I would have been just over eight-and-a-half years old when I first saw an advert for The Crystal Maze, and being well into gameshows I begged my Mum to be allowed to stay up and watch it. It. Was. Incredible – unlike anything I’d seen on television before (except possibly The Adventure Game and Treasures of the Mind Lord, which I was probably a bit young to appreciate) and the next six years involved having friends round and inventing our own games using whatever we had to hand.

Even now, there’s a sizable amount of us who will bellow “GET THE CRYSTAL!” when someone is failing at a simple task, like opening some blinds.

It’s the show’s 25th birthday tomorrow and it still holds up really well – Challenge are devoting an entire day to it to celebrate. There’s been a lot of talk recently that with the new popularity of exit games that this is a show that ought to be bought back, yet I think this will inevitably lead to massive disappointment, ending up as a referendum on whether you like Russell Brand or not.

Still, let’s remember the show as it should be remembered, someone failing to hook a cage on a stick whilst standing on a revolving log above a tank of water:

Quick interesting fact: we all know the story that The Crystal Maze is based on the ideas of (Le Cles de) Fort Boyard because the fort hadn’t been fully converted when C4 wanted to make a pilot, it actually beat it to air by six months, Fort Boyard‘s 25th birthday is on the 7th July. Fort Boyard is still going and still highly watchable, but it’s not been at its best for a while I think it’s fair to say.

Richard O’ Brien is 72.

Here’s some stuff from recent comments you might have missed:

• Benchmark – Paddy McGuinness is to host a new quiz for C4 daytime called Benchmark, in it a player is helped by a crowd of ten people in answering numerical questions for big cash prizes, and the crowd are simultaneously competing to come back as the contestant in the next show a bit like Judgemental. I assumed this was going to be “guess whether the actual answer is above or below the average” but David B points out it might be a bit like Wits and Wagers, which might be interesting. Anyway it doesn’t sound like the sort of thing likely to set the world alight, but it is a show by Bother’s Bar Recommended Victory Television and Stuart Shawcross (Five Minutes to a Fortune, Win Your Wish List) so WE’LL SEE.
• Keep it in the Family returns for a second series, which might come as a bit of a surprise given it seemed like a pretty expensive show for the numbers it was getting. Still though, I did think there was a spark of something there even if it didn’t really come through in the first series (even if it was mainly confidence), hopefully the Nanas will be given something a bit less tedious to do (it went on forever watching live and only felt slightly better on screen) and the whole thing will feel a bit less flat in the edit next time round. If you’d like to be a contestant:

Here’s the announcement you’ve all been waiting for…WE’RE BACK!! #KeepItInTheFamily http://t.co/vVxQ0LtzWl pic.twitter.com/GB5uOeGWKE

— KeepitintheFamily (@KIITFOfficial) February 12, 2015

• I’m a Celebrity – Now YOU can experience life as a camping celeb in the brand new I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here Maze at Thorpe Park! Relive the sensations of having lots of things crawl on you without having lots of things crawl on you or eating things, and without Ant and Dec laughing at you.

• And finally, it looks like BBC4’s replacement for Only Connect is Codex The Quizeum where Griff Rhys Jones guides some teams of experts through quizzes and treasure hunts in the UK’s most exciting museums. “Thought to be a television first,” apparently.

Solid 7/10 evening quiz and 2014 Hall of Fame CHAMPION Two Tribes is back for another series starting Monday (BBC2, 6pm), which comes a bit of a surprise. This time round the winner faces the rolling jackpot endgame (contestant must split seven people or things into two groups based on a category). I’ve heard how large it can get, it’s a shame they’ve not hilariously forcing them to take it in either book tokens or DIY vouchers.

In stunt news, Australia will officially be competing in the Eurovision Song Contest this year despite NOT EVEN BEING in Europe. If Australia win SBS will host it in conjunction with the broadcaster of the nation they decide to do it in, to pre-empt your question. It sounds like the idea of guest nations might become a regular thing.

So someone at Channel 4 is getting sacked or it’s an intriguing way to try and wrestle some viewers from Tipping Point, but it sounds like someone’s put the wrong tape in and what was meant to be start of the much hyped Double Trouble week on Deal or No Deal, for Valentine’s, has been apparently replaced by a normal episode.

Amazing scenes.

MEANWHILE! Hat Tip to David in the comments, this Christmas we’ve got the Tipping Point board game to look forward to! Just look at it!

And finally tonight, here’s a show you probably weren’t watching because you were probably watching Gladiators or something.

CRANK UP YOUR GRANNY! It’s Happy Families!

OK, smart London-based quizzers wanted for a runthough of a new format in London next week. Teams of three required. They will be at Archway on Tuesday 10th and Thursday 12th from 1-5pm. Travel expenses and lunch will be provided. If that sounds like you, fire off an e-mail for more details.

Don’t forget we are also playing Mario Kart 8 tomorrow night! Here are all the deets.

OK so here’s fun, you might have seen the story recently that ITV were looking into a few shows that skew male (because traditionally we’re difficult to reach, and hence advertisers will pay a large premium if they know young men are watching). The terribly titled but might be OK upcoming Mission Survive with Bear Grylls has this in mind, and it looks like they’ve asked TwoFour (currently making waves with the ABC1s on The Jump) to do a version of Belgian format Eternal Glory, broadcast locally as Eeuwige Roem.

In it, sportspeople (both men and women) compete in tests to see who is the ultimate sportsperson across disciplines like perserverance, stress, team building, power, that sort of thing. There are three tests each week, and the people at the bottom of the weekly leaderboard have to do a difficult Night Test to stay in the game. So far so Celebrity Born to Win with Dermot O’ Leary.

However there are a couple of things that make it a little bit more interesting, namely it’s a format from The New Belgian Primitives who sound like a 90s indie act but in fact are the guys behind Bother’s Bar favourites The Mole and De Slimste Mens ter Wereld amongst other things.

And look! Happily here’s the very first episode from the very first series on Vimeo with English subtitles so you can have a look for yourselves:

The challenges are quite fun (albeit, and you’ll notice this, hugely cheap) but there would certainly need to be some presentational changes if it wants to work in the UK, fewer empty shots, more focus on the challenges which will likely need to feel a bit bigger in scale if not be a bit bigger in scale. We’d probably drop the panel of sportspeople talking about things bit. I like the idea of the elimination challenge not necessarily ending with an elimination (Although I gather that in later series this isn’t the case, it becomes a duel).

The show had three series in Belgium and one in the Netherlands and sounds like it’s gone down well in Scandinavia (where being hardy is the regional sport). Could it work over here? It’ll likely depend on the names being lined up for it I suspect, it’ll likely suffer from the modern Superstars problem that anyone currently relevant will probably stay away, which is a shame.

That episode is from 2008 so it will be interesting to see what can be done with seven year’s difference.