I actually kind of like the FOX game show Greed, but goddamn is it hard to actually get any money out of it. There's also the off chance that, if your teammates trip over their first-round answer, that you don't even get to play. So, I kinda feel like making my own version of it.
I'll be going under the assumption that the reader knows how Greed plays out. If not, the rules are here, and there are plenty of episodes on YouTube.
So here goes, with my version of Greed.
The game is now ten questions long (up from eight), plus the Qualifier.
The Qualifier round plays the same, but heck, add a $10K bonus for a dead-on response because why not?
The format of the first round is completely new. Each of the five participants will get a question with two correct answers out of five options. Getting both answers is not necessarily required in the first round. A correct answer awards the player one share of the pot and adds $500 to the cash guarantee. The captain still has the option to reject one answer and substitute their own. All five players will play the first round, even if not every correct answer is found, unless it becomes impossible for them to advance to round two.
If the team has not amassed at least five shares total, or (more likely) two players don't have any shares, the game ends and everyone leaves empty-handed. Otherwise, play continues and everyone is guaranteed the amount they've won to that point per share, which means everyone could be guaranteed up to $10K regardless of what happens, whether they lose in round two or they get Terminated.
Round two is calculated in money per share rather than pot total. (For simplicity, the total amount would be shown on screen, but it would be an amount based on (share value × number of total shares).) There are now five questions in the second half of the game:
- $10K per share (max $100K)
- $20K per share (max $200K)
- $50K per share (max $500K)
- $100K per share (max $1M)
- $250K per share (max $2.5M)
- These amounts might also be increased to compensate for people potentially not getting as many shares, but the round 1 questions would generally be fairly easy.
Aside from that, it plays out a lot like the second half of Greed as it was, with each question being a team effort.
The captain still decides for the team, except for the final question, whether to continue to the next question.
The Terminator is still played before the $20K/sh, $50K/sh, and $100K/sh questions and is played for the total shares between both players (and captainship, as appropriate). The challenger still gets $10K fixed, win or lose. For some added spice, the Terminator may also be weighted toward players with fewer shares.
A Freebie is given before the $20K/sh question and can be used anytime before the final question to remove one incorrect response. If the team still has the Freebie on the $100K/sh question, they may also sell it for a guarantee of $100K fixed per remaining contestant.
Buyouts are still offered at the $20K/sh and $50K/sh questions for 10% of the question's value, as with the original show. The buyout for the $100K/sh question is still an individual decision for some luxury prize + cash.
It is still an individual decision as to whether contestants want to go for the final question. Since, in the original series, it only ever happened one time, I want to make it clear that, if multiple contestants go for the final question, consultation between them is absolutely allowed.
So there we go, that is my version of Greed. It's a little more complex, but I feel it also gives more people the opportunity to actually play (since it's not necessarily an instant game over if someone gets their first-round question wrong), and the cash guarantee gives contestants an incentive to play deeper into the game, since they won't be leaving empty-handed if they reach round two.