The Best US “Deal or No Deal” Moment

14 May

Posted by Alex Davis as BuzzerVision, Deal or No Deal, NBC

This clip came from a few weeks ago. Seeing all the worldwide Deal or No Deal clips really makes me wonder how NBC thinks offering massive, sometimes over the mean, offers will get anyone to play on. Look at most versions of the show who have had jackpot winners (except the first Australian one) and you see one common theme: if you want someone to win, you cannot offer anything close to the mean as it’s too much to turn down. That’s the issue when our version offers a $500,000+ bank offer for a board of $1,000,000 and $100. No one will ever turn that down. They’ve slightly hinted this season at getting evil offers, and they finally fully implemented it recently. It’s honestly the best moment the show’s ever had and it shows that you don’t need an ungodly amount of $1,000,000 cases to give away the million. You need to make offers tempting enough that people will think about gambling it all away for seven figures.

13 Responses

Mark
1
May 14th, 2008 at 9:53 am

“You need to make offers tempting enough that people will think about gambling it all away for seven figures.” I don’t understand this. If you make tempting offers, people will take the offer…. I think that offers need to be LESS tempting, because if you offer something equal to or more than the EV (expected value) of the remaining cases, the statistically correct thing to do is to take the offer.
Alex Davis
2
May 14th, 2008 at 9:58 am

More tempting to play on, I meant to say. Otherwise that would just be stupid.
Marc Power
3
May 14th, 2008 at 10:20 am

makes you wondering if NBC is starting to follow the uk version more, the syndie version is going to be more like the uk version, and in the uk the banker is known for making cruel offers, like that contestant who was down to 3,000 and 250,000 and the offer was only 45,000, or Trevor’s infamous game where he was left with 1p, 10p, 50 pounds, 250 pounds and the 250,000 and the banker offered only 9,900. I must admit I along with this contestant’s supporters thought it was going to be a higher or at least more or less the same offer, maybe $400,000 at the lowest.
Erskine Thompson
4
May 14th, 2008 at 11:10 am

This episode was the first one I had watched in a VERY long time, and I watched it with my wife, who absolutely HATES the show (and is in no small part why I don’t watch the show much). We both found ourselves caught up in the emotion of this episode, and were completely shocked when the offer went DOWN after the half-million went. This sparked a conversation about the show, and the banker’s role in it, that we hadn’t yet had.

This was a GREAT example, as Alex said, of what this show should be. $341,000 is a ton of money, and it was enough for HER to go for it, but the family talked her out of it. That scene brings forth all the elements this show was meant to have: Risk vs. reward, the evil banker’s calculations, and the element of the family, which many other versions worldwide don’t have.

And yes, dropping the offer was a brutal touch at the end. I actually DVRed back to make sure the previous offer had been higher, and then smiled evilly myself when I realized what the banker had done. :-)

Erskine Thompson
Rome, GA
vince
5
May 14th, 2008 at 3:52 pm

this was painful to watch because had she picked case 3 instead of 21 she would have knocked out the $25 and most likely have gone on to win the million
Scott
6
May 14th, 2008 at 9:09 pm

I am lead to believe the reason our network version offers so much is to play up the drama factor which has been done to death on these big jackpot shows.
Yes, it works for “Millionaire” but that show was designed for it and earns the right to do it because you have to be somewhat intellectual to earn your cash. “Deal” has just gotten far to gimmicky and is a braindead game.
Mark
7
May 15th, 2008 at 10:16 am

Also, these new shows really show how great Regis was. He would only hold contestants in suspense if they weren’t 100% sure of their answer. But if it was obvious they knew it, Regis just said right away that they were correct. See John Carpenter’s $1M answer vs. Joe Trela. Then compare that to Don’t Forget The Lyrics or Are You Smarter Than A Fifth Grader…….they will sometimes even break to commercial before they reveal that, yes, moth is spelled M-O-T-H. I hate the new era of game shows.
Marc Power
8
May 15th, 2008 at 10:58 am

but Vince, if you look at it that way, she could have eliminated 13 over the course of the game and lost the million. personally I think the only way anyone’s ever gonna go for the million at 50/50 odds is if the backup is at least $100,000.
andrew b
9
May 15th, 2008 at 6:28 pm

This person is a complete idiot!

Someone who really loves their fiance more than anything in the world would not tell him that she has the million!

And when will this opportunity ever get any LESS risky than where it is now?!
andrew b
10
May 15th, 2008 at 6:29 pm

How does she expect to win the World Series of Poker, since it takes more guts than turning that last offer down?
jaymich1128
11
May 16th, 2008 at 1:16 am

To me it’s all relative…to some $100,000 is a lot of money (to use an arbitrary amount). To others, it’s just a drop in the bucket. People will go home with whatever they feel comfortable with. Yes, I am waiting for someone to go all the way, and win the $1,000,000. However, people will only do it if they have the guts. Besides, if the offers become as cruel as the UK version, there won’t be any risk involved…and, for our version, risk is a main factor. Without it, people may stop watching. Not all, of course. But, a good enough amount to become noticeable.
Justin the Bull
12
May 16th, 2008 at 5:06 am

Wow. I have to wonder if that couple will actually go through with their wedding plans after all. I could definitely see the woman holding a grudge against her man for “costing her” a million bucks. She did not take that very well at all, judging from the footage at the end.

Then again, maybe I just assume the worst about shrill women…
andrew b
13
May 22nd, 2008 at 12:17 pm

She had enough guts to mention going for it when no one has before!