Eamonn Holmes and Ruth Langsford are set to host The Gift List for ITV daytime, where three engaged couples compete in a quiz to win a gift list, and even a dream holiday if they’re very good. I can’t say in honesty my gut is doing cartwheels over this, from that description it puts me in mind of Don’t Blow The Inheritance which was fine but you couldn’t get excited about. BUT YOU NEVER KNOW.

That’s going out in August apparently. I wonder if it will be doing a double with The 21st Question, which I am also frankly not going gaga about. It sounds like another record set of Summer shares for repeats of Pointless in the making at any rate.

TOMORROW AT FOUR is a new episode of First Person (follow @firstpersonquiz to play along on Twitter) with celebrity man Tom Scott. Subscribe to his channel on Youtube to get the link when he goes live.

Oh, the other ones are The Guess List and The Rich List (which is what Who Dares Wins is usually known internationally) by the way.

According to this report, there’s a new version of American Gladiators being shopped around.

In a nod to modern times, Smith says the new American Gladiators will incorporate elements inspired by the popularity of both The Hunger Games and mixed martial arts. “Times have changed,” he says. “This one is tonally different. It’s more post-apocalyptic. But it’s the same spirit.”

i.e. it’s Battle Dome.

In other news, we’ve heard that the host of the Name That Tune pilot next week is Bill Bailey. That’s in intriguing choice if true, might be a good host but not sure he’ll appeal to the core ITV audience.

So NOUVELLE Pyramide began on France 2 last night with new host Olivier Minne, and on the face of it it seems like a slightly baffling idea for a revival – traditionally Pyramide is closer to the original Password than Pyramid as a format, and Mot de Passe already exists (in fact it’s been quite a long-running regular show for the channel, the revival moreso there than it has been anywhere in the world). The set is all very shiny (they’ve actually built a pyramid, albeit without the walls) and the game has changed a little bit:

• Traditionally Pyramide had two celeb guests who were on every episode. This new version has a rotating panel of four “word masters”.
• The first round is “Les 30 Secondes” and is closer to what Pyramid is as a format – thirty seconds to get just five words on a given category across to your partner. Both get a chance to give and receive once. They did try something like this towards the end of the original’s run.
• “Les briques” is a bit more like trad. Pyramide. The celebs have swapped desks and once again each team mate will give and receive. This time each giver is given eight “bricks” and must use those to get three words across to their partner. They must select how many bricks they’re going to use for each word, and each one allows them to give a one-word clue. If they opt for three but only need two then they lose the spare brick. If they can get all three words across, and the giver still has bricks left, they score a bonus point for each brick left.
• “La Circle Gangant” – The winner’s circle except both teams will get a chance to play. This is a little bit like the end game from the original Pyramide, celebs must try and get across as many phrases as they can within a minute, each one worth a whopping three points. This is different from Pyramid where celebs must provide lists to a category. There’s rather a lot of points going this round.
• The winning contestant gets to go through to the final for €20,000 and they can select which “maitre-mot” to take with them. This is a fairly clever reimagining of a standard original Pyramide round – the celeb must convey six words to the contestant, each correctly guessed word goes into a piece of written descriptive prose. If the contestant can guess what is being described they win the money, otherwise they win 0€ (which looks rather stark and hilarious on graphics). They have to do the whole lot within sixty seconds (for this bit the main Pyramid at the back of the stage starts filling up with water as it used to back in the day) and the celeb can’t help with the riddle.
• Edit: Thanks Barry, the puzzle is worth €1,000 for each word found, €20k if they get all six.

Myself? I couldn’t get into it although the language barrier is going to be higher here than in most things. It does feel rather overproduced, the original was quite laid-back, this is a bit more in your face.

To celebrate the Tour de France starting in Leeds today, er, here’s Cyclo-Cardio from Fort Boyard.

Firstly the next Bother’s Bar Poker Open is TONIGHT at 8:30pm – I’ve tried moving it to Thursday to see if we can increase footfall as turnout for the last few has been a bit disappointing. Come and join us!

Then TOMORROW at 4:00pm join UsvsTh3m ironist in chief Tom Scott for brand new Youtube quiz First Person:

This is the series of the pilot tried out a little while ago. The actual live stream will at this link from Friday 4pm.

Finally this morning there’s a new Vernon Kay quiz called 1000 Heartbeats in the offing and you can apply here.

It’s certainly not the first quiz based around trying to beat your pulse rate – there was of course The Chair, but even closer than that was an Endemol show called Heartbeat almost ten years ago which has a very similar premise (if a different format), in that you had to answer rounds of questions within 500 heartbeats for cash. It was on in The Netherlands and, of course, India.

Amazingly despite nobody watching it (except on Bank Holidays where it managed a mighty 600,000 or so) and it hilariously not doing as well as Deal or No Deal which barely gets half a mill these days 15 to 1 seems to be coming back for a second run. If you want to have a go, and you might as well as nobody’s watching so it won’t be humiliating if you lose, you can e-mail 15to1apps@remedyproductions.tv for an application.

If I was the producer of 5 Minutes to a Fortune I’d probably be pretty bloody livid to be honest. Perhaps the next series will just be going out on Bank Holidays.

IN OTHER NEWS Mark Benton’s hosting quiz meets bowling quiz show The Edge and they’re filming a pilot on Sunday. I was going to play cards in London on Sunday but instead I might try and go to this. No promises though.

SPEAKING OF CARDS it’s the Bother’s Bar Open tomorrow night, 8:30 start, all the details are here.