The Wall (American game show)
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The Wall is an American game show series where contestants answer trivia and drop balls down the eponymous wall like a giant pachinko machine, with the slot the ball landing holding a value. Questions answered correctly result in the ball drop being a positive value, and wrong answers resulting in negative values. Thus the game is one of risk management, in conjunction with trivia skills and luck.
First aired on NBC in 2016 according to Gold Derby. LeBron James is involved with the show, and once delivered the winnings to contestants according to the website Cleveland.com. A number of international versions also exist.
Different from Pink Floyd's The Wall.
Tropes used in The Wall (American game show) include:
- The Announcer: Chris Hardwick plays host.
- All or Nothing: Downplayed with the contract mechanic. The risk isn’t necessarily that the players will end with nothing, though that is a strong possibility, the risk is that they may end up with less then the guaranteed amount.
- Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Balls that win money are green, balls that loose money are red.
- Commercial Break Cliffhanger: Often cuts to commercial before a major part of the game.
- Downer Ending: Any team who gambles away the guaranteed winnings, then looses all their money.
- Dramatic Irony: Contestants must make decisions that affect their overall success without knowledge of the game state that the other possesses.
- Foreign Remake: Several international editions exist.
- Golden Snitch: Played straight and inverted. Some of the values are extremely large, and can either basically make the game or ruin a run, depending on context.
- Luck-Based Mission: Ultimately luck plays a big role in how a game goes because if the pachinko mechanics.
- Pinball Zone: The Wall becomes a giant pachinko machine outside the trivia sections.
- Prize Letdown: Players can hit a low denomination value during a drop when aiming for values worth thousands or more.
- Reaction Shot: The camera often cuts to the contestants for dramatic effect around big events.
- The Reveal: The state of the contract, and thus if the players get a smaller guaranteed sum or an all or nothing sum, is left undisclosed till the end of the show.
- Soundproof Booth: Used to create dramatic tension and additional strategy where contestants must make decisions with incomplete information the others and the viewer may have.
- Trailers Always Spoil: The previews around the commercials don’t show the actual results, but given the contestant reactions, it’s pretty easy to guess what happens.
- Whammy: Hitting a high value target with a red ball serves as this. Any result will result in the loss of whatever value was on that target, but a loss of a few bucks is easily survivable. A loss of a few hundred thousand or million is harder to weather.
- Zonk: When a green ball lands on a $1 slot.