{"id":8444,"date":"2015-02-14T11:55:33","date_gmt":"2015-02-14T11:55:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bothersbar.co.uk\/?p=8444"},"modified":"2015-02-15T00:10:19","modified_gmt":"2015-02-15T00:10:19","slug":"the-crystal-maze-is-25-years-old-this-weekend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bothersbar.co.uk\/?p=8444","title":{"rendered":"The Crystal Maze is 25 years old this weekend"},"content":{"rendered":"

I would have been just over eight-and-a-half years old when I first saw an advert for The Crystal Maze<\/strong>, 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<\/strong><\/a> and Treasures of the Mind Lord<\/strong><\/a>, 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.<\/p>\n

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.<\/p>\n

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<\/a> 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.<\/p>\n

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:<\/p>\n