― katie, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― MarkH, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― Alan Trewartha, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― Sarah, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― Twatbag, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― Pete, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
i had a ridiculous haircut (black/white striped) at the time, which loads of people seem to remember when i mention it ("ohmygodyouwerethatfreakonuniveristychallengewiththeweirdhair!!" etc).
― toby, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― Gage-o, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― DG, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― RickyT, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― jel, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― Jeff W, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― mark s, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― Mike Hanle y, Tuesday, 8 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
She had an Italian name, but I have forgotten it, so no stalking for me.
― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 14:12 (nineteen years ago) link
― MarkH (MarkH), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 14:17 (nineteen years ago) link
― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 14:20 (nineteen years ago) link
― MarkH (MarkH), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 14:21 (nineteen years ago) link
― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 14:24 (nineteen years ago) link
-- toby (toby_ge...), January 8th, 2002.
My mate David was on it the year Durham won it - he was UCL, who were you with toby?
― Dadaismus (Dada), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 14:25 (nineteen years ago) link
As part of the Lancaster team we made it to the final round of auditions two years ago. They actually interview you as if you're going onto an actual game show ("What books have you been reading recently?"), which I found vaguely disconcerting, but answers to the questions on the test we sat included "Tony Hawkes" and "Sixpence None The Richer". So that's alright then.
― Dom Passantino (Dom Passantino), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 14:44 (nineteen years ago) link
― Mooro (Mooro), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 16:27 (nineteen years ago) link
OK, that may be just me.
― mike a, Tuesday, 31 August 2004 18:19 (nineteen years ago) link
1. Stream of Consciousness
2. Greil Marcus's Mystery Train
3. something else interesting - what was it?
― the bellefox, Tuesday, 5 October 2004 12:12 (nineteen years ago) link
I thought he did well.
― the bellefox, Tuesday, 5 October 2004 12:13 (nineteen years ago) link
― Matt (Matt), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 12:38 (nineteen years ago) link
1970s video games? paxman was aghast that people knew all these, i thought they were piss-easy. (pong, tetris, asteroids, snake)
― koogs (koogs), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 13:13 (nineteen years ago) link
Perhaps we should not be surprised that you thought they were easy?
― the bellefox, Tuesday, 5 October 2004 13:15 (nineteen years ago) link
I'd like to see how many questions he was actually asked as compared to the others.
Uni Chal Mastermind and Buzzocks makes Monday night the best BBC2 line up all week.
― Jarlr'mai (jarlrmai), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 13:23 (nineteen years ago) link
― Jarlr'mai (jarlrmai), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 13:25 (nineteen years ago) link
― aldo_cowpat (aldo_cowpat), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 13:36 (nineteen years ago) link
"what's 'amped' mean then?"
― CarsmileSteve (CarsmileSteve), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 13:39 (nineteen years ago) link
― the bellefox, Tuesday, 5 October 2004 13:39 (nineteen years ago) link
I found it strange that they didn't know what COBOL or SQL were yet got the (IMO) more obscure Ada question right.
University Challenge makes me realise how much stuff there is that I don't know. I'm usually chuffed to bits if I get a run of Starter + 3 Bonuses correct.
Discovered a fairly good quiz show called Eggheads yesterday while I was off work. A team of "boffins" (I think most of them are former champions of 15-to-1 or similar) is challenged by a different team of plebs every episode. Plebs can win £20000, boffins just get to be smug about being clever. Plebs won yesterday for the first time in umpteen episodes.
― Onimo (GerryNemo), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 13:43 (nineteen years ago) link
UC was good, I knew more answers than usual (ie, about 5). The Greil Marcus question reminded me of RJG. I liked the set of questions where they had to say who ruled in a X-ocracy, and one of the words sounded very much like phallocracy, and they dithered and snickered and then it was something not rude at all.
I like Eggheads too.
