Press Your Luck


The Game Show where You play for Big Bucks, but You have to avoid the Whammy!

Here is one of My favorite game shows from the 80's -- Press Your Luck. I used to love watching the show when I was young, just like Voltron. The game itself was fast paced, played by three excited contestants and hosted by Peter Tomarken. I liked His humor. The game show's announcer was Rod Roddy, the same announcer that says the names of the chosen contestants on The Price Is Right.

Here is how the game was played. The game consisted of two rounds where wach of three contestants earned spins. The first part of the round was the question round. At this time the contestants were facing away from the board which is shown above. Peter, the host, asked a question. The first contestant to ring in said an answer. If that answer was right, that contestant was given three (3) spins. Before seeing if it was indeed the right answer, Peter added two additional answers for the other two contesnts to choose from. They also can choose the first answer but if it was right, they would only get one spin. A total of four (or five) questions were asked. After the questions were asked, the show went into a commercial break. Right before the break, You could see the contestant area turn 180 degrees until they faced the board. Then came the money round, the second part of the round. This was everyone's favorite part of the game. The player with the fewest spins went first. If their was a tie, the play to the most left (from the host's point of view) went first. Everyone could see 18 squares in a rectangular shaped board. A light moved randomly from square to square across the board. The contestant that was spinning had to stop to board by hitting the button in front of Him or Her. When He/She did, the amount or money or value of the prize was added to the contestant's total. Their was a catch though, and this is what made the show fun. Their was these little critters called Whammies. If the lit square had a whammy in it, the contestant lost all of His/Her money. The viewers at home could see a little cartoon of the whammy teasing the contestant saying "Give back Your money" or the like. After that, a little whammy card popped up in front of Him or Her. This kept track of how many times He or She hit a whammy. If the contestant accumulated four whammies, He/She was out of the game. The contestant was also allowed to pass His/Her remaining spins to another contestant if He.She didn't want to risk getting more whammies. The contestant with the passed spins now had to play those spins until He/She got a whammy. When that happened, the remaining passed spins were added to the number of earned spins. The money round went like this until all three contestants used up all there spins.

The second round was pretty much the same, but the money round had more money. Their was a "Big Bucks" space that moved the lit square to a 5000 + A Spin space. This added $5000 plus one additional spin to the lucky contestant. When a contestant hit His/Hor third whammy, Peter warned Him/Her that if He/She gets one more whammy, He/She would be out of the game. At the end of that round, the contestant with the most money in cash and prizes got to keep it all. (By the way, the contestants didn't take home the whammies :) ) After a commercial break, Rod Roddy described the prizes that the contestant might have earned.

This show was first introduced to Me by My brother. He told Me it was like Wheel Of Fortune, but without puzzles. I had just gotten back into the show only a couple of weeks ago. After spending a while looking around the web for page on this show, I was happy to find a couple of others. They are listed below:

http://studentweb.tulane.edu/~bfranci/pyl.htm
http://www.fortunecity.com/lavendar/westbridge/448/pylpages.htm
http://members.xoom.com/Billmanm/press.htm
http://www.daccess.net/marchese/gameshow.htm (this one has a lot of pictures, so be patient as it loads) These pages have been accessed times.


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