The Phone Home Game
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The Phone Home Game was a pricing game on the American television game show, The Price Is Right. Played from the Season 12 premiere on September 12, 1983 to November 3, 1989, it was played for a cash prize of up to $15,000 and used grocery items.
Its name came from an event in the feature film E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.[citation needed]
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[edit] Gameplay
During much of the 1980s, The Price Is Right had a feature called "Play Along", where viewers were invited to send postcards to the show for a chance to receive the same prizes won by the in-studio contestants. The Phone Home Game took this concept to another level, having the person whose postcard was drawn participate by telephone in a cooperative effort with the in-studio contestant to split a cash prize of up to $15,000. The home player communicated by way of a telephone receiver as part of the game's prop.
The in-studio contestant was shown a game board listing seven grocery items, each having an amount of money concealed beside it. The home player had been prepared with a list of the products and their actual prices. The home player gave the in-studio contestant three prices, one at a time. The in-studio contestant had to match the price to the correct product on the board. If they were correct, the two contestants earned the amount of money concealed next to that product on the board, which was not revealed until the end of the game. If the pick was wrong, no money was earned and both the wrongly-guessed product and the product which actually matched the price were taken out of play (since the price of the incorrect choice was revealed).
Once all three prices were played, the money concealed beside any correctly guessed products was revealed and the two players split the winnings evenly.
The home player was only supposed to give a price to the in-studio contestant; if the home viewer read out the name of an item the team lost a turn.
[edit] Prize Money
The seven products concealed the following prize amounts: $200 and $1,000 were each on the board twice and the top three prizes of $2,000, $3,000, and $10,000 each appeared once for a top prize of $15,000.
[edit] History
For the week of August 22-26, 1983, The Price Is Right aired a special week of new shows simply to advertise the debut of The Phone Home Game.
At least two teams split the $15,000 top prize (April 17, 1986 and June 30, 1988); there were also teams who won nothing – including one in which the home player named a product instead of a price on all three turns and completely wasted the game.
The home viewer was called before the taping of the show began and was put on hold until the game was played. The staff reasoned that keeping someone on hold for over 20 minutes would be impolite, so the game was always played in the first half of a show.
From 1983-1988, The Phone Home Game went on hiatus from October or November until January or February so the show could present its annual Home Viewer Showcase.
Until the set was revamped in 2007, there was still a jack for The Phone Home Game's telephone to be plugged into on the frame of one of the show's Big Doors.
The at-home participants in this game forfeited their eligibility to become an in-studio contestant on Price; this was eliminated on November 13, 2007 in favor of a new rule permitting past contestants to appear on the show again after ten years.
The Phone Home Game was one of only two pricing games that used seven grocery items (the other being Hurdles).
The Phone Home Game was the only game where the main Price theme was not played at the end of the game; the cue used to open the game was also used to end it, and $10,000 wins were accompanied by the theme mixed with the "clang/whoop" sound effect traditionally played with big wins. The main theme was used for a post-game contestant plug for The Phone Home Game.
[edit] Retirement
The Phone Home Game was retired because the staff thought the game took too long to play and didn't draw enough interest. There may also have been complaints by at-home players that they would be ineligible to become contestants on the show itself.
Although the game appeared to go into its usual hiatus in November 1989, the Home Viewer Showcase (which was usually presented and held from November through January) was not presented until the week of April 23, 1990. In addition, "Summer Fun" ended up being the last Home Viewer Showcase.
[edit] Foreign Versions
At least one country has had a foreign version of this game - Germany, where the game was called "Heisser Draht" (Hot Wire) with similar gameplay and a DM15,000 (€7,669) top prize.
