Show Discussion: Rolling In It

By | August 7, 2020
#hostholdingaquestioncoin

Saturdays, 6:25pm,
ITV

Here we are then, Stephen Mulhern (almost wrote Merchant then, must be the heat) brand new (filmed a year ago) arcade machine quiz where three celeb/civilian pairs of contestants answer multiple choice questions and roll giant coins down a giant coin rolling machine in the hope of avoiding the bankrupts and going home with thousands and thousands of pounds.

We were at the pilot August 2018 and the game needed a fair amount of tightening up, but from a production value standpoint felt pretty much ready to go.

Watched it? Let us know what you thought in the comments.

64 thoughts on “Show Discussion: Rolling In It

  1. Brig Bother Post author

    This is I think one of the most pertinent bits of the pilot review:

    “It somehow manages to be a) quite exciting but after twenty goes b) not exciting enough. It’s not like Tipping Point and its natural board states to cause intrigue, this is a series of discrete events, it’s just a way of selecting the value or otherwise of a question even if on a deeper level that’s basically the same thing.”

    Reply
      1. Brig Bother Post author

        The app is very typically Barnstorm slick, very good in that respect. It’s a shame they’ve gone down the Jeopardy/WWTBAM World Tours in terms of unlocks and time delays and currencies and that, but what this has that that doesn’t is a very good multiplayer mode that’s pretty much exactly like the show (if the show has dropped it’s Top 10 round, which we’ll find out this evening) and ignores the single player cash grab entirely.

        Reply
        1. alex

          i actually was allowed to the beta for this app – NOT what i’d thought it would be , i would have never saw this coming.

          but very good and up to barnstorm’s standards for the most part.

          Reply
          1. Crimsonshade

            Having played the app daily for a week now, I’ve discovered it has a very annoying bug where after you select a Piggy Bank to unlock, the game does not automatically save. That means if you choose to unlock one, then quit the app without doing anything else, when you come back to the app it will forget you clicked to unlock the Piggy Bank and you’ll have to start the timer all over again. Given that Piggy Banks take 3-12 hours to unlock depending on rank (unless you pay gold to “Rush” them), this oversight can add up to significant lost time.

            (To prevent this bug, always play a game or perform some other action after choosing to unlock a Piggy Bank, whatever is available to you. Free Rolls, upgrading coins, collecting achievements or opening an already unlocked Piggy Bank all seem to count)

  2. Score

    This was nothing earth shattering, but I don’t see where the rumours about it being unbroadcastably bad came from. I’ve seen far worse.

    It was basically fine, not something I’d rush to watch every week but personally found it more watchable than Catchphrase. Might do OK (share wise anyway, it’s not going to get a big audience in the slot it has).

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  3. Greg

    I quite enjoyed that. More so than I thought I would. It’s a bit fluffy with the easy questions and the celebs but it is Saturday night. They clearly don’t want to give away a huge amount as towards the end there was a lot of minus amounts and bankrupts.

    Good sold choice of host, very Tipping point in its graphics and sounds.

    Like a lot of hour long gameshows I think this would be better if it was shorter. By the end I was losing interest a bit as there is no variety to the rounds.

    Also in the final Stephen read out an extra question. Was this a mistake or would it have changed the first lose to a win?

    Reply
    1. Greg

      Oh forgot to say I’d feel a bit cheated of at the end the winner got nothing. Would feel a bit like a waste of time.

      Reply
  4. Andrew Sullivan

    First episode broadcast, so I’ll give the format rundown.

    3 pairs of contestants, consisting of a member of the public and a celebrity, attempt to win as much money as they can by rolling coins down a conveyor belt towards the back wall of a giant machine with 10 slots. The outside slots are always Roll Again slots, but the other 8 change over the course of the game. Steven launches a coin into the machine to start, which seeds each pair’s bank.

