Apologies for the delay, but I'll catch up on these through the week.

The world's biggest game show is back... with an ALL NEW LOOK! Plus, the biggest changes to the quiz format since I started watching in 2006.

For what I think is the first time since the show began in 2002, we have radical visual changes. The set has been completely redone; two video screens replace the one wildly underused one from the old set, and there's a US-style staircase with the models standing there from the very beginning.


Welcome to your new Arena Of Quiz. Even better than the old one.

The music has been dramatically rearranged and very much orchestral (I like in principle, not sure in practice), even the intro has changed. (I miss the truck going through Amsterdam).


It's just not the same.

The bonus jackpot shared between lottery ticket-holders in the final contestant's postcode is back, too!


Hence "3x 5 MILJOEN EURO". One for the contestant in the studio, one for the home viewer, and now one for the lottery ticket-holders again. For a while, that last one had gone, and the introduction showed "2x 5 MILJOEN EURO" instead.

There are still 500 contestants in ten blocks - and one family member for each, so 1,000 in the studio - but there is no division between tiers, and each block represents a certain high-level (four-digit) postcode area, with the main town or city in that area named.


So this is postcode area 1705, for the town of Heerhugowaard.

Round one is now five questions, with question 3 a video question with a charity tie-in, and instead of each block competing against each other, it's the top player in each block (ties broken by speed of response) who progresses to the next round. This actually works in my opinion; everyone has a rooting interest from their home town in round two, and at least 49 will be wildly cheering from the very start of the DoND round. It also means we get to know each finalist from early on.

After a final question about the winner of China's Got Talent (who plays the piano with their feet), and Linda getting excited that each finalist has a "10% chance" of making the final, the winners from each block are revealed, and we move on to the new second round!

Ten contestants, over an hour of the show left. Product placement... and I think that's ALL 500 PLAYERS who have won a mini camcorder!

We enter the second part, and there's a head-to-head faceoff layout to the set. Eh, wha? Ah, they've been paired off in some order or another, and five will go through to round three. The survey questions are back; whoever is closest to the right answer goes through; anyone who guesses on the nose gets a Brand New Car. The crowd sound very lively, with a huge cheer from each block as "their" player goes up. This is definitely a bonus of the new quiz round.

Someone called Roland almost won a car - he guessed 350 out of 490 people would admit to picking their nose, and the actual answer was 351. I'd be embarrassed to win a car like that. Not least because I can't drive. Anyway, we have five finalists, and we cut to Winston advertising the Golden Case online game... and it's actually an online game of DoND with a €100k top prize it seems!


Yes, really. Sadly the game isn't available to actually play on that site, it's a prize promotion.

As I was saying. We have five finalists. They explain the third round, and then someone cycles into the studio on a bicycle, with someone else riding pillion. Only in the Netherlands. Oh, they're giving away €10,000, it's in a case on the bicycle! Nice.


They then go pedalling to the block when it's revealed, then the player name is revealed. Esther Tillema-Stam from Heerhugowaard got ten grand here should you care.

Riiight. Let's do this. We have five finalists. Finally. "Five desks, five contestants... we will lose three". Oh it looks like it's stolen from the old Channel Four gameshow "Number One", get a right answer and you go up a place, get a wrong answer and you go down (if you guess wrong from the bottom spot, you get locked out for one question). The players are sorted based on how close to the exact answer they were in the last round. This is another reason I left this recap late - I misinterpreted it and thought it was some unfair luck being added, but have learned otherwise. The player starting in position 5 hilariously leaps up to position 1 within 30 seconds. 100 seconds on the clock, whoever is in the bottom place at this point is eliminated, and then we repeat again, and again, to leave two contestants for the final showdown. (€1k, €2k, and €3k to the eliminated players in this round, in that order.)

After Josie dominated the round, she gets a bad run, gets stuck in position 3 from nowhere, and then gets the very last question right to make the final! Monique the unlucky loser there; Josie and Roland the finalists.

This bit hasn't changed. We interview the two players, and then it's the money clock countdown. Press the button, the cash is yours, and the other player gets to play the DoND bit. If neither does up to a predetermined but uncertain limit, it's a quiz showdown. Roland stops at €22,400! Amazingly early, and Josie gets to play for €5,000,000!