― Cathy (Cathy), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 13:53 (nineteen years ago) link
― Jarlr'mai (jarlrmai), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 13:55 (nineteen years ago) link
― Brigadier Rainham Steele, Mrs (blueski), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 13:56 (nineteen years ago) link
That was because it's named after Ada Lovelace innit. I didn't know the others but I know who the daughter of George Gordon, Lord Byron was. Hung out with Babbage, nice one.
― Liz :x (Liz :x), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 15:01 (nineteen years ago) link
― caitlin (caitlin), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 16:09 (nineteen years ago) link
― koogs (koogs), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 16:11 (nineteen years ago) link
― Markelby (Mark C), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 16:18 (nineteen years ago) link
(still, not as bad as the cow-orker who pronounces "spamhaus" "spamhorse")
― caitlin (caitlin), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 16:25 (nineteen years ago) link
My old drama teacher got to the semis on MM in '86 or so.
― Michael Jones (MichaelJ), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 17:31 (nineteen years ago) link
― Cathy (Cathy), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 18:01 (nineteen years ago) link
Didn't he get a wee bit more time than the others - Humphrys explained something by way of explanation about the lipreading thing but I was in the other room so missed most of what he was saying.
I wondered about the cane too.
Was the other interesting thing the karaoke backing tracks of cheesy ballads (all of which I recognised, much to the amusement of my husband and parents)? Wasn't there a Smiths lyrics question too, or was that last week?
― ailsa (ailsa), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 18:08 (nineteen years ago) link
― caitlin (caitlin), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 18:18 (nineteen years ago) link
"Kylie, you are AMAZING!!!"
― Mark G, Saturday, 10 February 2024 00:44 (one month ago) link
Look, if these are the worst things that can be said about him, I'll take them. Considering what craven, creepy weirdos most people in British entertainment seem to turn out to be, like.
― trishyb, Saturday, 10 February 2024 15:17 (one month ago) link
<quietly>i don't like House of Games</quietly>
Mangan is good on (Portrait|Landscape) Artist of the Year on Sky Arts. but whether he's better than Frank Skinner (who did the early series) is another question.
― koogs, Monday, 12 February 2024 15:07 (one month ago) link
House of Games very much relies on the personalities of the contestants. If the people are too stupid and/or annoying, we only watch the rounds we really like -- Distinctly Average, Where is Kazakhstan, I'm Terrible at Dating, the music intros round -- and skip the rest. Even if the guests are good, there's a couple of rounds we usually skip. That said, I usually skip the final round on Pointless too, unless it's a category I care about.
― trishyb, Tuesday, 13 February 2024 09:12 (one month ago) link
Mastermind got weird yesterday. Not seen that happen before. It was all above board wasn't it.
― Stevo, Tuesday, 13 February 2024 19:57 (one month ago) link
How do you mean?
― ailsa, Tuesday, 13 February 2024 20:07 (one month ago) link
Everybody tying, the person with the weakest first round winning. I suppose it is possible to have much better general knowledge than for the subject one has crammed for. no closing comment from the winner though maybe having to go for a tie breaker question swallowed that time.Certainly don't remember seeing the 4 way tie at least numericallyspoilers
― Stevo, Tuesday, 13 February 2024 20:25 (one month ago) link
Oh, ok, that didn't seem suspicious at all to me.
― ailsa, Tuesday, 13 February 2024 20:32 (one month ago) link
It's gonna happen at some point, it's been going a long time
― Mark G, Wednesday, 14 February 2024 07:16 (one month ago) link
almost seemed like she ground to a halt when she hit the score. but maybe she had just revised her subject and left her general knowledge though not sure how you revise that.
― Stevo, Wednesday, 14 February 2024 12:10 (one month ago) link
If she was able to keep track of her score as she's playing then she's already not paying enough attention to the questions. I've seen people lose from better positions than that through just not having a wide enough general knowledge. Or through nerves. Or all manner of other reasons. You wouldn't even believe the reason I basically bottled it and looked an absolute idiot on telly with the final in my grasp, but it was absolutely above board.
