Greed was an American television game show where a team of contestants answered a series of multiple-choice trivia questions for a potential prize of up to $2 million (later $4 million).

Broadcast history
Greed, produced by Dick Clark and hosted by Chuck Woolery, debuted on November 4, 1999. It was widely considered as Fox's answer to ABC's prime-time hit Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? After initially planning to renew the series for a second season, Fox abruptly canceled Greed on July 14, 2000, after 44 episodes. In a July 2005 interview with Steve Beverly, who runs the game show website tvgameshows.net, Woolery shared fond memories of his nine-month job hosting the show, which he believes would still be on the air had Fox not pulled the plug. Repeats of Greed have aired on GSN (formerly Game Show Network) since January 2002.

Greed has also been exported to other countries by FremantleMedia. Jerry Springer hosted a British version of the show in 2001. Kerri-Anne Kennerley hosted a version in Australia in 2002, and is still on in South Africa with Revin John as host. The show also aired on ZDF in Germany under the title "Ca$h" with Ulla Kock am Brink as host.


Rules of the game
The object of Greed was to complete a climb up the "Tower of Greed," which consisted of eight multiple-choice questions, with the value of each question increasing with the level of difficulty. Anyone who correctly answered all eight questions won or shared the $2 million grand prize. As long as an answer was highlighted in green, meaning it was correct, the game continued. Once an answer was highlighted in red, meaning it was the wrong one, the game ended and the players would lose all prize money earned as a team.


Qualifying round
Six players competed in a qualifying round that determined who made the team. The host asked a question that always had a numerical answer. After all the contestants locked in their answers, the host would reveal the answer (always between 10 and 999). The contestant who was closest to the correct answer became the captain of the team. The remaining players were ranked based on how close they were to the correct answer; the player who was furthest away from the correct answer was the only one who did not qualify. Players who did not make it to the team could return for another qualifying question.

Later in the series, the qualifying round was removed, with team positions chosen backstage by random drawing.


The first four questions
Each contestant, except for the captain, was given a multiple-choice trivia question to answer. Once the contestant answered it, the captain had the option to accept or reject that answer. The first two questions (worth $25,000 and $50,000) had four possible answers; the second two (worth $75,000 and $100,000) had five possible answers. To determine which contestant would answer each of the first four questions, they were asked in the order they scored in the qualifying question, starting with the contestant whose answer was the farthest away from the correct answer.

For each question after the fourth, the host gave the category of the next question. He also gave the captain the option to continue the game, if the team felt "the need for greed," or to end it and split the winnings among the players.

Each answer given by a player was highlighted in blue.


The Terminator
If the captain decided to continue, the host activated the "Terminator," which randomly selected a team member (and to whom Chuck would announce, "The Terminator has chosen you"). That player then had the opportunity to challenge another team member for a guaranteed $10,000 (regardless of the outcome) plus his or her share of the team's ultimate winnings. If the contestant opted to challenge, the two players competed in a sudden-death face-off trivia question. Either of them could buzz in at any point, upon which they would have to answer. The loser of that question (based on the answer Woolery was given) was eliminated from the game and lost his or her share of the winnings to the winner. The Terminator is activated before every question past the halfway point.


Higher-level questions
Once the Terminator round was over, the remaining team members were given a new question, with four correct answers. (The number of possible choices depended on the value of that question: the $200,000 question had six choices, the $500,000 question had seven, and the $1 million question had eight.) Before the $200,000 question, the captain of the team was given a "freebie" that he or she could use on any one question from that point onward. The "freebie" eliminated one of the predetermined incorrect answers from the question that it was used for.

After the team gave its four guesses, the captain was given the opportunity to change one of them if he or she desired. The answers were then revealed, one at a time. If three of the four guesses were correct, the host offered the captain a cash incentive (usually one-tenth of the value of that question) to end the game before revealing the fourth answer. If the captain refused, the fourth answer was revealed. If the fourth answer was correct, the team won the prize and was allowed to continue.


The $2 million question
If the team correctly answered the $1 million question, it was up to each remaining player to determine if he or she wanted to go for the $2 million or stop and take their share of the prize money.

The $2 million question had nine possible answers, the contestant was given 30 seconds to think about his or her four selections and another 10 seconds to select them. In Greed's nine-month run on Fox only one contestant made it to this level. On the third episode of the show, Daniel Avila was given a question on which odors were the most recognizable based on a Yale University study, and three of his choices -- peanut butter, coffee, and Vicks VapoRub -- were correct answers. However, he guessed "tuna" as his fourth choice, and lost; the fourth answer was "chocolate." In Super Greed (see below), the contestants were each offered a Jaguar convertible with $75,000 in the trunk (later $150,000 cash) to quit if three of the answers were correct on the seventh question.


Rule changes
In the first month of Greed's run, the top prize was worth $2 million plus an additional $50,000 for each game where the top prize was not won. The jackpot reached $2,550,000 in the first month.

In February 2000 eight previous Greed contestants were brought back for a "Million-Dollar Moment." Two players faced off in a Terminator round, and the winner was given a $1,000,000 question. The contestant had 30 seconds to study the question, then 10 seconds to lock in the four right answers to win $1 million. As usual, missing any part of the question meant that the money was not won. Curtis Warren successfully answered a question about movies based on TV shows and became the biggest U.S. game show winner of all time with $1,410,000. That record was beaten within a week as David Legler won $1,765,000 on Twenty One.

In May 2000, Greed became Super Greed for the month. The qualifying question was eliminated, and the values for the top three questions were doubled, making the eighth question worth a potential $4 million. In addition, any team that went for the seventh question was guaranteed $200,000 regardless of the outcome of the game. Two teams reached the $2 million question, and one team was able to answer all four parts correctly.

Toward the end of the show's run, the qualifying round was eliminated, and the five contestants for the team were given their positions randomly.