I'm sure a lot of you have a ton of hilarious/outrageous/funky Japanese
gameshows that you've heard about or watched first hand. After all, the
Japanese are truly mad.
Guess I'll start it off about one of two families. Candidates are those with
at least one young (pre-teen or younger) child. The prize vary from money to
appliances to whatever. Pretty standard in that regard. To win, the youngest
child of each family is put on stage and simultaneously each is told that their
mother and father have died. The family whose child cries first wins. Pretty
damn immoral and outrageous to our (at least, my) western cultured minds.
The only other one I've managed to remember was posted on slashdot so most of
you must have heard it. I'll reiterate it here for just in case.
They grabbed a guy from a comedian audition and stuck him in an apartment,
empty but for a stack of postcards, a stack of magazines, a cushion, a table, a
radio and writing implements. The idea was for him to live off prizes won from
contests in the magazines he won from filling out postcards and mailing them in.
Yes, he managed to do this. He won food, appliances, a TV, a playstation and
games, and other such things. However, he didn't win things like underwear
(actually, he did but not men's underwear ;)), clothes, pots and pans, or
bedding.
His name was Nasubi. His diary is apparently a national best seller. More
info is available here: http://www3.tky.3web.ne.jp/~edjacob/nasubi.html.
Oh and of course, there's
Iron Chef.