― ailsa, Wednesday, 14 February 2024 13:08 (one month ago) link
We watched house of games for the first time ever, it was one of the few things not in dutch on the tv in our antwerp holiday flat. (The existing netflix logins had been CANCELLED - 'this device is not in your account plan'.) Anyway I'm not a snob- ok I am a snob but I've enjoyed e.g. pointless, the chase. this was utterly devoid of intellect or entertainment. it was like a show for simpletons and it wasn't even trying to be funny - there were just no jokes, good or bad, no amusing between-rounds chat a la taskmaster.
― organ doner (ledge), Wednesday, 14 February 2024 20:55 (one month ago) link
Well, it really depends on the quality of guest/celeb contestants.
We did play the "House of Games" "board game" version one christmas, and it felt quite natural to take time answering rather than butting in quickly, which is the one thing noteable on the TV show: how they take their time when there's three others who could "get there first"...
― Mark G, Thursday, 15 February 2024 10:30 (one month ago) link
I quite like that it's generally comedy-free, there's definitely space in my brain for "quiz show that's boring but watchable and not starring bradley walsh". It does seem like something that should be on a cable channel that's accidentally been transmitted by the BBC.
Speaking of "utterly devoid of entertainment", and I'm not sure if this is the right thread for it, but David Mitchell's Outsiders, the Taskmaskter ripoff, must be one of the worst shows I've ever seen. Consistently unfunny, and it's paced like a home movie, just rambling, and inaudible dialogue, and people giggling at each other's jokes. I've seen Warhol movies with better plots.
― Chuck_Tatum, Thursday, 15 February 2024 12:49 (one month ago) link
outsiders does feel like some stop-gap thing they did during lockdown when people could only meet up if it was outdoors (there's some talk on the "ricky don't..." comedy thread)
― koogs, Thursday, 15 February 2024 13:16 (one month ago) link
can't believe the Osman toleration going on here, we should be tough on Osman and tough on the causes of Osman IMO, in particular his emetically twee detective stories
― Critique of the Goth Programme (Neil S), Thursday, 15 February 2024 13:45 (one month ago) link
yeah, but there's none of that on HOG.
Outsiders - is that a challengey thing? it's never been on long enough on my TV to find out...
― Mark G, Thursday, 15 February 2024 14:15 (one month ago) link
My mam is always amused when HoG has someone like Mark Billingham or Val McDermid on it. "Oh look at him, all pally with the proper crime writers."
― trishyb, Thursday, 15 February 2024 14:32 (one month ago) link
I am actually going to go further and say his books are pretty good and non-emetic. Twee? Sure. But they are for sure better than Mark Billingham's books.
― Chuck_Tatum, Thursday, 15 February 2024 17:33 (one month ago) link
I mean, I also find him offputtingly smug, and would never actively choose to watch HoG, but the books are pretty decent.
― Chuck_Tatum, Thursday, 15 February 2024 17:35 (one month ago) link
lots of football questions this week have boosted my score no end
― close encounters of the third knid (darraghmac), Friday, 16 February 2024 23:06 (one month ago) link
Aside from the aforementioned small handful of genuinely good rounds, its appeal mainly lies in feeling like you're much smarter than minor celebs.
― chap, Thursday, 22 February 2024 23:32 (one month ago) link
someone keeps a list of every single round and all the scores and some of the top names are surprising.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1kIJ9TYm2SFDN0UCibSCw01_KqkZH9tMDLwzJs6bCq3g/htmlview#
Angela BarnesNatasha Raskin SharpEd GambleRob DeeringSimon HicksonGlenn Moore (R)Steve PembertonMike BubbinsShaun WilliamsonJustin Moorhouse
i think that is slightly skewed by the fact that some games score more than others but Angela is the only person so far too win every day. everyone else there is 4 wins and a second assist from glenn who is 4 wins and a 3rd
― koogs, Friday, 23 February 2024 08:03 (one month ago) link
(actually i think i was pleasantly surprised by Natasha being up there, and not really surprised by Angela)
― koogs, Friday, 23 February 2024 08:04 (one month ago) link
its appeal mainly lies in feeling like you're much smarter than minor celebs.
