New old games in the J! Archive

[TimMierz]

There are some toughies there, for sure, but some strange responses showing strange interpretations of the clues.

If you're only playing from the Archive text without watching the video, some of what you read may be incomprehensible, because you may have in mind that the game is being played like a modern game. But in these early-season games, the name of the game was to ring in as soon as the clue was revealed--before comprehension of what the clue was asking for was even possible. Alex would rush through the clue read and then recognize the buzz-winning player by name almost is if the player's name were the last word of the clue, except even more hurriedly than that. Alex would pretty much delete any space at all between the end of the last word of the clue and the player recognition.

So, forced with this immense pressure to ring in first, before the gist of the clue can possibly be absorbed, there are naturally going to be a lot more weird guesses.

If it's astounding to us as fans of the modern show that the Trebek revival survived its first season this way, it should be even more astounding that the Fleming J! ran this way for 10-15 years (depending on how you count).

The innovation of the activatable lights around the board and not being able to ring in until after the clue read was complete and the lights were activated was the single most important change to gameplay in the show's history.

I was just reading along, so I definitely missed the distinction between the early "rush to ring in ASAP" and today's chance for comprehension. Thanks for the clarification and context!

[MarkBarrett]

Courtesy of A YT upload I added 3/1/9: https://j-archive.com/showgame.php?game_id=7641

Player pics of Ray Harp, Ben Macrory and Stephen Krisa:

Spoiler

[AndyTheQuizzer]

Courtesy of the National Archives of Game Show History, we have 1985-01-14: https://j-archive.com/showgame.php?game_id=7643

Player pictures of Rudi Logan, Tom Waters, and Rick Thierbach:

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Why did I pick this game today? Well, Tom Waters was considered a quiz bowl legend of his time and considered one of his era's best players.

[seaborgium]

I remember Rudi from one of Mark Richards's practice game videos that he uploaded to YouTube.

[Bamaman]

Courtesy of the National Archives of Game Show History, we have 1985-01-14: https://j-archive.com/showgame.php?game_id=7643

Player pictures of Rudi Logan, Tom Waters, and Rick Thierbach:

Spoiler

Why did I pick this game today? Well, Tom Waters was considered a quiz bowl legend of his time and considered one of his era's best players.

There is a stray percent sign in J11.

Thanks for getting the game in

[MarkBarrett]

Courtesy of the National Archives of Game Show History I added 6/15/90: https://j-archive.com/showgame.php?game_id=7644

Player pics of Maureen Walker, Eric Terzuolo and Steve Janssen:

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I matched Maureen and Steve and had [****] as well. [***]? That's some 5xer stuff to show off with that name.

[AndyTheQuizzer]

Courtesy of the National Archives of Game Show History, we have Tom Waters' second game, 1985-01-15: https://www.j-archive.com/showgame.php?game_id=7645

Player pictures of Don Adams, Jacque Erdrich, and Tom Waters:

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This one felt more "normal", and we almost saw 30 clues in Double Jeopardy!

As a treat, we got this in the bumper between J! and DJ!:

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[MarkBarrett]

Courtesy of a YT upload I added 10/12/94: https://j-archive.com/showgame.php?game_id=7647

Player pics of Matt McDonald, Kevin Leonard and Bill Schilling:

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What a treat to archive this well-played game with little red. Kevin was so smooth and had ToCer written all over him. Until the FJ! round. I've seen mythology mess up players many times, but 0/3 on that clue?

[AndyTheQuizzer]

Courtesy of the National Archives of Game Show History, we have Tom Waters' third game (1985-01-16): https://www.j-archive.com/showgame.php?game_id=7649

Player pictures of Gail Sherman, Jim Burland, and Tom Waters:

Spoiler

I guess the quiz bowl canon was larger than the Jeopardy! canon even in 1985—on multiple occasions, I had to Google to figure out what Tom's incorrect response was (and it was significantly more obscure than the intended response).

Jim 100% showed up to play, though, and this was one of the better Season 1 battles.

[LucarioSnooperVixey]

I guess the quiz bowl canon was larger than the Jeopardy! canon even in 1985—on multiple occasions, I had to Google to figure out what Tom's incorrect response was (and it was significantly more obscure than the intended response).

Are you talking about Bartolomeo Cristofori? He isn’t that obscure. He is widely regarded as the inventor of the piano.

[AndyTheQuizzer]

I guess the quiz bowl canon was larger than the Jeopardy! canon even in 1985—on multiple occasions, I had to Google to figure out what Tom's incorrect response was (and it was significantly more obscure than the intended response).

Are you talking about Bartolomeo Cristofori? He isn’t that obscure. He is widely regarded as the inventor of the piano.

And he's never been a correct response. He's shown up in clues a handful of times as a clue for "piano" or alongside "piano".

Also, Wyomia Tyus v. Mary Decker in a 1984 context.

[MarkBarrett]

Courtesy of a YT upload I added 3/2/95: https://j-archive.com/showgame.php?game_id=7650

Player pics of Joe Sharkey, Susan Trybull and Ben Macrory:

Spoiler

[Robert K S]

I can't wait until you get to the one where Ben wrote his FJ! response in Chinese.

[AndyTheQuizzer]

I can't wait until you get to the one where Ben wrote his FJ! response in Chinese.

You know, I was thinking that I might give Mark a hand with one of these later games—on second thought, I think I'll stick to Season 1 shenanigans, thank you.

[MarkBarrett]

I can't wait until you get to the one where Ben wrote his FJ! response in Chinese.

You know, I was thinking that I might give Mark a hand with one of these later games—on second thought, I think I'll stick to Season 1 shenanigans, thank you.

The OCR loves these S11 games and thanks for the heads up about the Chinese as I'm only watching the games as I archive them.

[MinnesotaMyron]

I can't wait until you get to the one where Ben wrote his FJ! response in Chinese.

I had to check to see if you were kidding. You weren't. Ha!

[Robert K S]

Chinese is nothing to be afraid of, really, though. Especially with Google translate being able to spit out the characters, which you should be able to evaluate and copy & paste.

If you need any help, let me know. My household has three native Chinese speakers (and a few more learners).

[MinnesotaMyron]

Chinese is nothing to be afraid of, really, though. Especially with Google translate being able to spit out the characters, which you should be able to evaluate and copy & paste.

If you need any help, let me know. My household has three native Chinese speakers (and a few more learners).

It looks like what he wrote matches the first three characters of the "Simplified Chinese" in the box on the wikipedia page.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square

天安门

Screenshot of FJ:

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[Robert K S]

The middle character is recognizable to beginner students as the word for tranquility. It depicts a woman kneeling in a house.

[alietr]

It looks like he's smirking as he's writing it.