In the last experiment in this run of the Game Garage, it is time for a proper quiz show.
One player against the game, all or nothing questions, and for me personally,
the challenge of fitting a very tall man inside a not very tall space.
Welcome to the Game Garage.
Thank you very much for joining us, we are playing Keep It or Dump It,
but before we start, do you want to introduce yourself to our audience?
Okay, thanks Tom. My name is Matthew.
I am a developer, professionally.
I used to work for a glamorous international record label and now, I make insurance software.
In my spare time, I enjoy crosswords and competitive quizzing, and competitive crosswords.
So you are a competitive quizzer as well, so...
-Yes. -David, please dump the non-metals.
-Yes. -How confident are you?
How much do you want to stake your claim that you’re going to win this, versus hedge your bets?
Well, it’s a very different format so I’m slightly nervous about that.
So am I! I’ve never tested this.
Where I come from, you get asked a question, you give the answer.
Here, it’s a little bit more complex than that, so we’ll have to see how it pans out,
but hopefully, I can translate some of the skills to this format.
There are seven questions between you and 5,000 pence.
Erm, the...
-That’s a lot of pence. -It is, it is.
It’s not a shovel and pennies.
The first two questions are going to be on the same category.
-Yeah. -You’re absolutely clear.
-Yeah. -And you get to choose.
It is Geography, Science, Pop Culture or Sport.
What do you want your first two questions to be on?
I’m going to rule out sport for probably the whole thing.
Erm, I think...
let’s start with something I’m moderately confident on
but not necessarily my strongest subject.
-Let’s go for science. -Let’s go for science. Alright.
Some shows have a fancy graphics display board and big projections.
We have David.
David, it’s science, please.
Antimony, carbon, copper, gold, iron, lead, magnesium, mercury,
neon, potassium, silver, sodium, tin, silicon, sulphur.
Those are the fifteen elements we’ve got for you.
Can I please have the bowl of scrolls?
Thank you very much.
Extremely high budget here today; pick a bowl from the scroll.
No!
Our catchphrase has gone, that’s gonna make the edit as well, isn’t it?
Please pick a scroll from the bowl.
What have you got?
‘Elements where the name and the chemical symbol start with different letters.’
Alright, so your choice is keep the elements
where the name and the chemical symbol start with different letters or dump them.
As long as there's one left on the board, you’ve passed the question.
-More is better though. -I am thinking that I want to keep elements
where the name and chemical symbols start with different letters
because I think that will keep more than half of the things on this board.
Okay. Anything you recognise up there?
Antimony is going to be Sb.
Iron is Fe, Gold is Au, Lead is Pb.
Mercury is Hg.
Potassium, I hope, is K.
Silver is Ag, Tin is Sn.
You have picked a home category here, haven’t you?
So... Sodium is Na, so I’m hoping to get maybe nine left over.
Yeah, whatever happens, first question, you are going to lose some and that’s fine.
As long as you’ve got one left on the board, you’re still in the game.
I’m pretty confident of having one left there, Tom.
So final decision?
You want to...
I’m keeping the elements where the name and chemical symbol start with different letters;
dumping anything where the name and chemical symbol are the same.
David, please keep the elements
where the name and the chemical symbols start with different letters.
-Carbon is gone. -Yeah.
Copper is gone.
Magnesium is gone.
Neon... you’ve got a lot left here.
And silicon’s gone, and sulphur is gone.
That’s good.
You couldn’t have done any better on that.
One, two, three, four, five, six gone
but that means you’ve got nine left for the next question, it’s a great start.
That was what I was expecting, so it is a good start.
I was gonna tell you more about that, but I think you named all those elements, so excellent.
We’re past the first question now, which means you also have a new option,
-which is to just burn a scroll. -Oh yes.
Once during your game, if you really don’t like that question,
we can burn it, throw it away and you get the choice to pick another.
But obviously after that, you’re taking whatever’s coming out of there.
It may happen in this round.
We’ll see.
-Or maybe I should save it till the end. -Please, pick another scroll from the bowl.
Let’s just try this one on the top.
Question two, and the last one in this category.
Elements usually regarded as non-metallic.
I am seeing a lot of metallic-type elements there,
so I am going to dump the non-metals and keep the metals.
Okay, that was a quick decision.
It’s your home category.
Look at this board, there’s quite a few obvious metals there, Tom.
Oh. Oh right.
That’s... there’s nothing?
-That’s flawless. -Okay.
That’s, both... so that’s both a great pick from here...
I realise that was, that was pure luck
but you picked one where there was a correct option and you went for it.
If you’d have got that wrong, everything on that board would have fallen
and you’d have been out of the game.