    Starting with the first pair, they decide who will load a coin into the launcher and who will press the button to launch the coin onto the play field. After the coin has landed in a slot, depending on whether it’s a money slot or a Steal slot, a 3-answer multiple choice question is asked. A correct answer allows the option of whether to play on or to pass to the next pair, a wrong answer hands control to the next pair. If the coin lands in a Bankrupt slot, all winnings are lost the pair in control automatically hand control to the next pair.

    After questions 3, 6, 9, 12 and 14, there is a siren which indicates the board will change. Higher money amounts are added along with more Bankrupts as well as other hazards such as losing half their winnings and losing set amounts of winnings, such as ‘Minus £2,500’ and ‘Minus £5,000’. After question 15 has been answered, the pair with the most money go through to the final.

    The winning pair is given 60 seconds to answer as many questions as possible. Each correct answer adds a WIN slot to the board, while a wrong answer adds a LOSE slot. If there’s still time on the clock, you can attempt to turn LOSE slots into WIN slots. After the time is up, a gold coin is loaded into the launcher. If it lands in a WIN slot, you win, if it lands in a LOSE slot, you don’t.

    Reply
  5. Brig Bother Post author

    This was OK actually, certainly not the worst thing ever if you’d believe the gossip (although they usually lead with the best one…), and they’ve tightened it up significantly from the pilot as well – dropping the Top 10 was a good idea, as was having a £5k maximum in R1 so you’re playing for at least the same stakes as the opening roll. The questions are one or two degrees easier than the pilot as well. And the replacing the odd question numbering system was a good step. Basically it needed tightening up, they’ve tightened it up.

    The music is a bit nondescript.

    The questions over the *structure* remain – in a game of accumulation it tends to be frustrating when scores are shuffled/eliminated rather than new money entering the game – occasionally is livable, but it still feels like every other slot is “red” or “steal” especially in the latter half. It makes the decisions a bit more of a decision, but I was getting a bit worried when twenty minutes in everyone was on zero. I’m also wondering if they’ve sorted out the very possible situation that the final question could be dead as it’s not worth enough to win the game from – which is absolutely OK but you needn’t actually ask the question in that case! The final big question is does The Thing stand up to repeated viewing? Was it annoying that it always veered to the left? Does that matter?

    Overall, I think people have already written it off before it had started and that’s not quite fair. It’s not amazing by any means, but I thought it was an entertaining enough.

    Reply
    1. Score

      Yes agree it being written off is a bit unfair. It was much more watchable than, say, Small Fortune, which seemed to have higher expectations put on it.

      I expect they led with tonight’s episode because of the Corrie stars. However I don’t think any of them added that much to the show, whereas some of the other celebs might add more. Next week is Joel Dommett, Chris Kamara and Gemma Collins, which I think (regardless of opinions on Gemma Collins) might be a better mix.

      Reply
  6. TheLupineOne

    Absolutely REELING that one of the contestants said “gamble”, at 7pm on ITV in the Year Of Our Lord 2020. How did ITV let that one through!?

    That it’s been on the shelf for so long certainly showed with that Brexit reference.

    It seems that a couple of Brig’s complaints from the pilot have been addressed; that of “poeple will google ‘do losers get to keep the money'” remains in the air but one would hope to see the losers’ pots zapped back to zero a la Tipping Point should they finish with any money in their pots. That which hasn’t was the case of Question 15 being one where contestants are chasing an unassailable lead; maybe they should turn to Chain Letters for inspiration and add a “Tie the Leader” slot to the machine for the final question?

    Reply
    1. Brandon

      Have we ever actually found if there’s any truth to the myth that you can’t say gamble on TV?

      Reply
        1. David B

          Contestants can say it. The script of the format cannot encourage people to ‘gamble’ winnings that they have nominally earned.

          Reply
    2. TheLupineOne

      Although in hindsight “Tie the Leader” wouldn’t really be that neccesary: the presence of a Steal slot will ensure that no matter how far back someone is, they can always steal the leader’s money.

