Pricing Game One-Offs

[Nick]

The current showrunners have shown a willingness to try different things with pricing games on a single or occasional basis.  Some of them aren't inherently bad ideas (e.g., six-digit 3 Strikes, as long as there are no repeating digits).  Some, I would say, are (e.g., Any Number with a piggy bank worth more than the car on offer).

One I thought of years ago I'd like to see tried is Make Your Move with two two-digit prizes and a five-digit car.  You could come up with a setup that works, and considering two three-digit prizes have been used in the game's history, we know those coloured sliders can be swapped out.

What are some other one-off ideas you'd like to see tried for pricing games?

[SeaBreeze341]

I guess I'd say play Check Game and/or Money Game in reverse.


For the latter, you'd have to pick 4 numbers, none of which being the front or the back of the car.  If you did, the game is over and the player loses.  However, he or she keeps whatever was won prior to filling up the money side.  After filling up the money side, you have to choose one of the three remaining numbers that were part of the price of the car.  If you pick one, you'd win $5000 & a chance to walk away.  With two, it's $10,000, and if you picked all three, you'd win $15K (or 20K/25K) AND the car.

During the bailout segment, if you were wrong, you lose everything and the game ends.  BTW, the car has to be a luxury vehicle.

I know that's stealing or borrowing from Gas Money, but if the above actually happened someday, I wouldn't have an issue with it.

[C8]

Honestly I’d like to see 4 digit Lucky Seven for high end four digit prizes again. That was such a refreshing playing on Halloween and the game so much more fun to watch.

[SeaBreeze341]

Honestly I’d like to see 4 digit Lucky Seven for high end four digit prizes again. That was such a refreshing playing on Halloween and the game so much more fun to watch.

I would too, but only if the player got to eliminate one of the 4 numbers.  Not a big fan of difficult pricing games that don't offer cash or an automobile

[Alfonzo]

I had that exact same idea for Make Your Move! I even joked that they could make the change permanent and Make Your Move could be the quickest SP/Car game in the dhow's lineup! The producers would love it!

[tpirfan28]

Money Game for a boat.
(Little) Money Game for a four-digit prize.

[SeaBreeze341]

Speaking of the lowest outcomes producing the highest reward, imagine if the zero slots were replaced with an amount higher than the center slot.  Just for one chip though (the final chip).  As a temporary move, I wouldn't be opposed to that

[gamesurf]

Honestly I’d like to see 4 digit Lucky Seven for high end four digit prizes again. That was such a refreshing playing on Halloween and the game so much more fun to watch.

On that note, Card Game for a trip.

Card Game works soooo much better with four digit prices. Something is lost when each card draw feels like pouring a thimble in a well.

[Nick]

I had that exact same idea for Make Your Move! I even joked that they could make the change permanent and Make Your Move could be the quickest SP/Car game in the dhow's lineup! The producers would love it!

Makes you wonder why they haven't yet tried it.

Money Game for a boat.

Has already been done.

Card Game works soooo much better with four digit prices. Something is lost when each card draw feels like pouring a thimble in a well.

Agreed, but instead of downgrading the game (for I would think downgrading any car game to something less than a car just makes the show look cheap), maybe it's time to reconsider how the standard deck is used.

Forget the opening bid and make the standard deck the number on the card in thousands of dollars.  As every car is over $20k now, you'd have to make a few draws to start; and this makes things really no different than when the opening bid was zero or $2,000 and you'd be topping out around $6-$8k.  Plus, you restore the long lost risk where one more draw may put you over, a feat difficult to achieve under the current format in this day and age.

Now, admittedly, having twenty-four $10k cards between the tens and face cards is not going to work very well, as you run a high risk of a single draw putting the contestant very obviously over when still needing to draw to get close enough to the ARP.  The fix, as I see it, would simply be to play with less than a standard deck.  Perhaps you could use a deck of thirty-nine distributed as follows:

Four of the aces (still holdable and wild for any amount), duces, threes and fours;
Three of the fives, sixes and sevens;
Two of the eights, nines and tens.

Under this arrangement, the odds of drawing an ace are notably increased (up to 10.3% from 7.7%) but so are the odds of an extra draw putting you over as you exhaust the lower-value cards.  The ace (if you are so fortunate as to draw one) can then be used for its intended purpose of targeting close to a bid without drawing further and not as a card made an exaggerated value for the purposes of wrapping up the game quickly since all non-ace draws add such a miniscule amount.

A change to the special deck would be necessary as getting within $1,000 would be pretty nigh difficult when your smallest non-wildcard is $2,000.  How about three each of $3,000, $4,000, $5,000 and $6,000?

My math may be missing some pitfalls, so perhaps there's a better distribution to use; but I think it's a start in fixing Card Game.

[tpirfan28]

On that note, Card Game for a trip.

Card Game works soooo much better with four digit prices. Something is lost when each card draw feels like pouring a thimble in a well.

Reverting the game all the way back to its original rules and play it this way would be a very interesting trial.

[SeaBreeze341]

I wouldn't be a fan of that.  It would be interesting, but one of the things I disliked back when was a point where a contestant wasn't close enough to a winning range, but following their next draw, they were over the range

[PimpinJC]

Punch a Bunch, but once a slip is revealed, if the contestant has additional punched holes not revealed yet, have a 3rd option to “gamble.”  If the “gamble” option is selected, the next hole punched is revealed: if it matches the 1st slip in dollar amount, the initial slip is multiplied by 10, and the contestant is given the option whether to gamble again, keep the money, or give both back and move on to the next hole.  If it doesn’t match, the contestant earns nothing.  (If there are additional punches earned, the contestant automatically moves on to the next hole.  If they gambled and lost on their last hole punched, they lose the game.)

[mrbrown2195]

Side by Side or Freeze Frame for a car. Obviously for Freeze, you’d have to replace half the cards with three digits - as it rotates, you’d always have a five digit price is the frame.

Might be hard to create a not obvious setup, though.

[BillyGr]

Side by Side or Freeze Frame for a car. Obviously for Freeze, you’d have to replace half the cards with three digits - as it rotates, you’d always have a five digit price is the frame.

Might be hard to create a not obvious setup, though.

Unless the first number was just a given, then you were picking out the four (as usual) to complete the price.

[TPIRZippy]

Side by Side or Freeze Frame for a car. Obviously for Freeze, you’d have to replace half the cards with three digits - as it rotates, you’d always have a five digit price is the frame.

Might be hard to create a not obvious setup, though.

That could be doable; for example, if the eight cards going around were 21, 235, 19, 229, 20, 257, 18, and 247, then the eight possible prices would be $21235, $24721, $18247, $25718, $20257, $22920, $19229, and $23519.  That would actually be pretty hard with those numbers--like 5 Price Tags but with 8 possibilities and only one choice.  It could be eased up with some more obviously wrong ones or a greater spread.