Your biggest TPIR "what-ifs"

[whowouldeverhurtawhammy]

I think this would been illegal, or at the very least run afoul of the S&P rules - even if the "rigging" was in the contestant's favor.

And in today's environment, with HD and DVR capabilities, it wouldn't have taken a second for some sharp eyed viewer to spot it and post it all over the internet.  Pretending someone won a game that was rigged for them to win, and using that for publicity would be almost as bad as getting caught rigging a game for a player to lose.

Assuming that would be the scenario, aside from repeated $50k wins every time being the dead giveaway of potential wrongdoing, would someone at home be able to see the wires within the board to know if the game was rigged or not?

[thatvhstapeguy]

While HD is good, there are limits to how fine the details can be. While you might not be able to see any wires themselves, the physics of the chips would most certainly give it away with some careful analysis of the footage.

[gamesurf]

IIRC the promo they used it for didn't show the "chip" being dropped, just landing in the 10K slot. They had no need to make it look realistic.

EDIT: Yep. Also makes me wonder if they weighted the bottom of the box to ensure it always landed in the correct orientation.

[JayC]

I think this would been illegal, or at the very least run afoul of the S&P rules - even if the "rigging" was in the contestant's favor.

And in today's environment, with HD and DVR capabilities, it wouldn't have taken a second for some sharp eyed viewer to spot it and post it all over the internet.  Pretending someone won a game that was rigged for them to win, and using that for publicity would be almost as bad as getting caught rigging a game for a player to lose.

Yes, that's why I said it would be a PR nightmare. Even having to give the contestant $30,000 because of the error looked bad itself.

[ClockGameJohn]

What if Clock Game John had played Poker Game? Would "Poker Game John" have become a game show legend?

I would like to hope so!

[tpir04]

How about this: what if Superball had remained off the chopping block?

Let me rephrase my previous question:

What if Superball had remained in circulation, and instead Plinko was axed?

[COINBOYNYC]

There was an incident in season 37 where a contestant playing Plinko was given $30,000 because they didn't remove wire that set up the chip to hit the $10,000 after filming a promo for a video game-- what if this had not been noticed and the contestant won $50,000 as a result? Would they have given the contestant $50,000 and then reshot the game to be played honestly like they did, or would they have kept in the tainted $50,000 win just to say someone won Plinko and get publicity out of it? They didn't use the perfect showcase bid for publicity because they assumed there was cheating involved and finding out the circumstances behind the Plinko win certainly would've been a PR nightmare.

If something like that had happened during the Barker era, I think they would have let the contestant keep the money, and the producers would have had Bob explain what happened - full, transparent honesty.  Depending on when the error was noticed, the explanation would have been either at the end as part of the show itself, or taped later and tagged on to the end - but this would have been too big to relegate to a voice-over announcement like they do if a contestant was later found to be ineligible.  The only adverse impact on gameplay would have been the contestant's slot during the Showcase Showdown, since as we all know the amount you win determines whether you spin first, second or third.

[LarryC]

If the Tom Kennedy nighttime version of TPiR had been renewed for the 1986/87 season -- who would have directed it?  Marc Breslow was fired in 1986, after directing season one.  Just a guess, but I'm thinking he would have directed season two also (since Barker wanted him off the daytime show, and may not have controlled the nighttime one).