Author Topic: Which Games Could Be Improved?  (Read 13506 times)

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Offline Roadgeek Adam

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Re: Which Games Could Be Improved?
« Reply #30 on: January 15, 2019, 12:57:28 AM »
Stack the Deck is one of the best games. If they insist on setting it up this way, they need to start investing in better cars.

$25,000 or more cars in Stack with those setups makes more sense than those setups for $18-19-20K pieces of garbage.
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Offline gamesurf

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Re: Which Games Could Be Improved?
« Reply #31 on: January 15, 2019, 12:01:57 PM »
Serious question:  Has there ever been a playing of Rat Race where bidding $200 wouldn't have won the third rat?

The premiere had a $400 Blu-Ray player. Seems like they stopped using $301+ items after the first two or three months.
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Offline SonicWhammy

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Re: Which Games Could Be Improved?
« Reply #32 on: January 21, 2019, 12:19:19 PM »
My idea for Secret "X" would have the contestant keeping the free "X", but using three small prizes. The Secret "X" would be behind any of the five middle squares. Getting all three small prizes would be an auto-win, but even getting two out of three makes better odds than the current version.
I've always wanted them to update Secret X, too, and digitally enhance it like Double Cross & Bonus Game so that the winning X pops up on the LED screens or whatever. But, actually, with 3 out of the 4 corners covers in Secret X, the odds go DOWN on winning if there's only 1 X in the other 5 spaces. It's only 60% to win versus the 66.7% it is now. (Trust the math teacher on this.)

I'd actually argue to instead install TWO X's into the 5 hidden squares, and no third item.
> With 2 out of 4 corners covered, you'd have a 40% chance to win (up from 33.3%), as 4 out of the 10 combinations of X locations would have one of them land in your winning square.
> With 3 out of 4 corners covered, you'd have a 90% chance to win. The only way you can lose is for both Secret X's to be in the two bad squares. (Ex: Your X's are in squares 1, 3 and 7, and the Secret X's are in 6 and 8.)
> And heck, if you want, install a cash bonus ($2500, $5000?) if both of the Secret X's make a tic-tac-toe.

Offline Alfonzo

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Re: Which Games Could Be Improved?
« Reply #33 on: January 21, 2019, 08:05:17 PM »
I've always wanted them to update Secret X, too, and digitally enhance it like Double Cross & Bonus Game so that the winning X pops up on the LED screens or whatever. But, actually, with 3 out of the 4 corners covers in Secret X, the odds go DOWN on winning if there's only 1 X in the other 5 spaces. It's only 60% to win versus the 66.7% it is now. (Trust the math teacher on this.)

I'd actually argue to instead install TWO X's into the 5 hidden squares, and no third item.
> With 2 out of 4 corners covered, you'd have a 40% chance to win (up from 33.3%), as 4 out of the 10 combinations of X locations would have one of them land in your winning square.
> With 3 out of 4 corners covered, you'd have a 90% chance to win. The only way you can lose is for both Secret X's to be in the two bad squares. (Ex: Your X's are in squares 1, 3 and 7, and the Secret X's are in 6 and 8.)
> And heck, if you want, install a cash bonus ($2500, $5000?) if both of the Secret X's make a tic-tac-toe.

Yes, the odds do go down (I was waiting for someone to catch that after I posted it), but it still allows for perfect pricing to cover for it. At least in my scenario two 'X's gets you three chances to win.

I'm not so sure about adding another "X", though. That seems a little...much.
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Offline SonicWhammy

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Re: Which Games Could Be Improved?
« Reply #34 on: January 22, 2019, 12:31:20 AM »
It's six of one, I guess, Alfonzo. The main reason I proposed it that way is because of the odds going down with only 1 X, which therefore makes the game harder to win, and that would rub fans the wrong way. Likewise, I can understand how raising the odds in the contestant's favor as my idea does would make production wary because it increases the chances of eating into the prize budget, as much as you like to see people win. It would still, however, hold to the core of the game's history that you can do everything right but still have a chance to lose, as it does come down to being a game of chance as the "Secret" has always allowed it to be.

The bottom line: Short of actually retiring the game, if you're gonna keep a game in the rotation that has this always had this one glaring flaw to it, what's the ultimate answer to fixing it?