And, whoah! Some of them are very minor, aren't they??? Sometimes wonder if their definition of 'comedian' is 'did stand-up once'.
One time only, I'd heard of all four contestants on HoG. Almost fell off the sofa. Usually, first job on hearing the music: press the 'i' button on my remote. Second: Google names.
― Grandpont Genie, Friday, 23 February 2024 08:24 (one month ago) link
Angela is the only person so far too win every day
Yeah, apparently the protocol is that you're not supposed to do this, and if you find yourself storming ahead too far, you throw at least one day in order to give someone else a chance.
― trishyb, Friday, 23 February 2024 10:07 (one month ago) link
Having said that, you'll often see them on Taskmaster two years later.
― chap, Friday, 23 February 2024 17:22 (one month ago) link
The recent Dave reboot of World's Most Dangerous Roads is 'someone off taskmaster + someone you've never heard of' half the time.
― Hello I'm shitty gatsworth (aldo), Friday, 23 February 2024 17:27 (one month ago) link
there's a new series of that on Sundays and first episode was Angela and Rhod (2nd episode is Joe Swash and Seann Walsh)
― koogs, Friday, 23 February 2024 17:34 (one month ago) link
And, whoah! Some of them are very minor, aren't they???
I like it when House of Games dig up someone you haven't seen on tv for years, like Simon from Trevor and Simon. I thought I remembered seeing Bob Carolgees on there, but he's not on the spreadsheet; maybe I was thinking of Pointless Celebs.
Osman is always saying that stand-up comics do well on the show, which makes sense, a lot of the rounds require you to think and speak quickly and make connections between things, these should theoretically be things that a stand-up comedian is good at
― soref, Friday, 23 February 2024 19:05 (one month ago) link
We were watching Challenge the other day, and an episode of The Chase comes on. Jen immediately said "I think this is a really early one", and we checked and it's season 1, episode 1!
No chatter with the contestants, no intros to the Chasers, because there's just Mark (which is good, can't stand the intros usually), and the standard of contestants are a lot better than in future.
I'm not alleging anything, but if you were to design an intro to The Chase, you couldn't get much better than this:
First contestant has an okay cash builder, goes for the middle offer, goes out - that's how the show worksSecond contestant gets 7k, takes the high 20k (also the high amount offered to the other contestants, they're not doing the progressive offers yet), takes it home with Mark one step behind most of way - you can get a lot of money in the pot - it's exciting!Third contestant gets 8k, takes the middle offer, goes out - being smart won't guarantee you the money if you get bad questions.Fourth contestant gets 9k, takes the low £200, takes it home - you can do that, too, but the other team member might be a prick about it (and Bradley might encourage him to be)And then they rack up 18 on the final chase, and Mark just tears through it, but slows near the end - 3 questions to go at 42 seconds, still 3 seconds to go at 17.
The lack of teamwork is also hilarious:
In the final chase, the fourth contestant buzzes in on nearly everything, racks up a decent score (18), including a few where he got it wrong and it looked like the second contestant was going to punch him.On the first pushback the second contestant's answer is immediate, confident, and wrong and it looks like the fourth one is going to punch him instead.And in one of those bobbling-around-the-three-question-mark pushbacks, the question is about a theme tune to which Bond film, and four says "From Russia with Love", and two says "but it's not" then "Casino Royale" - neither of them are right, but you can imagine someone jotting down "Get Bradley to only accept the first answer".
<about Bradley>(watch old ones to see how much better he's got at it over the years)
ailsa otm as usual, he was just tongue tied a few times in the questions when he really never does that recently.
I don't think we've mentioned his Cash Trapped, from his own idea - I've never seen a show from the start but it seems weirdly overcomplicated, never really clear whether something is a good strategic move or not. But also I might be (I probably am) missing something, but I don't think there's been a UK gameshow reliant on the continuity of seeing it every night, one with a returning champion in the same way as Wheel of Fortune? Which we're getting another bloody version of, weith Graham Norton, by the way.