      Reply
  7. John R

    I enjoyed it in a strange sort of way, as a Saturday night boredom buster it actually worked out quite well with the combination of Mulhern and the ‘celebrities’ providing the entertainment value

    It is certainly no Tipping Point but I would certainly watch it again, for sure when the alternative is 10 year old clips presented by a Top Gear host now narrated by Top Gear hosts anyway

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  8. Cliff

    This should be a daytime show. They’ve made an unnecessary effort to make it different from Tipping Point, but it should be more like Tipping Point. Having one long game take up the first three parts is too repetitive. I feel that the Steal mechanism should be harder to get; maybe by something as simple as making the question for a Steal much more difficult.

    It’s obviously been cast as a Saturday night show, with super-enthusiastic contestants.

    A simple improvement would be to make the coins have different weights and colours, so even if it doesn’t make much difference to gameplay, it would give Stephen some “ghost drop” / “rider” / “kamikaze drop” type bullshit terminology to riff on.

    I’ll be cancelling my series link because it’s not an unmissable show, but it’s not Hall of Shame material.

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  9. Brekkie

    Watchable enough but the first 13 questions feel a waste of time with the bankrupt and steel elements seeming to be more dominant than the cash prizes. 15 questions over 45 minutes isn’t great either – almost Peoples Versus territory.

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  10. Paul Farrer

    All the coin roll sound FX were made with the same ikea frying pan that I used to make all the Dancing On Ice blade sound FX, and all the anvil impact sounds on Ninja Warrior.

    Reply
    1. Brig Bother Post author

      Sound effects are fine, sting going into the break a bit annoying, the rest I don’t really remember.

      Not your best work Paul, but everyone’s allowed an off day.

      Reply
  11. Chris B

    The quest for a decent format for Stephen Mulhern to call his own continues (he does Catchphrase well but never feels quite like his. Maybe that’s just the old git in me).

    That said, I can’t help but agree it would have genuinely been the disaster it was rumoured to be without it and he upgraded it from toxic disaster to forgettable fluff. Far too much luck and shifting of scores for it to be a genuine hit (Stephen said it could be as big as Millionaire in terms of talking point TV on Radio 2 the other day, which is… an interesting take. but God bless him for working for that cheque).

    The questions are far too easy – taken from Tipping Point “too easy for even us” reject pile. I guess since you can lose it in an instant it, I wouldn’t want the questions to be too hard so it makes sense in that way.

    Not the disaster suggested, but happily would never watch again. That said, August at 6.30 even when they have run out of all other shows suggests ITV really do hate it.

    Reply
    1. Brekkie

      Yes, the Roundhead question a good example of how easy they were making them. If they’d put Cavalier in their as well (rather than Airhead/Blockhead) it would have been a genuine 50/50 for most people.

      Having seen Total Wipeout re-edited into 40 minutes tonight it would be interesting to see how much more watchable these ITV shows of late would be if they were edited into half an hour. That said though I don’t think it particularly dragged or had obvious filler in tonight, but you do feel they could do one question a minute in the main game surely.

      Reply
    1. Score

      That’s impressive given the slot and time of year. Might drop from here of course but certainly suggests that ITV should have had a bit more faith in it.

      Do you know what the share was? I know shares get mocked sometimes but they can be useful and it will have been comfortably over 20% in that slot.

      Reply
    1. Score

      Thanks. That’s a really good start. Has wiggle room for sure, particularly as the forecast for next Saturday is not so good.

      Reply
  12. Matthew James

    Total Wipeout: Freddie And Paddy Takeover Got 1.9 Million And The Voice Kids Got 2.8 Million.

    Reply
    1. Des Elmes

      Apologies for being really, really picky here, but… I Don’t Think it’s Necessary to Capitalise Every Single Word. 😉

      Reply
  13. gyroscope

    I enjoyed this, but felt that it was too samey all the way through. I was waiting for the ‘first round to end so they could mix it up and do something a bit different.

    I found it frustrating that all the coins rolled to the left hand side of the board whatever they did, I don’t think anything landed on the right side at all – it seemed the machine wasn’t very well calibrated, etc, and it really broke the game for me (“oh.. she’s got all wins on the left hand side at the end, she’s bound to get it… oh wow what a surpise she did”) but as nobody else has mentioned it, perhaps it was just me!

