The Price Is Right has dozens of pricing games in retirement, and some fans want 3 Strikes decommissioned, too. As TV Insider covered last week, TPIR viewers think 3 Strikes is “too hard,” “not fun,” and even “the ‘f*** you contestant, you’re not getting a car’ game.”
If 3 Strikes is put out to pasture, it’ll join the games below, all of which left the Price Is Right rotation while Bob Barker was still hosting the game show. Scroll down to learn about those challenges — and to read Reddit users’ commentary on the gameplay.
Add ’Em Up
To win a new car in Add ’Em Up, a contestant had to guess the car’s price tag, which always had four non-repeating digits. Bob Barker would show the contestant the sum of those digits and would give the contestant one free digit of their choosing. The contestant could pick the remaining digits in any order, and they were allowed to make one mistake.
“I thought Add ’Em Up involved too much math for the average contestant and was too complicated to explain,” Reddit user bluegambit875 wrote. Jcs290 agreed, saying, “Excited and nervous contestants shouldn’t be asked to solve an algebra problem.”
Bullseye I
Not to be confused with The Price Is Right’s current Bullseye game, Bullseye I gave contestants seven bids to guess the exact price of a car, with Barker telling them “higher” or “lower” after each attempt. According to TPIR lore, no one ever won the game, though Jeannie comes awfully close in this YouTube clip.
On Reddit, user 42069CakeDay argued that the original Bullseye shouldn’t have been scrapped. “Guessing the price is not that hard,” they wrote.
Hit Me
In this riff on the casino game blackjack, contestants had to get their hand of cards to total a sum as close to 21 as possible — or, at least, closer than the sum of the house cards — without going over. To draw cards, they had to identify the multiplier between items’ displayed prices and actual prices — a box of rice actually costing $1.29 but displayed at $5.16, four times as much, would yield a 4 card, for example. And if they identified the item with the correct price displayed, they’d get an ace card worth either 1 or 11.
“Retired because it became ‘too complicated’ for some people. It’s fourth grade math based on blackjack,” said Reddit user rick420buzz. User scream4ever added, “Yeah, if you knew what you were doing, you were guaranteed to win.”
Hurdles
This game featured a product with a displayed price represented as hurdler character. At each of three hurdles, a contestant would have to correctly guess which of two other products was cheaper than the original product to keep the hurdler progressing toward the finish line. (And the contestant would fire a starter pistol to get the action started!)
“Hurdles could have become legendary like Cliff Hangers with the little character moving around,” bluegambit875 opined on Reddit. “I can see how it became too undependable with the mechanics of the set, but the concept was solid.”
Penny Ante
Compared to other pricing games, this one was simple: Contestants were given three oversized pennies and presented with two products, each with four possible prices displayed. Each time a contestant named a wrong price for a product, Barker would take a penny from them. And if they identified the correct prices with at least one penny left, they’d win.
Penny Ante lasted decades in the Price Is Right rotation, despite mechanical glitches, but it was reportedly retired after the game board was accidentally left out in the rain.
The Phone Home Game
In this game, a contestant would collaborate via telephone with someone playing from home. The at-home contestant would have a list of seven items and their prices, but they could only say the prices of only three items, and the in-studio contestant would have to identify the product that went with each dollar amount. After three tries, the prize money was revealed, and the players would split their earnings.
“I’m honestly surprised they haven’t brought The Phone Home Game out of cold storage,” MndnMove_69982004 wrote on Reddit. “That could be brought back as The Skype Game or something.”
Super Ball!!
Yes, two exclamation points! This game had contestants guessing the price of three prize items. For each correct guess, they’d get a shot at winning that prize through a Skee-Ball-like challenge. Then, if they guessed the price of a fourth item, they’d get the Super Ball. And if they sunk the Super Ball in the “WIN” hole, they’d win all the prizes.
“I miss Super Ball, but more for the sentimental entertainment value of playing high-stakes Skee-Ball,” wrote Jcs290. (And we’d give a shout-out to James, the contestant in the YouTube clip above, who explained to Barker he worked in a toilet paper factory seven days a week to “keep America wiping”)
Trader Bob
This game was relatively straightforward: Contestants started with one product and then had to pick one item from three other pairs of products, and they would win if each selection was more expensive than the last.
“I think Trader Bob had a decent setup,” bluegambit875 said. “But it was complicated, production-wise, with all three models busy … criss-crossing the stage to move those podiums. I think there was room to simplify the game to keep it moving.”
Walk of Fame
In this Walk of Fame, players had to guess the retail price of increasingly expensive prize items with increasingly wide margins of error. If they guessed a price outside of the range for one item, they’d draw a Price Is Right autograph book from a stack as a consolation prize. And if that book had the words “second chance” written inside, they’d get a second chance at the other prizes.
The game was reportedly retired due to inflation, but 42069CakeDay says, “If inflation is such an issue, why not increase the win ranges?”
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