Nothing is more valuable to a collector of the finest in useless knowledge than trivia about trivia games. Hence, we are gathered here today to find out the question to which the answer is: "This is how much money you can make in a game of JEOPARDY! if you have impeccable speed, near-omniscience and never-failing luck."
Conditions:
- The opponents may or may not ring in to answer before the contestant, but they must answer incorrectly.
- All daily doubles must be located at the very top of the board and must be found after all other questions have been answered.
- The contestant must answer all questions correctly and wage all his or her money for the daily doubles and final JEOPARDY!.
"That having been said, let's take a look at the scores."
JEOPARDY!
6 x 500 = 3,000
6 x 400 = 2,400
6 x 300 = 1,800
6 x 200 = 1,200
+ 5 x 100 = 500
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Sum: 8,900
Daily double: x 2
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17,800
Double JEOPARDY!
6 x 1,000 = 6,000
6 x 800 = 4,800
6 x 600 = 3,600
6 x 400 = 2,400
+ 4 x 200 = 800
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Double JEOPARDY! sum: 17,600
Money from JEOPARDY!: + 17,800
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Total sum: 35,400
Two daily doubles: x 4
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141,600
Final JEOPARDY!: x 2
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$283,200
Trebek: The most money you can earn on JEOPARDY!
You: What is two-hundred and eighty-three thousand two-hundred dollars and no cents?
Trebek: That's a lot of money!
If the contestant repeats this for a full week (the rules prevent a contestant from playing more than five games), the profit is $1,416,000.
I have just been told by Orange Julius that they have doubled the money for every question in the game, so make that $566,400 for a perfect game and $2,832,000 for a full week. I am assuming this is with the impending threat of having to change names to Who Wants to be a Bum? given the relative disadvantage of playing JEOPARDY! rather than another popular game show, which will remain without a name here. I'm assuming this is valid for the U.S. version of the show. YMMV, I know mine does.