People have been saying that once the £250,000 is won, ratings will begin to lower and the show will lose interest.

I don't agree with this because as we see on the UK and US versions of Millionaire?, is that after they crowned their first millionaire, ratings either stayed at a reasonable pace.

Deal or No Deal is simply a game. Just because a game is beaten, doesn't mean the game is over. Others will try to beat the game their way and may do it in a different, unique, or more exciting way (saying NO DEAL with £5 and £250,000 left). It would be nice to see another half a million or million pound prize game, but maybe for only special occasions.

Thus, I feel the show will still gain interest and good ratings by keeping the £250,000 prize the way it is. That's my opinion and stand, and I'm curious of what all of you think!


YAY for my first poll! haha

I agree. And while I wouldn't mind seeing an increase of the jackpot I think for the moment it should stay the same.

Each show is always so different, be it the way the board forms or the contestant sitting in the chair and while the main objective for the contestant is to win lots of money, for the viewer at home it is to be entertained, and while the jackpot has now been won it's no less entertaining than it was before.

Unlike Millionaire which is more formal in it's appearence DOND is more of a relaxed show with its emphasis on being entertaining with all manner of crazy stuff going on and always something different, and while Millionaire is a good old fashioned quiz with questions there's not as much interaction between everyone and is a more serious show.

So I think that DOND ratings may boost for a while but then gradualy fall back into their average figures and plenty of things to keep everyone entertained.

I think they should keep it exactly as it is, but have very occasional games involving the amounts of 500K or even £1,000,000 for primetime shows at Christmas and other special occasions.

I would argue that a jackpot increase would be broadly positive if it weren't for the players-on-the-wings element.

In terms of ratings though, Friday night £500,000 specials at 8:30 might work - the slot's occupied by Celebrity Big Brother this month, but after that it will probably be filled by something that will be lucky to draw a million viewers. The Italian version has done big-money Friday night games before, and they do have players in the wings (though I think some of those big-money shows involve celebrities, and Noel is quite right to insist he will never do one of those).

Conclusion: not sure.

Good idea actually, although that might make Sunday a relative anticlimax. The other option is to keep it as normal and have Sunday as an increased jackpot day.

I'd actually get rid of the Sunday shows in that context. After a great start they've mostly been rating below the weekday shows - even yesterday's show only picked up 4m according to overnight figures, and that's barely above the top weekday figures in recent weeks. It's also 700,000 below the top Saturday evening show from March - could a Saturday night £500,000 edition work? Depends on the competition: it could take on (and maybe kill off) Millionaire, and there's quite a few other shows it could take on too. However, Channel 4 must continue to avoid X-Factor and Strictly Come Dancing, the two biggest shows on UK television right now excluding soaps.

I think the jackpot could now be raised to make the show more exciting, well now see as every amount has been won except the 50p and jackpot raise would be in order.

I personally don't feel increasing the jackpot would make the show more exciting as such, it just means the contestant walks out with more money!

In 351 odd shows Noel has only been in the £250,000 situation 3 times, so it certainly isn't happening every other week (Post deal it has appeared more than 3 times of course!)

I find any game where there is a small / big final 2 and the contestant No Dealing exciting anyway

i'd love it. it would be much more exciting

Leave it as £250,000 for another year to give someone else a chance to win it and then maybe next year up it to £500,000. It will be very interesting and would be much harder to win than the £250k overall.

The problem with increasing the jackpot to £500,000 is it would mean larger offers at each stage that its still in play, and a greater chance of people walking early as a result which can make for a more boring game. Endemol wouldn't like increasing their overheads without the ratings significantly increasing. The evidence suggests that there wouldn't be a dramatic increase in ratings as far as the weekday shows are concerned, but having an increased jackpot for evening primetime and specials might give the viewing a boost.

This is true, but if they did have £500k primetime specials (which would undoubtedly pull in extra viewers), how would they select the contestants to play them? Wouldn't it be a bit unfair on the hundreds of other contestants who have played with £250k as the top prize? And if they had the £500k special on Fridays, I'd imagine the contestant who plays on Friday afternoon or Sunday would feel very irritated at missing the chance of getting to play for £500k by one show!

The Christmas £500k show method of the other players voting for a contestant to play is undoubtedly going to mean that it is still more likely to be a person who has been there for a long while will play, meaning the newbies may not get a chance at all. I'd also imagine if voting became the norm, we'd see the contestants acting differently to try and gain votes from people.

The other way to select the contestant "fairly" would be to do it totally random, but that would mean some people playing really early, and as viewers, we may not really know who the person is playing!

Yer you do have a point there thinking about it in those circumstances the show would be ALL DEAL lol.

Looking at the current crop of contestants, I'm not so sure...

...and people might be more inclined to chase their losses too (think about how contestants' behaviour has changed since the early offers started to skyrocket).

A 50/50 split current with 24 votes. Interesting.

I think the jackpot should only be increased for special shows, such as the Christmas shows, and possibly the anniversary of DOND show.