The $100,000 Pyramid (2000)

This is chronicling The $100,000 Pyramid 2000 pilot.

Main Game
The game is played with two teams of two players (consisting of one celebrity & one contestant) in a game of word communication. Each game starts with the introduction of six categories arranged in a pyramid. In the main game, a category's position on the pyramid was not an indicator of its difficulty. The categories were usually puns hinting to the content within that subject.

Each team in turn chose a category, and then a subject under that category was given. Each subject has seven words/phrases/names. The team had 30 seconds to guess the seven answers that fit into the category. One player described each item while the other player tried to guess what the words are. Each correct word was worth one point. When a word was passed, it cannot be returned to, but if the guesser can guess the word already passed, the team still scored. If at any time the clue giver gave away any part of the answer or conveyed the essence of the answer, a cuckoo sounded and the word was thrown out. Should a team get seven out of seven in any turn, the contestant wins $500.

Each team had three turns with the celebrities giving first in rounds one and three, and the contestants giving in round two.

Tie-Breaker
If the game ended in a tie, both scores were deleted and the game shifted into a tie-breaker situation. The team that caused the tie had a choice between two letters leaving the other for the other team. Both teams had 30 seconds to get as many of the seven items beginning with their letter(s) as they can. The team with the highest score won the game.

The team with the most points won the game.

Winner's Circle
The giver of the winning team faced a larger pyramid board of six subjects with the guesser having his/her back to the board. The winning team had 60 seconds to climb up to the top of the pyramid by getting all six. On each subject, the giver gave a list of items that fit the subject while the guesser tried to guess what they all have in common. As soon as the guesser gets the right subject or passed, they moved on to the next subject to the right. Upon a pass, the team can come back to it if there's time leftover though the guesser can still get the subject without going back to it. If at any time the giver gave an illegal clue (giving away part of the answer, conveying the essence of the answer, descriptions of the category or a synonym) a buzzer would sound, and a new subject would take its place. Getting all six in 60 seconds won the grand cash prize.

Payoffs
The first Winner's Circle is worth $10,000. Each win increases the prize by $5,000, up to $30,000 for the fifth. Should the contestant lose, the next trip is for the same amount the previous trip was worth.

In addition to the top prize increasing per win, the amounts for each individual category increased as well.

Contestants retired after winning five Winner's Circles, a total of $100,000 plus any other monies earned.

Trivia
The $500 bonus for getting seven out of seven rule was carried over into the 2012 Pyramid revival.