That would have been embarrassing.
That is a really good first category, so that’s great.
Two questions down, two questions to go in the next category and then you’re going for the money.
So it’s time to pick the next category.
You have Pop Culture, Geography and Sport left on the board.
Now, you want; I suspect sport isn’t going to get used here, from what you said.
Not my category.
So pop culture or geography?
The one I’m slightly worried about still is pop culture,
so I’m going to try and get it out of the way.
The magical display board has somehow changed.
The nine you had left are now nine celebrities.
John Cusack, Drew Carey, Kim Cattrall, Oprah Winfrey, Rachel McAdams,
Nicki Minaj, Hugh Grant, Kylie Minogue, Damian Lewis.
Nine is perhaps a good position to be in here,
because I suspect that pop culture is not your strongest subject here.
Well, well, I recognise most of these people but er, I don’t know how they all fit together so,
so let’s find out.
Well, it might be better to have this here, before you get into the all or nothing at the end.
You could still lose this all in one question, we know that.
-Could do. -And it’s gonna depend on which scroll you pick.
So for question three, please pick a scroll from the bowl.
I’m taking straight from the top, let’s have a look.
-I don’t wanna... I wanna see this catch fire. -Alright.
-Ooh!
What have you got?
Celebrities that have acted for a Simpsons TV cartoon.
Ooh, any of those celebrities that have ever acted in the Simpsons on TV?
Ah, this seems like such a big pot luck question,
because a lot of celebrities have been on the Simpsons
and my ability to identify which ones is not great.
So it could go either way here, couldn’t it?
I think I might just burn this one, you know.
Yeah? First one on pop culture is going?
It’s too much of a...
Too much of an either-or?
I mean, I don’t know how you’ll feel about the other pop culture ones, but...
-Well. -I imagine sport would have been worse?
-I’d burn them all. -Haha.
There you go, it’s gone.
That question is burned.
So that’s gone, that’s absolutely gone.
Just for the folks at home, here are the celebrities that were on a Simpsons TV show.
Pick another scroll.
Alright, let’s hope this one isn’t even worse.
Celebrities born in the USA.
Right, that’s a simple one.
Do you want to keep the celebrities born in the USA or dump the celebrities born in the USA?
Oh, this one’s going to be quite close, I think.
Erm... I think I’m going to keep the born in the USA celebrities.
I think it’s close but I think the majority of these are probably American.
If they all turn out to be Canadian, I’ll be very sad.
Do you want to talk it through?
Alright, well we’ve got Kylie there who is probably Australian.
Hugh Grant, I hope he’s British, otherwise he’s been lying to us all these years.
Damian Lewis could be British, but I’ve seen people like John Cusack,
Rachel McAdams, Drew Carey, Kim Cattrall, Oprah Winfrey,
all of whom are if not necessarily born in the USA, at least associated with America.
So I’m hoping for at least four or five Americans here, and out of nine.
Alright, so what are you going to do?
-Are you going to... -I’m keeping the Americans.
-We’re not counting translations here. -Okay.
-Keep the celebrities from the USA.
Alright, David, please keep the ones that were born in the USA.
Okay, Kim Cattrall. Liverpool, UK, apparently.
Rachel McAdams. London, Ontario, Canada.
Ah, Canadian!
Nicki Minaj, Trinidad and Tobago.
Yes, yes, yes.
Obviously, Hugh.
Hugh Grant, London, UK.
Oh, getting on.
Damian Lewis, I think he’s British, isn’t he?
Yes, he is!
Oh no! It’s a tough round.
It was a tough round, but you’ve still got three on the board.
There’s only one pop culture question left.
You’ve got John Cusack, Drew Carey, Oprah Winfrey.
Pick a scroll from the bowl.
-Oh, come on, scroll. -You can’t burn this one.
Be kinder.
Oh, goodness me.
What have you got?
Celebrities that are practicing vegetarians.
Whoo! Any thoughts, or is it going to be a stab in the dark?
My first instinct was to say, well, there aren’t that many vegetarians and get rid of them,
but I don’t know.
Oprah’s a lovely lady, isn’t she?
She might easily be a vegetarian.
John Cusack, I wouldn’t put it past him at all.
-So don’t forget, this could be three and zero. -I know.
It could be two and one.
Oh yeah, I don’t know.
You only need one to go through.
Alright, I’ll play against the... the goodness of my fellow human beings
and hope that at least one of them is a meat eater.
I will dump the vegetarians, much though it pains me to do this.
Alright.
David, please... and this sounds like bad relationship advice: dump the vegetarians.
Oh no.
You’re clear.
-So the next question is... -Ah!
