The Genius II

By | November 8, 2013
5 Comments

It’s quiet so because we don’t really have much to say about Davina’s Celebrity Ski Jumping (it will probably not do very well if they stretch it out, I don’t know why it’s called The Jump despite apparently featuring lots of winter sports, we still love Davina though) here’s a trailer for Bother’s Bar favourite The Genius series two starting in a few weeks. It’s been out for a few days:

 

Massive props to Bumdidlyumptious for continuing to subtitle the episodes, I’m intrigued to see if and how returning players change the dynamic.

The post for series one has scrolled off the end of the Recent Shows list, so here’s a handy link if you want to know what it’s all about.

Knowing Jack

By | November 6, 2013
4 Comments

This was bought to my attention this morning and likely of interest to readers, Steam currently has a You Don’t Know Jack US bundle going – all of the old PC games except for YDKJ 5 (which featured online play) for fifteen quid. (Edit: Also doesn’t include the weekly online episodes that were released as two compilations – Offline and Louder! Faster! Funnier! so a little bit less complete, but still good value.)

Be warned the humour and references are American and some of those pop culture references are going to be twenty years old, however you’re looking at around 8,000 questions (and to a lesser extent gags) that have been properly crafted and remains a great fun single and especially multiplayer quiz. It’s a shame the Paul Kaye UK edition isn’t up on Steam as you’d get the references and had people like Mel and Sue on the writing team. Of the bundle I reckon The Ride is the most interesting set-up, YDKJ 3 is probably the second best one. I haven’t played Head Rush, which was the teen version.

I spent about £50 on eBay a few years ago getting the CD-ROM versions of most of these and it would have taken about a week to download on your 56k modem. Now you can get the lot for £15 and download them in seconds. Amazing.

In other news Takeaway On Tour tickets now on sale, tickets between £25 and £50-ish depending on venue, 20% discounts for families of four.

Or you can wait for the next series in the Spring.

Show Discussion: Pressure Pad

By | November 3, 2013
40 Comments

pressurepadWeekdays, 3pm,
BBC 1

A visually iconic quiz unlike any you have seen before.

That’s what the blurb suggests, if the pilot is anything to go by it’s lots of mini-quiz formats you have seen before done but on a yay-big sized floor screen, not seen since the “place the thing on a map” bit from I Love My Country.

Still, it does have one-man nuclear power station John Barrowman hosting (so that in itself should guarantee it a few viewers), if they haven’t changed much from the pilot the quiz itself is harmless enough (individuals face off in best of three games, losers are eliminated, in the final round the team captain can get help answering multiple-choice questions from surviving teammates, and if they get them all right straight off the bat they win a progressive jackpot – it’s the most 12 Yard 12 Yard format in aeons). Here are the two things I think will kill it if they’ve not modified them from the pilot (of course you never know how well these things come out in the edit):

  • The insistence on playing everything as best of three but starting each game from the easy beginning bits each time, which made me want to claw my eyes out. The games are sort of Price is Right style – some take longer than others. the prospect of a third go round of some of the games makes me wake-up in a cold sweat. The more quickfire ones are less bad.
  • Whilst there is a rolling jackpot element, it’s difficult not to come to the conclusion that the standard prize of £2,000 split between five people feels a bit cheap.

Very interested to see how this translates to screen, so let us know what you think.

Takeaway on Tour

By | October 31, 2013
11 Comments

Ant and Dec with no Red or Black to fill their Summers are taking proper Saturday night entertainment Saturday Night Takeaway on an arena tour next year so everyone can join in with “did you watch that programme? No.” Blimey and indeed gosh.

Tickets go on sale from next Friday, the 8th November at 9am, at prices yet to be announced. They’re taking in Cardiff, Birmingham, Leeds, London, Manchester, Nottingham, Belfast, Glasgow, Sheffield, Newcastle, Liverpool AND London.

I can’t believe the Cambridge Corn Exchange misses out… AGAIN!

Show Discussion: Release the Hounds

By | October 27, 2013
20 Comments

releasethehoundsMonday 28th October, 10pm,
ITV2

One-off horror comedy gameshow with a view to a series. Reggie Yates communicates with a team of three friends sent into a scary forest to complete apparently terrifying tasks and challenges for money, which they only get to keep if they can outrun the titular hounds at the end and escape the forest.

It taps into the primeval fear of it being very dark and the possibility that something may or may not be there. Letting people scare themself with their own imagination has been done before (in MTV’s Fear, for example), and has proven highly entertaining.

It looks like basically an hour of people getting “BOO!” shouted at them in the middle of the night for money, and whilst it sounds like a bit of a one-joke show it can be a helluva joke. I hope it’s got a little more meat to it then that otherwise we’re not sure it has a lot of places to go for a full series, but this is something we’ve been looking forward to for a while so are keeping our fingers crossed is good.