How to win big on a game show

All Aussies want to one day win big on a game show, but it is something one man made a reality when he won close to $700,000 on Aussie TV game show Temptation.

Stephen Hall now spends his days advising how others can win the jackpot.

So what is the secret to winning big?

“There are a number of secrets, one of the key ones is preparation, doing your homework and studying the show so that you know it inside out – watch it intelligently and analyse it,” Hall said.

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“I used to record the show and use by remote control as the buzzer so if I buzzed in and paused the vision before I heard someone else’s buzzer go off, I knew I had beaten them and then I’d answer the question, made up score sheets and put myself in a column so I could see how I was playing against them.”

He added: “The new thing I thought of recently is that you can record them and play episodes back at twice normal speed to practice further.”

He said there are also a number of self-talk things Aussies should do to avoid seizing up or going blank.

You often see people ponder on a question too long and then they’ve wasted too much time and two questions have passed without them realising,” he said.

It’s clear that the ones that do well are the ones which are able to quickly move on from their errors.

“One game show champion I spoke to said he envisaged the host was throwing a whole host of tennis balls at him – some you’ll catch and some you won’t but you just stand there waiting to catch the next one.”

But when it comes to reading into the mannerisms of game show hosts to look for clues, Hall isn’t so sure.

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“With a lot of the shows, it all happens so fast that there’s not really enough time to do that, although there are some hosts on some of the not-quite-so-fast moving shows which have certain mannerisms which keep coming up, that you can study,” he said.

Hall strongly advises that anyone who wants to win big on game shows should participate and take as many different quizzes as possible to get as much experience as they can.

“Most newspapers have them everyday, there are heaps online, there are apps and you can go to pub trivia nights. Anything you can get your hands on,” he said.