Designing a complex circuit

[Michael A. Covington]

Probably slightly more fruitful to Google for "game show circuit" and "quiz
circuit" since there is some variation in what it's called.

 

[Dave Platt]

OK, now we're getting somewhere.

Is this the traditional "game show buzzer" where as soon as one button is
pressed, a buzzer sounds, a light lights up indicating which button was
pressed, and the other buttons are turned off until reset? That is, a
gadget for showing which button was pressed first?

If you Google "game show buzzer" you'll see a wide variety of solutions.
It's basically a logic problem and can be implemented with relays, or SCRs,
or logic gates, or a microprocessor.

And, be careful to read and understand all of the requirements for the
design before you start implementing. I've seen (well, actually I was
quizzed about) one version of this whose timing and fairness
requirements made it... well, let's just say it'd be nontrivial to
implement.

Hint: unscramble "aabeiilmsttty".