Bingo ITV
Some may be surprised to find out that ITV has launched a bingo television programme that gives viewers the opportunity to play bingo along with the TV for an hour a night between Tuesday and Saturday.
The programme is hosted by Michael Underwood and Melinda Messenger and is said to mix entertainment with special draws, lucky numbers, and the traditional style of bingo game, with the numbers being called by Underwood. Viewers can download cards from the ITV website and mark them off as they go along, whilst a statistician on the television will analyse the results and show which areas of the country are particularly lucky on any given night.
Bingo on television is the culmination of the bingo media experience. Bingo in halls has been an attraction for decades and the game is a consistent success year after year. Most people claim that the social elements, combined with good, clean, undemanding fun is the reason for the attraction of the game and who can argue with that?
From bingo houses the game then made the leap to the Internet and took off in an unexpectedly enormous fashion. As bingo is based around one caller whose only interaction with the contestants is the calling of the numbers bingo works surprisingly well on the Internet. There is bound to be suspicion as to the validity of the game, and whether your chances of winning are as fair as perhaps they should be. From that point of view it’s important to remember that there are thousands of UK online bingo sites springing up – it’s best to stick with one of the bigger known brands like Mecca Bingo to ensure that you are getting the odds and game play that you are paying for.
So now the gaming world has decided to push its way from the safe regions of the Internet onto our televisions. One struggles to work out the entertainment factor to be found in the television version of the game. So you still have the calling element, well that’s great, but how do you actually win? And where’s the social element of the game? The intention of the new ITV bingo show is to bring the game to a new media format, but the reality is that bingo is firmly established in the bingo hall and on the Internet, so ITV has its work cut out if it is to establish itself as a genuinely popular bingo player.
