Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, 3rd Edition (PC)

GameSpot editors' review

• CNET editors' rating: 2.0 stars Mediocre
  Detailed editors' rating
  Overall score: 4.6 (2.0 stars)

• Reviewed by:
  Steve Smith
• Reviewed on: 06/25/2001
• Released on: 05/20/2001
• Originally published on GameSpot: Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, 3rd Edition (PC) Review

The Who Wants to Be a Millionaire computer game concept feels about as listless as its host Regis Philbin now sounds in this unrevised sequel. When the irrepressible pitchman starts the game with his familiar cry, "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire...Third Edition," even he sounds bemused that the publisher is milking the show's waning popularity yet again.

It seems as if not one line of programming code has been changed this third time out since the previous installment. To its credit, the basic Millionaire game engine has always been a competent translation of the prime-time experience. On a nicely animated version of the TV set, you respond via keyboard commands to an increasingly difficult list of multiple-choice trivia questions. While Regis doesn't read the individual questions, his characteristic urgings and chides are piped in as you make your way up the money tree to the $1 million question. The topic mix (familiar phrases, pop culture, sports, science, history, and so on) is all here, and unlike in previous editions, this question set doesn't seem as dominated by TV trivia.

The lifelines are handled creatively. Phoning a friend for help gives us a cute exchange with one of Regis' apparently endless collection of oddball acquaintances (from circus clowns to grease-monkey savants). They may or may not provide you with the right guess, although you can often get a pretty good read on the accuracy of the guess from the nature of the exchange between Regis and the friend. The 50/50 option eliminates two of the possible four answers for a question, and the poll-the-audience lifeline uses actual response data from test audiences.

The only revision in this third edition is a fresh set of trivia questions and the new ability to download additional question sets from the game's home Web site. Currently, only one specialty question set on famous phrases is available online, which seems either stingy or lazy since this is the only new feature of the new edition. Worse, this set turns out to be really only a single run of 15 questions that can be played once--not a full library of sets that can be played repeatedly without encountering the same question twice. Also, considering the game's target audience of casual consumer gamers, the procedure for downloading these new questions is surprisingly awkward. The software launches the default Web browser and makes you download the appropriate file, then seek it out on your hard drive to install it manually. Less experienced home users deserve a more seamless installation in which the game engine does most of the work.

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