Join us on Saturday night in the Discord from 19:15 (UK) for the first Schlag den Star of the year where journalist and chatshow host Johannes B Kerner will take on actor Moritz Bleibtreu in up to fifteen mystery events to win Elton’s €100,000 briefcase.
Riiiiiiiggght!
I’ve been watching a fair amount of old Catchphrase on Youtube lately. The original started in January 1986, meaning that the show is *almost* 40 years old, yet the original set design in all its space pink and blue neon glory still looks great, Ed Welch’s music package is still great and particularly those titles – imagine how hard (and probably expensive) it would have been to render that 3D world so smoothly in the mid-1980s, especially when you consider the graphics of the actual puzzles – I still think those titles were more impressive than the ones that followed when Carlton took over. Then there’s the pure adrenaline-fuel of someone hitting the big money in the moneychase only to then solve the bonus in one go rather than clean up. The excitement that we might see a different colour flashing light in subsequent rounds – ah to be seven again.
Anyway Catchphrase was great, and really these days other than the 3D puzzles sometimes being a bit Full Of Stuff, it basically still is. Who turns over when they see Catchphrase is on? A psychopath, like the first 3D iterations of Mr Chips. There are people in their early 20s who won’t understand the significance of why he is called Mr Chips, think on that.
Anyway the point is I came across a Youtube vid of a VHS called Catchphrase For All The Family! Which is just two-and-a-half hours of puzzles, 500 in all. A link to the answers is in the video description. Enjoy.
Physical 100
The first two eps “dropped” on Netflix yesterday and it looks like we’re getting two eps a week, nine total.
Physical 100 is the latest in the popular “Korean reality gameshow where the whole thing is marshalled by a mysterious voice” genre. The premise of this one: 100 fit people do eliminatory “quests” to determine whose physique is the ultimate one, that person will win 300m Won, which is just shy of £200,000 so not small beer.
The first full half an hour of the first episode is the 100 coming in and admiring each other and going “goodness, you look fit!” “Yes, you too!”. Everyone has had a plaster cast of their torsos made, which they will have to smash as they get eliminated.
The first game is actually more of a qualifying round – all 100 contestants will hang from a grid for as long as possible in two heats. It is important to do well, because the higher up the pecking order you are the bigger your advantage in the first quest proper. In typical Korean style, the editing, direction and the set-up here is super slick, even if endurance is not your thing there is still a kind of visceral thrill in watching 16 stone people rain down into a swimming pool from 15ft, and it’s interesting to see the different tactics and approaches of the people who do do well.
Pecking order decided, the first Quest is revealed proper and it’s… Murderball from Celebrity Wrestling. Starting with the winner, they’ll pick any of the remaining contestants to challenge. They’ll also get to pick from two arenas – one based on a kids playground which favours agility, the other like a mud pit favouring raw strength. The game? Wrestle, dodge and be the one holding onto the medicine ball at the end of a three minute period. The winner goes through, the loser goes home after smashing their plaster cast torso, a failure. Again, a surprising amount of possible approaches to this, strategies in choosing your opponent and so on.
However fun as it was to have most of the second episode based around it, I hope they move on with the other 40-odd matches in a montage next week – I’ve seen the game, I think I’ve seen most of what it’s got to offer, I’m not sure I need to see another hour of it, I want to see what else you’ve got.
It’s deffo worth a watch if you quite enjoy physical competition.
Make your staff meetings more exciting with…
…Sam Watts’ official The Traitors original soundtrack, out Friday. We love a soundtrack album, and one of the first things we picked up on with The Traitors was the music.
Although the central riff was clearly inspired by the BBC Winter Olympics 2010 titles (Cry Me A River by Michael Buble):
Bridge of Lies is back this afternoon
The non-celeb one, that is, weekdaily from 4:30pm on BBC1 AND IPLAYER.
It will be interesting to see whether/how much of the bigger stakes that the celebs have been offered has made its way to the daily show. Presumably the new EXCITING graphics (i.e. there’s a screensaver of some water in the background now) has made its way across. I quite like how the new arches for the entrances and exits make it all feel like a real life version of Knightmare.
In other news this week, Physical 100 starts on Netflix tomorrow.
Poll Results – LIVE at 9pm!
Watch the results!
It was gripping.
NOW! Read the results at UKGameshows.com, then read the statistics under the cut:
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