For this syndicated nighttime edition, Bob Eubanks, the host of the CBS daytime edition, was very busy hosting The New Newlywed Game (1984), and could not host it. Jim Perry, the host of the original NBC Card Sharks (1978) was considered, but was still hosting the NBC daytime Sale of the Century (1983) as well as a syndicated nighttime edition at the time. Ultimately the job was given to Bill Rafferty, who was best known for his role on Real People (1979) on NBC.
The maximum amount that could be won was $32,000.
Beginning on October 27, 1986, a second bonus round game was added in which the contestant could win a car, respectively. The game followed the Money Cards, and featured a row of seven playing cards, aligned in a horizontal row. Correctly choosing the card marked "CAR" won the car for a contestant. Contestants got one pick (from winning the game), but could win additional picks by finding a "JOKER" during the Money Cards.
This new version featured two new varieties of questions in addition to the traditional survey questions: First, the audience poll was a question asked of a group of studio audience members (usually 10 members) selected for a shared characteristic such as gender or occupation. If a contestant guessed the exact number of audience members who made a certain response to one of these questions, he or she won a $100 bonus and the poll group was given $100 to share. The same poll group was used for a week's worth of episodes. Second, the educated guess questions were general knowledge trivia questions which had numerical answers. Exact guesses won a $500 bonus for the contestant. Guesses and responses were originally registered on the displays; this later changed to the guesses and responses superimposed on the displays, as they could be more than 99, which was the highest number the displays could register.