Offline PhillyFlash

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Re: Which Games Could Be Improved?
« Reply #35 on: January 22, 2019, 01:34:33 PM »
For Magic# replace the lever with an old Check Out style keypad.
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Offline SteveGavazzi

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Re: Which Games Could Be Improved?
« Reply #36 on: January 22, 2019, 03:21:03 PM »
For Magic# replace the lever with an old Check Out style keypad.

Why?  Without the lever, Magic # doesn't really have much of a reason to exist -- it's much more about the spectacle than it is about the game.
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Offline PhillyFlash

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Re: Which Games Could Be Improved?
« Reply #37 on: January 22, 2019, 03:39:09 PM »
Why?  Without the lever, Magic # doesn't really have much of a reason to exist -- it's much more about the spectacle than it is about the game.

It just seems like the contestants are afraid of the lever. Like if they lift the lever too high the number will go to like 27500 or something. I do see your point in it being the spectacle of it.
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Offline Casey

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Re: Which Games Could Be Improved?
« Reply #38 on: January 22, 2019, 04:58:30 PM »
Under the category of “it’s not my money” - I think you’d entice more people to put the Magic # in the correct place if you gave them the value of the Magic # as a cash bonus and maybe cheapened the prizes a little bit.  They’ve tried as hard as they can to set the values of the prizes to be so far apart from each other that just setting the Magic # at $3000 would win nearly every single playing, but contestants still don’t do that.

If Drew told you to set the Magic # between the prices and if you are right, you win them plus the amount of the Magic # in cash, you’d probably be more inclined to set it too high than too low.

Offline easy1

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Re: Which Games Could Be Improved?
« Reply #39 on: January 23, 2019, 06:54:46 AM »
Punch-A-Bunch is a game that needs to be improved. It needs to being back the Second Chances

Offline GobGlom

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Re: Which Games Could Be Improved?
« Reply #40 on: January 23, 2019, 05:04:32 PM »
Under the category of “it’s not my money” - I think you’d entice more people to put the Magic # in the correct place if you gave them the value of the Magic # as a cash bonus and maybe cheapened the prizes a little bit.  They’ve tried as hard as they can to set the values of the prizes to be so far apart from each other that just setting the Magic # at $3000 would win nearly every single playing, but contestants still don’t do that.

That's not a terrible idea. They've been throwing in a bonus prize in Clock Game.

But you hit on one core issue: Contestants. No matter how they set up a game with prizes and prices, the player will always be the variable.

Offline tradersnob10

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Re: Which Games Could Be Improved?
« Reply #41 on: January 23, 2019, 07:53:41 PM »
One Wrong Price: Give an second chance.
Clock Game: Announce the price of the bonus prize.
Vend-O-Price: Combine all three prices of three shelves and multiply by 50x for wins.
Freeze Frame, Flip Flop, Bonkers and Coming or Going: Play for cars using the last four digits of the car.
Cliff Hangers: $100 bonus for any steps remaining.
Secret X: Introduce a third small prize if the contestant won the first two prizes, if right it is not only an automatic win, but give a cash bonus for finding the Secret X
Bargain Game: Cash bonus for wins:

Offline JT

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Re: Which Games Could Be Improved?
« Reply #42 on: January 23, 2019, 09:20:34 PM »
One Wrong Price: Give an second chance.
Clock Game: Announce the price of the bonus prize.
Vend-O-Price: Combine all three prices of three shelves and multiply by 50x for wins.
Freeze Frame, Flip Flop, Bonkers and Coming or Going: Play for cars using the last four digits of the car.
Cliff Hangers: $100 bonus for any steps remaining.
Secret X: Introduce a third small prize if the contestant won the first two prizes, if right it is not only an automatic win, but give a cash bonus for finding the Secret X
Bargain Game: Cash bonus for wins:
The only one I actually see them doing on the show one day is Bonkers for a car!  They can put a "1" or "2" on the left center side of the board just like they did with Deluxe Dice Game back in the 80s.  The game play is the same.  Would be very exciting to hit the button and win a car in this game!   

Offline jhc2010

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Re: Which Games Could Be Improved?
« Reply #43 on: January 23, 2019, 11:01:11 PM »
Clock Game:
Go back to showing the price of each of the prizes to be bid on BEFORE the contestant starts bidding. Bob would always pause and allow the graphic to appear and the sound effect to be heard.