Video Power

Premise: Four kids played video games and answered trivia questions in order to move on in a season-long tournament.

Play: Four kids were chosen out of the studio audience, and each asked the host a question about video games. If the host could not answer correctly, that person won a special bonus prize. Either way, those four people would play a video game. The two players who could score the most points or progress the farthest in 1:41 would move on to the next round, the others were eliminated.

The two winners would face off center-stage and answer three-choice questions from the host. First to buzz in got to try, and if he was wrong, the opponent could choose from the other two choices. The first three questions were worth 10 points each, and the fourth worth 20. Sometimes, a bonus question would be played where the contestants would listen to a track from a game, then have to name it. The winner of that question won a game cartridge, but no points.

The final round had the two players playing a new game for 61 seconds. Whomever scored more points or advanced farther won 50 points. The player who scored more points would win the game. If it ended in a 50-50 tie, the player that scored better in the preliminary game broke the tie to win.

The winner had 31 seconds to gather up as many video games, systems and other miscellaneous prizes as possible, and exit the Power Mall via a tube-slide. (If the champion could not exit the area within the time allowed, he got nothing. If that was ever the case, we never saw, since the run would be edited out and the champ got to play it again.) The champion was also on the lookout for a specially named game, and if it was included in the player's haul; he won a bonus prize (usually a Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis, NEO-GEO or Miracle Piano Teacher)

The four winners on Monday-Thursday would come back on Friday for the finals of the week. The preliminary round lasted for 2:02, but other than that, the game was the same, and the winner got a chance for more stuff in the Power Mall, just as before.

The nine weekly winners came back for week ten to determine the Grand Champion. Each day, three former winners would play each day, with the winner of the day coming back for the Grand Championship on Friday. The three players who lost in the Question Round got to come back for the Wild Card game on Thursday, where the winner got the fourth spot in the championship game.

The eventual winner of the tournament won (in addition to all of the other stuff accrued on the way) a $10,000 scholarship, three passes to Universal Studios Florida, and a special 41 second Power Mall run.