Alex Horne makes a wonderful commentator for this Westminster Dog Show where all the dogs have morphed into Marie Antoinette
It was definitely fun to watch, but count the rice it was not
I feel like this one didn't quite hit what it was going for
this feels like a sequel to Secret Sober, but the reason that one worked was that the twist was simple and consistent; you could watch it a second time and have new context, and new appreciation of the performances, and understanding of why things are happening
this one was so complicated that a second viewing would be only slightly more coherent than the first, unless you've got an incredible memory, or are sitting down to watch with a spreadsheet that explains all the different mechanics of every round
and the fact that everything changes round-to-round means the players can't gain any understanding of the types of behaviors they should be looking out for; i.e. they can't socially deduce in the social deduction game, aside from the very basic strategy of "I guess that was kinda vaguely weird, I'll vote for them"
I feel like Secret Sober had two benefits going for it which helped with viewer attention. First, they killed off contestants immediately so the eight players shrank down to an easier to follow number. Second, the show identified Lili Du as "the" secret sober and edited the show around that definition, so players had a contestant to focus on.
So, you add more effective contestants and constantly move the focus around and it becomes harder for viewers to follow. I also think the additional side quests weren't really done in a way to draw attention to those doing the side quests.
It was alright, I guess. The cast was entertaining and trying to win, but it felt like an oddly skinned version of the Jackbox game "Fakin' It".
I also feel like if you're going to the wigs, you might want to lean into the theming more with the game.
After the first meta-game, I expected that *I* was the secret meta-meta-gamer, and started watching for details. The wigs specifically stood out, as did Sam's stand, and about halfway through the episode I went back and looked for changes...
The wigs gained butterflies to match point totals, but it wasn't obvious on first pass that they were the scoreboard.
The mess of the wires/details on the stand didn't change that I could tell, or any background scenery.
I couldn't identify anything else that seems different, but my webapp player also got mad at me for scrubbing around to look at things and stopped loading, so I might have missed something, and I haven't given it a second full watch. Maybe there was something audible instead of visual. If there's no super secret extra meta game discussed in the making-of next week, I think that'd be a missed opportunity.
Also loved getting Alex Horne in to do the scores between rounds. That was a neat touch.
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