    Reply
  14. John R

    Weirdly for a show that has been gathering dust for so long ITV have a contestant call up for Series 2…

    Also very sketchy rumours flying around that Tenable has been axed but that would seem odd

    Reply
    1. Danny Kerner

      well Tenable might not necessarily axed but rested as Warwick is gonna be quite busy what with a new willow series being/planning to be filmed with him reprising the role. Also an unannounced project too.

      Reply
  15. jonsteadman

    I actually like the one long round format, it feels refreshing after so many shows that shoehorn in rounds to fill the time. I also liked the money board changes – again a nice touch.

    Compared to Small Fortune this is an absolute triumph! (I’d guess it also cost less)

    Makes you wonder why they never tried to supersize Tipping Point for prime…

    Reply
  16. Danny Kerner

    I think if season 2 is completly greenlit i feel they should do an additional guranteed bonus of 500 – 2k during the course of the game if they can make the coin land between the lines without contact similar to how a real arcade machine pays out, but in ticket terms.. They could install lasers to help demonstrate if the coin lights up red/green/blue depending on what feels best.

    Reply
  17. Cliff

    Maybe they should’ve put tonight’s show on first, it’s actually really exciting! (Though maybe that’s because I have opinions about the various celebs, whereas last week I was totally disinterested.)

    Reply
      1. TheLupineOne

        Still remains to be seen if they’d have played out the last question if they rolled into the £25,000.

        Reply
        1. Brig Bother Post author

          I suspect the fact that they were quite clear that hitting the £25k wasn’t good enough suggested they wouldn’t.

          Reply
  18. Callum J

    Up 200k to 3.6m this week, I’d be quite happy to see it recommissioned!

    Reply
  19. Brett Linforth

    I ordered the board game from Zatu Games’ website – it’s listed as a pre-order. I’ll be honest, part of me only did it to see if such a thing materialises!

    Reply
    1. Jackson H

      Mulhern was showing it off at a booth at the Toy Fair this year. Looks pretty nice. The board is one stationary piece rather than a conveyer belt though. Even if it were a conveyer I think it would be hard to get the same rolling effect.

      Reply
  20. Steffon Johnson

    What were the ratings for the voice kids and rolling in it

    Reply
  21. Brig Bother Post author

    Really don’t like adaptive final board, it feels massively cheap. You want to put a steal right down the middle, fine, but having between 0-3 on producer whim is frankly a bit rubbish, and suggests you don’t trust your format.

    I’m also intrigued to find out what would have happened if they got Q15 wrong tonight, with all three teams on zero. Roll-off?

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    1. John R

      I did enjoy the show tonight, Jimmy Carr was good entertainment (the producers were probably not enjoying the prospect of him breaking the machine…)

      Apparently next week is the last one in the series as Episode 6 featured someone from Emmerdale who got the sack in the short period this was sat on the shelf

      Reply
      1. Brig Bother Post author

        Ha ha, he wouldn’t have broke the machine – in the pilots there were short skits coming out of the breaks using it with extras.

        Reply
      2. David B

        You could’ve driven a car onto that thing and not broken it. It’s make out of thick beams.

        Reply
    2. Brig Bother Post author

      From a producer:

      “The boards are locked in before we start recording. We never change or adapt them depending on the game play.
      We do have a contingency board for question 15 in the scenario where two teams are on £0 – which we had tonight. The contingency board has no STEALS as there’s nothing to steal. Aside from that, the boards don’t change!”

