(The Final) Countdown
The Countdown game is one of the oldest TV show in theworld. It started broadcasting in 1972 on the french televisionand in 1982 on British channel 4, and it has been running since inboth countries.The game, while extremely popular, never received any seriousscientific attention, probably because it seems too simple at first sight.We present in this article an in-depth analysis of thenumbers round of the countdown game. This includes a complexityanalysis of the game, an analysis of existing algorithms and the presentationof a new algorithm that increases resolution speed by a large factor.It also includes some leads on how to turn the game into amore difficult one, both for a human player and for a computer, andeven to transform it into a possibly undecidable problem.