HQ the review

A faux tweet noted that live mobile-app game show HQ is piling up impressive audience figures. Since I'm a full-service game show blogger, I figured a review of the show was in order.

Fortunately, lots of players have uploaded episodes to YouTube, so I could sample here and there. What I saw was an entertaining interactive quizzer that gets the job done in thirteen minutes or so. The money isn't big - on one ep sixteen lucky winners went away with $78.13 each - but I don't care about that. The idea is to spend a little time with trivia.

Scott Rogowsky hosts in a thumpingly emphatic manner, which might get wearying for a half-hour and unendurable for an hour. But it works for a few minutes, though some of his material sounds scripted and corny.

The 12-question quizzer starts easy and gets tough fast, as the assembled multitudes are winnowed down to a select few. (Don't worry, there are second chances for the vast majority who goof a question or four.) To avoid mass googling, there are only a few seconds to respond to each query. On the eps I watched, I knew some of the more classical stuff but flunked badly on recent pop culture. I'm an old fart, after all.

If HQ's success continues, you can expect more live game show apps to invade the field. I don't know how such a format would work on TV, where interactivity has been an elusive goal for the genre. But I wouldn't be surprised to see somebody try, sooner or later.

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