Add 'Em Up

Add 'Em Up
Premiere Date	September 11, 1986 (#6174D)
Pricing Game Locations	Center Stage & Big Doors
Previous Premiered Pricing Game	Bump
Next Premiered Pricing Game	Pathfinder
Finale Date	October 3, 1988 (#6971D)

Add 'Em Up was a game played for a car in which the numbers in its price totaled a specified number between 10 and 30.

Gameplay

• To win the car, the contestant had to select the four digits in the price of the car from the digits 0-9, each of which could appear in the price only once (similar in concept to Any Number).
• To begin the game, the contestant was offered one digit for free. They selected a position in the price, and that digit was lit up on a display above the car. To aid the contestant, the sum of the digits in the price was shown on a game board, along with cards for each digit. The card representing the free digit was moved to the top of the addition column above the sum.
• The contestant then guessed one of the remaining digits they believed was in the price of the car. If they were correct, the number was lit up above the car, and the card was moved to the addition column. A subtotal of the first two numbers was then lit up to help the contestant determine the total of the remaining digits. Another subtotal would be displayed under the third digit if the contestant guessed it correctly.
• The contestant was allowed to guess one digit that was not in the price and play on; however, if he/she missed twice, the game was over.

History & Trivia

• The price display that stood behind the car was shared with Pathfinder, which still uses it today. Originally, the name of the game was shown above the car's price display, which was removed on March 31, 1987 (#6442D), one week before Pathfinder debuted.
• It was the first pricing game to premiere after Rod Roddy became permanent announcer.
• The most number of times this game was played in any season was 19 (season 15), while the least number of times this game was played in any season was 2 (season 17).
• This pricing game was similar to Gridlock!, which would premiere 31 years later, in that you are allowed to miss once before you lose. The game's guessing numbers from left to right would be somewhat reminiscent of Pocket ¢hange, which premiered more than 18 years after, except they now have less numbers to choose from and are allowed more than one mistake.
• Add 'Em Up's game board was in the shape of a giant plus sign.

Gallery

To view the gallery, click here.

Retirement

The reason often given for the game's retirement is its rules confusing too many contestants, which caused the game to take too long to play and a somewhat low win rate. Another reason is the wins are anti-climatic when a contestant is down to the last digit to equal the total. The game was also not very popular with the Price is Right staff, for the reasons mentioned above. Finally, Add 'Em Up was always played for cars with four non-repeating digits in the price and was the last car game to be incompatible with five digits, so the decreasing availability of attractive cars priced under $10,000 because of inflation may have expedited the game's demise.

YouTube Videos

Premiere Playing
An Add 'Em Up Win from 1987