Jimmy Donaldson, known to YouTube fans as MrBeast, is launching his biggest project yet with the game show “Beast Games.” The show, produced in collaboration with Amazon Studios, will debut exclusively on Prime Video.
Donaldson’s YouTube channel, famous for its extravagant challenges, boasts over 300 million subscribers. His philanthropic efforts, which are also shown on his channel, include giving away 100 homes and providing cataract surgery to 1,000 people.
While Donaldson is known for tackling major projects, “Beast Games” represents a new level of ambition. The show will feature 1,000 contestants competing for a record-breaking $5 million prize, making it the largest game show cast and prize in history, according to Amazon Studios.
However, as previously reported by Deseret News, “Beast Games” has faced accusations of mismanagement. Contestants have claimed that set conditions were subpar, resulting in food and water shortages and some injuries.
New accusations come to light
A recent New York Times report provides additional details on the situation, from anonymous contestants, due to nondisclosure agreements, sharing their experiences on the game show.
Per The New York Times, during the onboarding process, contestants stated they were asked how far they would go for a chance to win $5 million, including potentially life-threatening tasks. While some viewed this as a deterrent, others saw it as an exciting opportunity for adventure and potential wealth.
However, for many contestants, they found it was the poor set conditions, rather than the challenges themselves, that proved to be the main difficulty.
“We signed up for the show, but we didn’t sign up for not being fed or watered or treated like human beings,” one contestant told The New York Times.
Initially, contestants were told there would be 1,000 participants. They were surprised to find 2,000.
“Obviously, there’s 2,000 contestants,” Donaldson said in a video to participants, reviewed by The New York Times. “I don’t remember if I said that publicly or not, but there is.”
The starting number of contestants would be whittled down until there were 1,000 left who would then go on to participate in the actual show, a spokesperson for MrBeast told The New York Times.
Contestants reported that staff members assigned to assist with issues surrounding food, hygiene and medical care were disorganized and unhelpful.
Accounts included contestants not receiving adequate food to not receiving necessary medication such as insulin. Individuals with dietary restrictions also reported not having their needs met.
“We were treated horribly,” a contestant said. “They took on this challenge of 2,000 competitors. They should have known they needed an enormous crew to handle this correctly.”
MrBeast’s response
Per The Hollywood Reporter, in a statement addressing the allegations, a spokesperson for MrBeast said that the preliminary event for “Beast Games” had been complicated due to “the CrowdStrike incident, extreme weather, and other unexpected logistical and communications issues.”
The statement continued by saying they were in the process of reviewing feedback provided by 97% of the participants in order to ensure they “learn from this experience.”
“Beast Games” will continue as planned with the participants who made it through preliminaries moving on to the main event held in Toronto.
Most of the contestants who qualified in the preliminaries plan on continuing into the second round, although one contestant revealed to The New York Times she is concerned for her safety.
Furthermore, photos of a group chat provided to The New York Times showed some of the contestants were unbothered by the poor conditions reported by the others.