― Andrew Farrell, Sunday, 25 February 2024 21:38 (one month ago) link
Oh and also there's a lot more interrupting before the end of the question in the first one, contestants and chasers, though this might just be both sides wanting to prove themselves.
Because Jen's smarter than me, she pointed out that they'll have filmed them in a block and probably picked the most impressive one to go first.
― Andrew Farrell, Sunday, 25 February 2024 21:39 (one month ago) link
The afternoon reboot of Jeopardy obvs has returning champions but is also full of Twitter chumps going "I wish Emma/Michael/whoever would lose, I hate them, they think they're so clever". It's very weird and part of the reason I'm glad I didn't go for it.
They could have done with 500 Questions, a very good format, but chose instead to cast characters and make it a last-man-standing standalone per show thing, where you could theoretically go through the entire show answering everything then get knocked out on the second last question and someone just rocks up and takes all the money you earned for doing sod all. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/500_Questions
― ailsa, Sunday, 25 February 2024 22:04 (one month ago) link
Also chose the odious Giles Coren as a host, urgh
― ailsa, Sunday, 25 February 2024 22:06 (one month ago) link
That was a great match!
Was Henderson's answer for the London Zoo question really not specific enough? I thought that was ungenerous scoring.
― reggae mike love (polyphonic), Monday, 26 February 2024 23:38 (one month ago) link
What annoyed me was when the Cambridge team captain put up his finger in a way that appeared to signal that he was going to answer the starter question. Surely that counts as conferring?
― trishyb, Monday, 26 February 2024 23:43 (one month ago) link
The question ultimately asked for the organisation and specified it was what ZSL stood for, I thought, which is wider than just the zoo.
xpost
― ailsa, Monday, 26 February 2024 23:58 (one month ago) link
was that Jenny from the Chase on OC repeat this week?
― koogs, Tuesday, 27 February 2024 14:55 (one month ago) link
Haven't seen it yet but it was Mark from The Chase last week. He sure is tall.
― ledge, Tuesday, 27 February 2024 14:59 (one month ago) link
Also it was from series 2 with the greek letters, not hieroglyphs.
― ledge, Tuesday, 27 February 2024 15:00 (one month ago) link
Yeah, that was Jenny on this week's repeat
― ailsa, Tuesday, 27 February 2024 15:40 (one month ago) link
i missed last week's because the epg had it as a different series id from the previous specials 8( don't think i've seen an episode with greek letters.
― koogs, Tuesday, 27 February 2024 16:00 (one month ago) link
the personal facts at the start of oc in 2013 were dull
― koogs, Monday, 4 March 2024 20:51 (three weeks ago) link
caught the end of the one with the beast on it and that was quite the drubbing, highest score i think I've seen.
― koogs, Monday, 4 March 2024 21:22 (three weeks ago) link
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2024/mar/06/tory-peer-jacqueline-foster-pays-damages-university-challenge
I hope Gorgianeh got handsomely compensated for the disgusting abuse she suffered.
― Dan Worsley, Wednesday, 6 March 2024 12:43 (three weeks ago) link
Was it on here we talked about the UK rebooting The Genius? Anyway, David Tennant!
https://www.itv.com/presscentre/media-releases/david-tennant-front-itvs-genius-game
― ailsa, Thursday, 14 March 2024 11:24 (two weeks ago) link
So that's one way to confirm I didn't get through the sift.
― Hello I'm shitty gatsworth (aldo), Thursday, 14 March 2024 11:27 (two weeks ago) link
Good to see people know Borges. Is that a constant? Not sure how I discovered him could it be Colin Wilson or Martin Esslin or something. But seemed the guy knew him pretty thoroughly.May need to reread Labyrinths etc.
― Stevo, Thursday, 14 March 2024 12:36 (two weeks ago) link
David Tennant? Jesus, there's no hope for the mid-tier lads if that's the kind of talent they're recruiting. Oh well.
― trishyb, Thursday, 14 March 2024 13:20 (two weeks ago) link