-You’re absolutely clear!
Am I?
All three of those are meat eaters.
John Cusack is a meat eater, Drew Carey, meat eater.
Oprah Winfrey does promote vegetarian eating, but doesn’t practice it herself.
You are through pop culture with three still on the board.
What category do you want to play for the money for?
You’ve got three questions left.
Get through the first one, 1,000 pence.
Get through the second, 2,000.
Get through all three, 5,000 pence.
That’s a lot of pence. I’m going to have to go for geography.
As I’ve said all along, sport is not my bag.
It’s going to be enough.
I’ve been intimidated by this, so come on, geography, you can do it for me.
David, can we have the geography question, please?
Athens, New York, Paris.
You had three celebrities on the board; you’re now left with three cities on the board.
This is the first question where you’re going for money.
If one of those cities is still standing after this question...
Let me rephrase that.
If one of these cities is still on the board after this question, 1,000 pence.
-Best of luck to you! -Thank you.
For 1,000 pence, pick a scroll.
Alright, let’s see.
Er, cities that have chosen to change their name.
Cities that have chosen to change their name, so they’ve ever been known by a different name.
But we’re talking name change.
Oh, I know New York has changed its name, I think.
I think I know that, and I think Paris has been known by different names thousands of years ago,
a long time ago.
So I’m going to keep cities that have changed their name at some point
because I think there’s one to two of those.
Okay.
David, please, for 1,000 pence,
please keep the cities that have chosen to change their name.
We just need one to stay on the board.
Athens has gone.
Okay. And that’s it.
-That’s what I thought, good. -That’s it.
Congratulations, that is 1,000 pence.
Oh, I wanted it in pence. Aww!
So it’s your choice. You can now take the money....
Or you can hand that back to me,
and take another scroll for 2,000 pence and maybe a shot at 5,000.
-I’ve got two on the board, I’ve got this far. -You’ve got two on the board.
I’m going to... I’m going to keep going for at least one more.
That is gone.
That is back in my pocket.
There’s a perfectly good chance that this could just be a one-each-way.
Or it could be a two-nil.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So question six of seven, for 2,000 pence, pick a scroll from the bowl.
Cities that are national capitals.
Now, we’re using the United Nations definition here.
I think you might be in luck here.
Hmm.
This seems like a quizzer’s dream, this does.
If I go out on this one, something’s gone wrong.
So I’m pretty sure that Paris is the capital of France, as most people probably are.
I’m pretty sure that New York is not, in fact, the capital of the USA which is Washington DC.
So I’ve got to decide which one stays and which one goes, really.
Yeah, that’s an important question because if, if you’re sure that’s one all,
you know what you’re going for then it’s whether you want to take that shot at fifty,
seeing which one you want to keep.
As an interesting side point; I was born in New York
so I’m going to keep that one and dump the city that is a national capital.
Alright, David.
Please dump the national capitals.
I think we know what’s going to happen here.
Yeah, there goes Paris; New York is left.
2,000 pence.
Congratulations, you nailed it with just one left!
Congratulations, I will hand that over to you again.
So you have the same choice.
Oh, that’s gone in the pocket.
That’s gone straight in the pocket.
So, it is your choice.
2,000 pence: take it away with you or one more scroll and one more capital, go for 5,000 pence.
I’m on the knife edge here, aren’t I, with one thing left on the board?
But with more than double the prize money at stake, I’ve got to go for it, I think.
Alright, can I have my money back, please?
-Oh man! -Haha!
Very best of luck to you.
It all comes down to this: there is one thing left on the board; it is New York.
It could be easy. This could be easy, this could be not.
What have you got?
Cities that have hosted a modern Olympic Games, Winter or Summer.
So we’re looking for anything that has hosted any modern Olympic Games, Winter or Summer.
You can keep it or you can dump it.
Even though New York is a really big city,
I think it might not have hosted an Olympic Games, though I’m really not sure.
I think there was a ‘might’ in there.
Yeah, so it’s a bit edgy for me, but I’m going to dump hosts of modern Olympic Games
because I can’t remember if New York has done it.
But I think based on what I know, I’m not sure it has.
So dump the Olympic hosts, please.
Alright.
David, for 5,000 pence, please dump the Olympic host cities.
You’re clear!
5,000 pence.
Wow!
Put the scroll away, you don’t need it anymore.
That is...
Ah!
Fifty quid, 5,000 pence.
You’ve made it through with just one remaining at the end; that’s all you needed.
It was exciting till the very end, because I would have rather had a different question on that.
Congratulations, that’s all yours.
That’s been the Game Garage; we’ll see you next time.
Thank you.