      Reply
      1. John R

        Someone on Digital Spy has just pointed out on the TV nobody has yet landed on the ‘roll again’ lane, and assumed they may have done so in the studio but these have been edited out

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          1. Crimsonshade

            And supported by the evidence, the Rolling In It Twitter account last week posted an “Unseen” clip of Stephen Mulhern chasing after and catching a coin that was on the “Roll Again” lane before it actually landed, after being goaded by Joel Dommett because waiting for it to land was taking too long…

            https://twitter.com/RollingInItITV/status/1297582192697184257

  22. Joey Clarke

    I think for season two, there should be a tie the leader slot for the last three rolls.
    The final needs a bit more risk by offering a bail out before the final roll (10% per win slot)
    And for the pyro displays, I think they should have the spark fountains at the side go off for 5 seconds when Stephen is walking onto the set and when the jackpot is won, instead of leaving the fountains on for too long, they should have the fountains by the podiums lasting 5 seconds whilst the wall fountains are being shot repeatedly 5 times and confetti is raining from the ceiling from those swirl fans, and rather than have a win sound effect, they should have a grand fanfare whilst the set is being virtually blown up and the audience is screaming their heads off.

    Reply
  23. Philip

    I see that the programme is returning starting next weekend pauired wirth The Void and Who Wants to be a Millionaire. First three guests are Martin Kemp, Oti Mabuse and Sarah Millican
    Does anyone know how many episodes are in this series?

    Reply
    1. Joey Clarke

      YES! It’s back.
      I was thinking of applying earlier this year but I didn’t get round to it.
      But I have applied for a new show Youngest media are filming later this month in Manchester.
      I’m currently on the audition process.

      Reply
  24. Thomas Sales

    Today’s new The Wall was clearly filmed before social distancing. Was it recorded as part of series one or did they film a couple of episodes in Poland just before lockdown?

    Reply
    1. Danny Kerner

      Ummm…… I think this maybe an S01 episode which may have been held back as I am sure the intention for S02 recordings were to do it here even before lockdown became a big factor. If so this has been the longest quiz show on BBC to be held back.

      Reply
      1. Thomas Sales

        So far, anyway. TVguide.co.uk reckons Take Off – which was also pre-social distancing judging by the trailer after The Wall – will air on the 24th, along with The Wheel (not sure if new or repeats).

        Reply
        1. Joey Clarke

          BUT THAT’S DURING THE OLYMPICS!
          Bad move by the BBC.

          Reply
          1. Thomas Sales

            Maybe it was made as an Olympics tie-in? The pilot sent the winners to Lapland, which might be a little too Christmassy for something that isn’t a Christmas special.

    2. Mart With An Y Not An I

      That was from the original recordings done in Poland.
      Credits for ‘Studio Crew’ all had Polish names

      Reply
  25. Philip

    Interesting little discovery about Rolling In it that I found out yesterday.

    Anyone know about Gameshows.ru, a Russian game show wiki? There is a user, Dicto, who usually creates and updates pages for the British game shows primarily ITV ones. I’ve been checking it out for a few years. Well, last night, after the Series 2 premiere, I noticed that Dicto had created a Rolling In it page as well as an episodes page. He had made a grid for Series 2 with episodes listed (perhaps 10 episodes this series) as well as a Series 1 grid with 6 episodes listed.
    Now we know that a few years ago, when they originally taped Series 1, they had taped 6 episodes, but 1 was not shown. Somebody somewhere, had discovered the reason was that it was an Emmerdale special featuring an actor who had just recently been let go unceremoniously from the programme, so they pulled the episode of Rolling in It. Dicto, in this “Wiki page” had not only added in a listing mentioning All three Celebs and civilian partners, but also who won and the actual score. How could he have gotten this if the programme is unaired at present.

    I’ve seen Dicto add in early information for programmes like the Chase or Tipping Point. I wonder how he knows this stuff.

    http://gameshows.ru/wiki/Rolling_In_It_(%D0%A1%D0%BF%D0%B8%D1%81%D0%BE%D0%BA_%D0%B2%D1%8B%D0%BF%D1%83%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%B2)

    Reply
  26. Crimsonshade

    There was a small editing cock-up in yesterday’s (21st August) aired episode of Rolling In It:

    Stephen Mulhern’s starting coin landed in between the £2,500 and £5,000 slots, eventually falling into £2,500. If you look very closely at the screen in the long shot that follows, however, you can see the screen originally flashes up “£5,000”, then quickly blanks out, and is finally replaced by “£2,500” just before they move over to the podiums.

    Reply

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