Writing a Bonus

A bonus in Flashback is not as easy as a bonus in, say, a general trivia game. In a general trivia game, you can find a bonus in the theme; in Flashback the theme is the year and some years have bonuses that are obvious and some do not. The limitations of how I put the sources together can also limit the availability of a bonus. Nearly always I am staring at a single source (a couple of times, most often when dealing with a year before 1700, I will find a new source) and have to find a bonus after writing the first 45+ questions.

In its simplest form, a bonus is two questions tied together. The perfect bonus is a single question with two answers:

Q: WHO WERE THE FIRST TWO MEN ON THE MOON?
A: NEIL ARMSTRONG, BUZZ ALDRIN

Q: WHAT TWO ACTRESSES TIED FOR THE BEST ACTRESS OSCAR?
A: BARBRA STREISAND; KATHARINE HEPBURN

Those are unusual. Sometimes you can combine two related concepts. If you were doing 2010:

Q: WHO BECAME PRIME MINISTER OF THE UNITED KINGDOM? WHO WAS SELECTED AS THE NEXT SPEAKER OF THE U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES?
A: DAVID CAMERON, JOHN BOEHNER

The next kind is the "two variables in a single question" kind.

Q; WHAT WOMAN TOOK WHAT CABINET OFFICE AND BECAME THE SECOND FEMALE EVER IN THE CABINET?
A: OVETA CULP HOBBY; SECRETARY OF HEALTH, EDUCATION AND WELFARE

Finally, there's just two relatively unrelated questions as "one question." You don't need examples; it's anything.

I don't go searching for the perfect bonus; the first one I find in the source is the one I use. For 1911, it is in fact a "two variables in a single question" bonus. The good thing about it is that it's answer is suggested by two questions earlier in the game.