The Room Romp theme is as tense and exciting as a Bonus Round theme should be, especially as it builds in intensity in the last few seconds.
Broken Base: Who was the better host? Wesley had a better rapport with the contestants but was visibly uncomfortable with the messy side of the show. Larry was more laid back but seemed largely indifferent to the competitive side of the show.
Do Not Do This Cool Thing: Admit it, you wanted to trash your own house after seeing the kids on the show do it.
Nightmare Fuel: The Dungeon, Dracula's Den, and the Torture Tower. Several teams were noticeably more hesitant when searching the Dungeon than other rooms, which had unfortunate results when it was the Instant Prize Room in one episode.
Quite often, the Instant Prize was worth more than the Room Romp's grand prize (sometimes more than all six prizes combined). Pity the poor team who won a keyboard for completing the Romp (or, worse, only found one or two clue cards before time ran out) while their opponents got to go to Disney World or Space Camp.note On the other hand, a team that found the Instant Prize on their way to a win only to faceplant in the Romp might console themselves with having won the day's most valuable prize at the expense of several lesser prizes. Less common in the Toffler era, when the trips were often moved across to being the grand prizes for the Romp.
Any time confetti cannons were hidden during room searches as a means of distracting contestants.
The hidden pictures round, as the gateway to the room trashing for which audiences really tuned in, was gradually made easier over the series' run. In the first Eure season, there were four clues in the first hidden picture round and four or five in the second, so it was quite common for one, two, or even three of the eight rooms (sometimes including the Instant Prize room) to go unclaimed, requiring Eure to pad the episode's run time by bantering with the contestants. In the second season, the pictures had six clues each, so it was far less common (but not unheard of) for rooms to go unclaimed. And in the Toffler era, the pictures were the size of a wall rather than displayed on a monitor and the hidden items were pre-identified via a set of Colorforms, and rooms almost never went unsearched.
In the Eure era, the romp record was 66 seconds, and contestants sometimes had to find hidden objects in one or more rooms to find the next clue card. In the Toffler era, the clues were much more straightforward, with the cards often visible as soon as the contestants entered the room, and at least three teams finished the romp in under a minute (the record was 40 seconds).note Although the Toffler era also saw at least four teams find just one clue card in the romp; the "record" for the Eure era was two clue cards.
That One Level: Ever had trouble finding things buried deep in your closet or in your attic? Then you can see why the Closet and the Attic were the most dreaded rooms in Finders Keepers, with many teams coming unstuck during the main game and especially the Room Romp because of the sheer number of possible hiding places for objects. Pity the poor teams who entered one of those rooms to be greeted by the Instant Prize flashing lights and bells; they could nearly always kiss that trip to Disney World or Space Camp goodbye.
They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: With Toffler came an overhaul of the Hidden Pictures round (with an inexplicable decrease in terms of technology), an increase in difficulty of the room searches, and a decrease in difficulty of the Romp.
, would you expect anything less?