Merv Griffin's Crosswords

''OPENING SPIEL: Welcome to Merv Griffin's Crosswords. and now, here are your Crossword Solvers: (insert two contestants) And now, here's your host, Ty Treadway.''

''REST OF SPIEL: Thank you, Ed. Thank you, all. Welcome to Merv Griffin's Crosswords. It's one of the America's Favorite Past times, and it's Winner Take All.''

A game show where 2 contestants answer questions related to a crossword puzzle presented to them. Three players called "Spoilers" are added and they can get a chance to steal the active player's podium.

Gameplay
The game was played in three rounds. They played with the same crossword puzzle for the entire show.

Round 1
In the first round, the two main contestants filled in the words in the day's crossword puzzle by solving its clues one at a time. When answering, they must spell out the answer too, and some answers may contain more than one word. The first player to buzz-in with a correct answer wins money for the question, but an incorrect answer loses money and gave the other player a chance to answer.

Rounds 2 & 3
In the last two rounds, the main players were joined by three extra contestants called "Spoilers" who stood behind podiums behind the main contestants. The Spoilers can ring-in at anytime but the front row players always get to answer first. Should both the front players miss or if they don't buzz-in to answer to all, that's when the Spoilers come in to play; if any of the Spoilers comes up with the correct answer, they had a choice of which front podium to steal; but if only one of the front players miss, then the Spoilers can only take that podium; either way, that Spoiler (who's now one of the front players) was also credited with the value of the clue.

Special Words
Some of the words in the puzzle were special that either affected gameplay or won a prize.

Crossword Getaway
A correct answer to that word exposed that special, and won a trip which was inserted into the bank. This lasted for the first two months.

Crossword Extra
This was where the player who answered a clue had a chance to wager any or all of his/her current dollar total (or up to $1,000, $2,000 or $3,000 (depending on what round it was) if he/she had less than those amounts) on a follow-up clue. A correct answer added the wager, but an incorrect answer deducted the wager.

Early Rules
There were only two Crossword Extras and neither one were part of the main puzzle, so they were just what they sounded like. The player who buzzed in with the correct answer to the first word, had a chance to solve the extra for $300 in round 1 and $600 in round two.

Later Rules
In later weeks, there were three Crossword Extras (one in each round) throughout the game; but after the removal of the Crossword Getaways, there were five Extras (one in round one, and two in the last two rounds).

Crossword XBOX 360 Extra
For a brief period, the show was sponsored by XBOX 360. So therefore, the Crossword Extras were renamed Crossword XBOX 360 Extras.

The front player with the most money won the game. If the game ended in a tie, one final crossword clue was played in which the winner of that question became the victor.

The winner of the game kept all the cash (and trips) and went on to the bonus game where he/she can fill in the remainder of the crossword puzzle for more cash & a trip.

Bonus Round
In the bonus game, the winning contestant had 90 seconds to fill in the rest of the puzzle. He/she picked off a word (by number & direction), and then must answer it & spell it after hearing the clue. He/she can pass on a word and may return to it later although there's no penalty for an incorrect guess.

Successfully completing the crossword puzzle before time ran out won an extra $2,000 (later $5,000) and a trip. While the show was sponsored by Microsoft's XBOX 360 video game system, the system in question was also a grand prize. In earlier episodes, The winning contestant won $100 for each word correctly solved win or lose.

Trivia
Creator & executive producer Merv Griffin died before this show premiered.

Music
An updated version of "Buzzword" by Merv Griffin

Inventor
Merv Griffin

Tagline
"Thanks for playing along everybody. Keep thinking outside those boxes. We'll see you next time on Merv Griffin's Crosswords." - Ty Treadway, (2007-2008)