is an American and Canadian television game show produced by Bob Stewart which saw contestants attempting to solve riddles in order to win cash and prizes.

Jackpot made its debut on the NBC television network on January 7, 1974 as part of their daytime schedule and ran until September 26, 1975.

This edition of Jackpot aired on USA and Global from September 30, 1985 until December 30, 1988 and was produced in Toronto, Ontario, with Mike Darow as host.

That series (the only one to refer to the title with the exclamation point in it) debuted on September 18, 1989 with Edwards once again hosting, coming to an end on March 16, 1990 after its syndicator went out of business.

Sixteen contestants competed for an entire week, with one designated King/Queen of the Hill, who stood at a circular podium at stage-left.

The Super Jackpot could be played for in one of two ways: Originally, the contestant who answered the most riddles in the week won a car.

Beginning on June 30, 1975, the format was altered for the last 13 weeks of the run: The riddles and Target Number returned, but there was no multiplier; the Super Jackpot was set at random, ranging from $4,000 to $9,900 in $100 increments.

All contestants who found and answered one of these designated riddles, which were considerably more difficult than the others used on the show, won equal shares of a $50,000 cash prize at the end of the season.

The network's head of daytime programming, Lin Bolen, placed Jackpot at Noon eastern (11:00 AM Central), where the venerable Jeopardy!

brought in audiences who did not ordinarily watch daytime television, such as businessmen and college students, primarily due to its intellectually challenging game play; these people often watched the show during their lunch hour on TV sets at restaurants, college student centers, or bars rather than at home.

managed to earn respectable ratings throughout 1974; it looked at one point to be more promising than its sister show, The $10,000 Pyramid, during the latter's final month on CBS (but before its move to ABC in May, where it became a hit).

In reaction to the show's slumping ratings, Bolen decided to revamp Jackpot by making use of a "focus group", a then-new audience analysis technique.

Edwards stated that Bolen's group participants expressed a strong dislike for the show's foundational riddle format.

Bolen accepted this judgment and gave Stewart an ultimatum – replace the riddles with a straightforward question-answer format or be canceled.

On July 7, the show moved back one half-hour, but the new time slot brought much stronger competition in the form of Search for Tomorrow on CBS and ABC's All My Children, the latter already a big hit with younger audiences.

The combination of strong competition and the forced change in format led to the end of Jackpot after a 21-month run on September 26, 1975.

Pardo would also not appear on another game show until November 1988, when he was the announcer of the nighttime syndicated version of Wheel of Fortune for two weeks of episodes at New York's Radio City Music Hall.

Ken Ryan and John Harris, Global staff voice-over artists, served as announcers on this version.

As a ploy to try to generate sponsorship cash as quickly as possible, the company forced the staff to record over 10 episodes per day for a period of over two weeks.

Under normal circumstances, half-hour weekday "strip" shows taped only three to five episodes per day, depending on the studio's schedule.

By spring 1990, Palladium Entertainment shuttered its operations after declaring bankruptcy, and the remaining stations pulled Jackpot!

Edwards also hosted the Canadian-produced Chain Reaction and the Sacramento-produced The Big Spin, the weekly California Lottery program, at that time.

A Brazilian version called Clube dos Quinze, hosted by Silvio Santos, aired on TV Globo in 1975 before moving to Tupi in 1976.

Other than the cosmetic difference, the game is the same in both boxes; the gameplay more closely resembles the 1980s Darow format, with the Target Number randomly established and Super Jackpots of only four-figure amounts.

The Bebu Silvetti song "Spring Rain", itself previously used as the theme for Stewart's The Love Experts, was used for the unsold 1984 pilot.