over 4 years.

[splinkynip]

About TTD and the split bonus game between shows or commercials... They did that only for a brief period during the 2 seasons Bullseye aired. Not sure why either, since you could get through the bonus game quickly.

[PYLdude]

Well, that and the fact that it had the NOON time slot in most markets didn't do the show any favors, either.

That's debatable - the next game show to air on NBC in the noon slot (Super Password) lasted there for a little over 4 years.

But how many shows found that kind of sustained success there in that day and age. Certainly an exception to the rule, like Feud and Pyramid were on ABC.

[calliaume]

Well, that and the fact that it had the NOON time slot in most markets didn't do the show any favors, either.

That's debatable - the next game show to air on NBC in the noon slot (Super Password) lasted there for a little over 4 years.

But how many shows found that kind of sustained success there in that day and age. Certainly an exception to the rule, like Feud and Pyramid were on ABC.

It's also possible, after six different programs in the slot in two and a half years since they'd cancelled Password Plus, NBC said, "Look, this show is a guaranteed passing grade, and we're not going to beat The Young and The Restless anyway, so let's counterprogram with something that we can be reasonably happy with going forward."  Much like they did with Three on a Match after five flops in two and a half years in the 1970s.

[aaron sica]

But how many shows found that kind of sustained success there in that day and age. Certainly an exception to the rule, like Feud and Pyramid were on ABC.

That's very true - CBS had not had the noon slot for around 4 years by that point*, and the longest-lasting ABC show at the noon time slot until it was discontinued (Ryan's Hope) lost viewers because of it. I was basically saying that SP was a much better game than Hot Potato was. It might have felt safe to try it, but I thought it was too much like Feud, and I would imagine there were others that did as well.

* Citing Nicholas and Greg's awesome website on that - 4pm was the official CBS timeslot, but stations like WCBS ran the 4pm offering at noon starting in, I want to say, 1982 or 1983.