In the beginning there was What’s My Line? Then came Magnus Magnusson and Mastermind. Now there is Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, and in the grand tradition of peak-time TV quiz shows, like the C64’s Play Your Cards Right and student fave Block Busters, it has made its journey to a game platform. Whereas TV shows from the distant past came in unwieldy boxes and relied on cut-out pieces of card or a healthy appetite for Ever Ready batteries, all you need for this game is your PSX and a mind f ... more >>

In the beginning there was What’s My Line? Then came Magnus Magnusson and Mastermind. Now there is Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, and in the grand tradition of peak-time TV quiz shows, like the C64’s Play Your Cards Right and student fave Block Busters, it has made its journey to a game platform. Whereas TV shows from the distant past came in unwieldy boxes and relied on cut-out pieces of card or a healthy appetite for Ever Ready batteries, all you need for this game is your PSX and a mind full of trivia.

Chris Tarrant, presenter of the hit TV show is on hand as the man with the questions. Let’s face it, …Millionaire, the game, would not be the same without him. Playing the game is simple: he asks the questions and you answer, hopefully correctly. Each correct answer will double the amount you have before you’re asked the question. There are four possible answers to choose from, and if you are stuck for a response, there are the familiar features from the TV programme to fall back on. You can go 50:50 where two possible answers are taken away, Ask The Audience gives you the chance to peruse the assembled throng’s opinion, and Phone-A-Friend lets you take advice from a voice from the ether, the ether in your author’s case being somewhere in the Midlands.

Who Wants To Be A Millionaire is a trivia game, no more no less, but get a few folks around the console, and it can turn into something of a battleground where you can reveal yourself as a walking encyclopaedia or a confused airhead. Good old-fashioned entertainment will never go out of style and …Millionaire fits the bill nicely.
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