The Adventure Game was a game show originally broadcast on UK television channels BBC1 and BBC2 between 24 May 1980 and 18 February 1986. The story in each show was that the two celebrity contestants and a member of the public had travelled by spaceship to the planet Arg. Their overall task varied with each series. For example, the team might be charged with finding a crystal to power their ship to return to Earth. The programme is often considered to have been a forerunner of The Crystal Maze.

Background

The programme was devised by experienced BBC producer Patrick Dowling (who also introduced episodes of series 2). Dowling was interested in Dungeons & Dragons and wanted to televise a show to capture the mood. The programme had a similar sci-fi feel influenced by Douglas Adams; Dowling asked Adams to write the show, but he was working on the television production of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. The first two series were written and produced by Dowling and directed by Ian Oliver, who wrote and produced the final two after Dowling retired. Peter Hawkins provided the opening narration for series one and four.

Characters

Arg was inhabited by shapeshifting dragons known as Argonds. As a reference to this, most proper nouns in the programme (including Argond) were anagrams of the word dragon. Argonds commonly shifted form, primarily to human, to avoid scaring contestants a few minutes before the contestants arrived. Notable characters within the game included: The look of the characters in Argond form was different in the various series. In Series 1, they looked like dragons, and each was distinct. In Series 2, they didn't look like dragons, but were furry, with no tails and mask-like faces, and primarily differed in colour. In Series 3 and 4, their heads returned to looking like dragons, with ruffs, though they had furry bodies and monkey-like tails and were almost identical to each other. Notable contestants included Keith Chegwin, Sue Cook, astronomer Heather Couper, John Craven, Paul Darrow, Noel Edmonds, Sarah Greene, Bonnie Langford, James Burke, Elizabeth Estensen, Janet Fielding, and Richard Stilgoe. The credits for the series listed the human characters as being played by Argonds rather than the other way around.

Common tasks

The contestants had to complete several tasks to achieve their overall goal (i.e., regain their crystal and return to their ship). Many tasks involved the drogna, a small transparent plastic disc containing a solid geometric figure, which was the currency of Arg. The value of a drogna was its numbered position in the visible spectrum multiplied by the number of sides of the figure (though the contestants usually failed to work this out). For example, a red circle is worth one unit, an orange circle is worth two units, a red triangle and a yellow circle are both worth three and so on. Tasks that often appeared included:

Episodes

Episodes with a dagger (†) after the number are missing from the BBC archives. However, some of these 'missing' episodes do exist as off-air recordings and are included on the DVD version of the show.

Series 1

Originally broadcast in 1980 on BBC1 on Saturday mornings. They were repeated in 1980 on BBC2 on Saturday mid-afternoons.

Series 2

Originally broadcast in 1981 on BBC2 on Monday early evenings. It was repeated in 1982 on BBC1 on Friday late afternoons.

Series 3

Originally broadcast in 1984 on BBC2 on Thursday early evenings. It was repeated in 1985 on BBC2 on Thursday early evenings.

Series 4

Originally broadcast in 1986 on BBC2 on Tuesday early evenings. Repeated in 2002, 2003, and 2004 on the digital TV channel Challenge.

Signature tune

Home video releases

In 2016, the show was made available to purchase for the first time, with seven episodes from the first two series available digitally from the online BBC Store. The store and apps were discontinued on 1 November 2017, making purchased programmes no longer playable. A six-DVD box set of the series was released on 12 June 2017, rated U. The DVDs are region 2–encoded, with a total running time of 665 minutes. The artwork on the discs represents five different colours and shapes of Drogna.