Before then, we get a truly bizarre bit where someone in the audience is given a bell for no discernible reason. An adbreak is needed, we get one, and here come the models. The model walk music hasn't changed from last season, though I mixed it up with the US music at first. It's been a while. Josie, wearing distinctive red glasses, and with young male partner Robin in the studio with her, has an interview with Linda that went completely over my head. Linda mentioned €500,000 somewhere, but I missed any context. Anyway, she has CASE 8. We cut to the independent adjudicator, and apparently the bell relates to a prize of some sort. Then they mention a night in a posh hotel, worth €250. I laughed. €10,000 goes to someone in Oldenzaal - Karel Holsbeek, to be exact. I think the night in a posh hotel goes to everyone in that block, but I may be totally wrong.

Ah, I see, the models are now case-openers in the US fashion, something made necessary by the fact there are no longer 26 finalists.

The game's the same, the board's the same (though the graphics are now different, similar but not identical to the US graphics, and there's a properly stylised board in view of both the cameras and the player)... Linda cues the "exciting music", and away we go!

ROUND 1
13 - €2,500. With no reaction, except for Linda saying "oh! That's a good beginning!"
1 - €20!
19 - €1,000,000! Now they react. "That is unlucky," Linda says. Completely pointless laser effect to remove that amount from the board.
18 - €200,000. They really haven't sorted out the audience non-reaction in the early rounds.
5 - €10,000. "Not with six zeroes," Linda demands of the next one.
11 - €750,000! "Oo-ee!" Linda pretty much asked for that.

Top two in play, at least...

OFFER €28,000


Which showed up on an LED ticker above the staircase. Niice.

NO DEAL, obviously.

ROUND 2
21 - €25,000.
15 - €1,000. One on the left at last!
26 - the bell rings. I have since discovered that the audience member can ring this at any time during round 1 or 2, and will win whatever's in the next case or €50,000, whatever is lower... €0.20. To huge GROANS from the audience. This really doesn't work. Still, it's good for Josie, and on we go...
2 - €10! That one gets applauded.
7 - €500,000! Linda thought it was the jackpot, there! It's not, but it's not good either.

OFFER €73,000

"Six cases higher", Josie points out. Linda adds that €73,000 is a lot of money. Not enough for this board, though, and NO DEAL it is.

ROUND 3
22 - €75,000.
"We need the cent."
3 - €500. Or that... and there is applause!
10 - €5,000,000! Oh dear.
Adbreak, after which...

we get the previous offer graphic from the US version! Looks almost identical, but not quite.
24 - €1! And now Linda gets excited at last.



There's €3.35m on this board and I'm prepared to describe it as being relatively bad. A terrifying thought.

"Over a ton?" Linda asks... that'd be €100,000...

OFFER €97,000

Not quite. Crowd offer advice... I'd go on... stair lights flash red... "One more?", she seems to ask to Robin... NO DEAL!

Linda points to the tiny amounts on the board. They need to be hit, obviously.

ROUND 4
17 - €50!
20 - €0.01! Linda squeals! She's overemotional late in games, she really is. "Come on," she says, with one to open...
14 - €5,000! A fabulous round, and what a time for it!

Now we've got a game. Three-in-eight chance that there's €300k or more in the case, to say nothing of the €2.5m staying in play...

OFFER €180,000

I instinctively guessed €200,000. I'd go one more here, as there's three higher with two to open, and it's under half the mean. Josie talks through the situation she's now in, something she said draws applause. Linda reminds us there's two to open. Crowd offer noisy advice... she's tapping her fingers nervously... taking a while, this is a big decision for her... DEAL!

The obligatory-for-this-show confetti spray at the Deal. Both Josie and Linda are agreeing that's "so much money". What now?

PROVEOUT
16 - €400,000...
12 - €50,000. Would have been survival, that round, but no more... still no proveout offers...
25 - €5!
23 - €300,000. "Ooh!"
6 - €100! Oh dear... this could have been enormous now...
24 - €2,500,000! And that's that.

Case 4 is opened... that's got €100,000! Josie's case 8 had €0.50! Too soon, but goodness was that ever better than going too late! And we finish with the obligatory live giveaway to an unsuspecting home viewer. Keith Chegwin can only dream of giving away €180,000.

I think I like the new format, although there's a couple of things (notably the bell) which don't work so well. The new five-player round is rather good, and the head-to-heads get the crowd going.