Never really did a New Year special, so this is my equivalent.If you've never seen it, let me first share this clip, from JB1601 the BBC millennium celebration (let's not get pedantic about the real start). https://youtu.be/wSXlMkpwP48 The first of these cock ups is easily explained, the camera cables around the set are jamming the … Continue reading A lotto chaos, 2000 today
Carl Nicholson, one of the minds behind Cyberdrome has been in touch to point out the contents of the old site are on his personal blog. Link at http://www.cornucopia.co.uk/?page_id=701. Of interest to me was that apparently a Noel's House Party attraction was considered, but presumably foundered for the same reasons as the theme parks.
In Part 1, the concept of quiz machines taking their lead from other media was just starting to take hold in the UK. JPM had modified their existing slot machine hardware to account for the growth of video, and the other main manufacturers (Maygay, Barcrest and BFM) were starting to do the same. Initially, these … Continue reading A pint and a puzzle – the growth of the quiz machine (Part 2)
Nowadays, any moderately large British public house will have some sort of touchscreen arcade machine around, playing either a selection of fruit machine designs or (more likely) a number of quiz games where a suitably clued up and lucky individual can win cold hard cash. Difficult as it may be to believe, the genesis of … Continue reading A pint and a puzzle – the growth of the quiz machine (Part 1)
Just a quick one here, in which I analyse an episode of Noel's House Party like the Zapruder footage, because why not. In this, we're looking at Series 7, Episode 3, which featured throughout the show a game called Russian Omelette. I'd show the whole thing, but this segment seems the most appropriate. (About 43:25 … Continue reading Egg on everyone’s face
It's no surprise to many I'm sure that a site dedicated to the technology of the game show has an owner who is a massive fan of Cory Anotado's Pacdude Games and his work in general (I wish I was even half as capable with that sort of thing, it'd make explanations easier). At around … Continue reading Game Show Marathon
With the tragic events surrounding the Jeremy Kyle Show resulting in the cancellation of all future broadcasts, many have speculated about what should fill that scheduling slot going forward. At present, ITV have taken the decision to step away from the confrontation TV format altogether, substituting the first run slot on the main channel with … Continue reading The return of the 9:25 quiz?
For context, let's start with a recently unearthed episode of the Virtual Reality Gameshow Cyberzone. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kLj-xibrpoM Broadsword's foray into virtual reality would be significant in their future as a company outside of television, but despite their reputation as innovators, the virtual reality worlds here (including Cyber Swindon) have a rather more domestic origin. The Virtual … Continue reading Cyberzone – Building borgs in a virtual Swindon
This link from TV Forum caught my eye a few days ago. https://tvforum.uk/tvhome/looking-vintage-quantel-paintbox-systems-44335/ While these aren't really gameshow related, it can't be underestimated how the ability to automatically generate images and effects at this scale started to pave the way for more technology to enter the TV Scene as a whole. Of particular interest is … Continue reading The World of Quantel
No time to do this properly, but for those who didn't catch it, this thread is worth a read: https://twitter.com/tomscott/status/1085596994196987904 https://twitter.com/tomscott/status/1085651896830816256 One thing that did turn up in that thread was a handy VT clock generator, at http://mdfs.net/Software/Video/VTClock/ - which looks like it may still be in use in parts of the BBC. It goes without … Continue reading The search for BBC TV software
