The Amazing Race > The Amazing Race Discussion
Why the Amazing Race has lost its magic
Moo:
--- Quote from: Coutzy on October 20, 2009, 01:45:59 AM ---Season 6 was one of the worst in my eyes. The problem was, in one word: Levelers.
There was a certain leg (I can't remember it off the top of my head) Where teams flew to one country, got an hours of operation, did a task, flew to another country to pick up a single route info directing them to another country.
I understand the ratings nightmare that is a Guido finish, but three levelers in one leg, and only one task being meaningful? Give us a break.
--- End quote ---
I think it's not cross country but it may be Sri Lanka...
Ethiopia's baseball thingy, then off to Colombo, only to find out an hours of operation, eliminating Lori and Bolo the next day, even with Adam and Rebecca's 2 hour delay the previous day. :(
apskip:
--- Quote from: Caelestor on October 21, 2009, 12:55:00 AM ---Well said mswood. I understand that TAR is clearly on a budget, and buying wrong plane tickets does waste quite a bit of time and money (a la Brad and Victoria from TAR 14)! And of course, the racers do damage their cars on occasion. (They need to penalize them, shame on the racers! (:;) )
However, there are some obvious ways to save money:
Taxis from Narita to Tokyo? SERIOUSLY? (Another reason why the Japan leg was useless.) Taxis drain the most money on the show after plane tickets.
Removal of Fast Forwards completely (there needs to be at least 3 per race or none at all).
Replace the NEL penalty from Speedbump to mandatory U-turn. (Although speedbumps look pretty cheap, half of the time they're lame.). U-turns look cheap too since the tasks are already set up, and enough of them allows for strategic racing -> interesting TV.
Fewer detours (a bit drastic though, let's not go there)
Force teams to take public transport where it's possible (Europe, Japan, etc.). Navigation is paramount!
Make two legs in same country into one to lessen the cost of pit stops. (You could've easily done that with this season's Dubai legs!)
This brings me to another issue this season: bring back the 12-hour pitstops! In Vietnam, you left half the teams waiting at the airport for half a day. That hardly makes for great television. (And cut it out with the "will this team get on the flight" unless a team does epically screw up or the teams go on different flights; go back to TAR 14).
And from that, there is an evidence issue about the planning of the races. A spotting task a la New Zealand TAR 13 would have been great at Burj Dubai (and force Mika to confront her issue of heights :groan:). As Josh Wolk over at EW says, the Burj was too anticlimactic.
TAR should take a few pointers from HaMerotz LaMillion. (They don't need that many destinations/tasks, but at least the teams do something!)
--- End quote ---
Caelestor, I like most of your thinking. Specifically, I agree with these cost-cutting measures:
1.Use of public tranportation in high-cost situations (like the 77 mile trip from Narita to downtown Tokyo; it was a case of hurry up and wait using the taxis and probably would have been quicker with the train). However, when you are in HoChiMinh City or Kolkata, taxis are cheap enough that it does not make much difference.
2. Force teams to use public tranportation. Self-navigation is always the hallmark of a great Amazing Racer and seeing more of this on both public tranportation and in U-drive cars is desirable.
3. Eliminate FAST FORWARDs - I would like a return to the way it was in the first 4 seasons of the Amazing Race, but FAST FORWARDs have been lame and uninteresting, so I agree with you to get rid of them.
SPEEDBUMPs have been totally lame (particularly making pho in Cai Be). However, logistically I think your proposed solution of using a U-Turn make no sense. all the setup for a DETOUR is removed once teams have gone through them. Doing a U-Turn on the following leg, the way it is currently done, is clearly impossible and even doing it as an extra task at check-in is very problematical. You need to invent something more appropriate because U-Turn in this situation is not the answer.
Pit Stop length is determined mostly by the logistics coming out of the pit stop. Let me give you the base case against mandatory 12 hour pit stops: AR11 Episode 2 returning from Hacienda Yanahurco to Quito Airport. With less than a 18 hour pitstop teams would have had to navigate that terrible road in the dark, which would have been extremely hazardous. The Racers obviously need one or two breaks in the middle of these very physically demanding races, so the extended 36 hour pit stop is the best way to accomplish that. Demanding 12 hour pit stops from WRP is not a viable solution.
On the problems of the apparent 8 to 10 hour pit stop in HoChiMinh City, this looks like it was deliberately designed to hold teams back, as no nonstop flights were available until the next afternoon and even if a team had done the Bangkok connection they would have arrived only slightly earlier. The 12 hour pit stop would have made no difference. When a leg begins and ends in the morning, the normal release will be that evening and you have exactly the same conceptual problem of waiting aroudn for a very long time. The solution would have been a much longer leg in the HoChiMinh City area.
Moo:
To be frankly honest... TAR planners need to
1. Read the forums sites... Get their frickin ideas here! Isn't our voice enough?
2. take a look at the many many many fantasy games that produce better, realistic and crazier tasks and racecourses... (see: Vicdemort, Mooyou, Sam's, Uycocoa's (But it's insane) ) :funny: :funny:
Caelestor:
--- Quote from: Moo on October 21, 2009, 09:50:01 AM ---
--- Quote from: puddin on October 20, 2009, 04:35:19 PM ---One of the biggest letdowns to me were the tasks TAR14 Romania, fake gypsy village, drag the coffins and break the plaques filled with blood to find a clue
. .Tammy and Victor looking for the detour for what seemed like 30 minutes screen time. The Roadblock/Gymnastics was cute though.
--- End quote ---
LOL, it turned out to be one of the best episodes though (followed by Leg 4)... :lol: (Even though I love T/V so much <333)
--- End quote ---
I'm going to have to call you out on that. There are faster ways to go from Austria to Bucharest than by plane via Munich. (Ditto for Interlaken to Munich.) Surely if they went by plane, they wouldn't have that mid-leg bunching (though I am a fan of the train, I don't want teams waiting for one). The Point: When in Europe, drive or take the extensive train system there!
apskip, glad to see I'm not making a total fool out of myself. It seems as if TPTB can never find an appropriate penalty for NELs. The only other way I could see is to make every pit stop an elimination, but extend some same-country legs into TBCs (for this season, they could've gotten rid of Japan easily and made a long leg in Vietnam/Dubai/Prague). The pit stops can be longer to accommodate Phil.)
michael:
HELL....ALL I KNOW IS THAT I'M LOST WITHOUT YOU... *memories*
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