Card Game (pricing game)
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Card Game is a pricing game on the American television game show The Price Is Right. Debuting on July 4, 1974, it is played for a car.
[edit] Gameplay
The goal of Card Game is to make a bid on the car that is within a certain range below the actual price of the car. First, the contestant draws a card from a special deck of seven cards to determine how close they must come to the car's price without going over. The values in that deck include two cards each of $1,000, $2,000 and $3,000; and one $5,000 card.
The contestant is then given an opening bid of $15,000, and asked to draw cards from a standard deck of "Big Bicycle" oversized playing cards. The cards drawn are used to increase the contestant's bid: Number cards add the face value multiplied by $100 to the bid, while face cards, like tens, are each worth $1,000. Contestants may draw as many cards as they want until they believe their bid is within the required range. When they decide to stop, the price of the car is revealed and compared to the contestant's bid; if the bid falls in range, the contestant wins the car.
Aces are wild in Card Game; if a contestant draws an ace, they can add any value they wish to their bid. Contestants are allowed to use an ace when it is drawn, or save it for later use. They are also allowed to continue drawing after playing an ace, although the ace can effectively make their final bid whatever they want it to be.
[edit] History
Card Game has undergone a series of rules changes, mostly because of inflation:
- 1974-1983 - No opening bid. The deck used to determine the winning range had cards from $200 to $1,000 (in increments of $100), with one card for each value. Aces were worth anything up to $1,000.
- 1983-1993 - The opening bid was $2,000. The special deck used 12 cards, with two each of $500-$1,000 (in increments of $100). Aces from this point forward have had no upper limit.
- 1993-2001 - The opening bid was $8,000. The special deck consisted of 12 cards, with three each of $500, $1,000, $1,500, and $2,000.
- 2001-2005 - The opening bid was $10,000. No changes to the special deck.
- 2005-2008 - The opening bid was $12,000. The opening deck was changed to two each of $1,000, $2,000, and $3,000, and one $5,000.
- April 22nd, 2008-Present - The opening bid is $15,000. No changes to the special deck.
When the game's rules were changed on March 16, 1983, the game was retitled "New Card Game" for approximately a year; in addition, the table received a new logo and paint job. Sometime in 1984 after the original name was restored, the game received another new paint job and a new 5-digit bid display, allowing it to be played for more expensive cars.
In the later years of his tenure, former Price Is Right host Bob Barker had contestants drawing an ace simply say what they wanted their final bid to be, instead of requiring them to do the math and come up with a value to add to the bid.
Current host Drew Carey has returned to asking contestants to decide a value for drawn aces instead of stating a total bid, though he accepts final bids if a contestant offers one instead of a value to add.
