eBay Find: "Lost TV Game Show"

[Clay Zambo]

Would it be a better game with only six celebrities?  Were they hesitant to do that because it would resemble Match Game even more?

Probably; but also perhaps because 3 clue-givers per team increases the likelihood of matching answers cancelling each other out, leaving the player with very little help. (I might be wrong about that, probability-wise, but I don't think so.)

[BrandonFG]

I agree that it would make a fun board game or even an app, but on TV, as spread out as it was, it got to be like watching paint dry. Having players blindly call out "Up", "Down", "Left", "Right" gets old pretty quickly although the entire round of each player getting blocked in was good for a chuckle.

I did like the concept of being able to eliminate a player out of the round. If they could somehow see the board, it presents an interesting strategy, but otherwise it's just blind luck IMO.

The gameboard technology was pretty sweet.

[BrandonFG]

My Oddball observations, without spoiling anything.

The game was fun, but play-along ability is reduced with Jamie saying the keyword throughout the round. I'd switch it so that he says "Write down a clue that best fits this word..." That way, the viewer can look away from the screen as the clues are revealed.

As Mike mentioned, the scoring is very flawed. Being able to win off the final round alone never sits right with me.

I'd change the bonus round to where you get to choose up to four or five clues (in spite of the strange ones given). The catch: if there's a duplicate, you have to make your guess right then and there. Not a fan of the "lose everything" consequence, when the clues are supposed to help you out, and you could possibly lose without even possibly making a guess. There's blind luck (Beat the Devil/Dragon/Lightning), then there's this.

Is it just me, or did the theme sound like the $otC win cue when someone would win the Instant Cash?

[Matt Ottinger]

The gameboard technology was pretty sweet.

Mike and I assumed magnets while we were watching.  He also noticed that there appeared to be a completely different set of A-D markers that lit up, depending on who had control of the treasure.  When there was a win or a steal, there would always be a cutaway to something other than the board while they traded out the normal marker for the lit one.

/The Joker's Wild reboot will probably have a lot of "lit ones".

[Kevin Prather]

Mike and I assumed magnets while we were watching.  He also noticed that there appeared to be a completely different set of A-D markers that lit up, depending on who had control of the treasure.  When there was a win or a steal, there would always be a cutaway to something other than the board while they traded out the normal marker for the lit one.

That makes more sense than what I thought. I imagined a donut shaped light-up marker that attached to the ABCD pucks.

[DoorNumberFour]

On Buzzerblog this week, I was lucky enough to interview Randy Economy, the winning contestant on the Oddball pilot (and lots more). Check it out!

http://www.buzzerblog.com/2017/08/31/tbt-randy-economy/

[Matt Ottinger]

On Buzzerblog this week, I was lucky enough to interview Randy Economy, the winning contestant on the Oddball pilot (and lots more).

This is so cool.  What motivated me to send you guys Oddball in the first place was the fact that we had gotten SO excited about the unknown pilot and it turned out to be pretty dry.  I knew the 70s and (especially) 80s are a real sweet spot to this crowd, so I thought this flawed but much more lively exercise would be a nice bonus.

For the record, lest some secretive collector feels I violated a sacred trust or something, I happen to own an original 3/4" U-matic tape of Oddball and did the transfer myself.  So if you already had a copy of it (as I'm sure a few of you did), there's a pretty good chance you got it from me, even if you didn't realize it.

[Allstar87]

Just got around to watching them both. Even though both pilots were pretty flawed, they were still incredibly fascinating. Thank you so much for sharing them, and glad I could play a part in the MYM transfer!

[The Ol' Guy]

Appreciate your thinking on that, Matt. There was just nothing there with Make Your Move, and ever since reading about Oddball in a book about Rich Dawson and Family Feud, I'd been curious about it. The game itself isn't all that bad. I have two or three board/party game projects that use the same "avoid matching" mechanics. But the action is faster, because you don't have a host trying to milk humor out of comments for the home and studio audience, plus no loss of momentum because of commercial breaks. The game idea is solid. Adding Oddball made the whole DVD package much more enjoyable. Thanks again.