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Butterfly Soup is a visual novel by American independent developer Brianna Lei, released in 2017 on Itch.io. A sequel, Butterfly Soup 2, was released in 2022.

Butterfly Soup
Developer(s)	Brianna Lei
Engine	Ren'Py
Platform(s)	Windows macOS Linux
Release	September 16, 2017
Genre(s)	Visual novel

Plot

The game is set in 2008 and follows four young, queer Asian-American girls as they attend their first year of high school and bond as members of a baseball club. The narrative focuses on the relationship between two of them, Diya and Min-seo.[1] It addresses topics such as child abuse and homophobia, but its tone is generally upbeat.[2] For the story, which takes place in Fremont, California, Lei drew on her own experience growing up in a similar neighborhood among many other Asian-Americans.[3] While the player may make choices in the narrative, these do not influence the outcome of the story.[1]

Gameplay

Butterfly Soup is a visual novel, and, as such, its gameplay has a low level of interactivity and consists of scenes with static two-dimensional images of characters in a first-person perspective. The game's plot alternates its focus between four major protagonists; any decisions made by the player are followed through from the point of view of whichever character is in the spotlight.[1] Occasionally there are gameplay sections that consist of clicking through different locations or on various objects.

Development and release

Lei was inspired by various sports anime such as Haikyu!! and Free!. Through this she came up with an idea for a "baseball yuri" game. The game was built over two and half years in Ren'Py, with the art made in Photoshop and Illustrator and the audio edited with Audacity. The characters were designed to be polar opposites of one another so they would create interesting scenarios. The game was intended to be much larger, spanning the entirety of the characters' freshman year, but the length was cut in half due to the scope being too large to reasonably accomplish. [3][4]

The game is available in English and multiple other languages for the Windows, Mac and Linux platforms natively.[5] It is distributed via itch.io, which allows the buyer to name their own price. The game also has unofficial Web, Android, iOS/iPadOS, and Apple Silicon Mac ports.[6][7]

Reception

Butterfly Soup was among the visual novels of 2017 most popular among players and critics.[3] Rock, Paper, Shotgun described it as "an insta-hit, and (...) a contemporary classic".[2] The Verge praised the writing of the game, saying that "Its cast feels like a real group of teens".[1] It was named the "best visual novel" of 2017 by PC Gamer[8] and was the subject of an exhibition at the Game Developers Conference.[2] Laptop Mag noted it as "one of the most influential titles on itch.io" in a June 2022 feature of games not available on Steam.[9]

Legacy

Brianna Lei released a sequel, Butterfly Soup 2, on 29 October 2022. The game takes about two to three hours and is available for "pay what you want" on Itch.io. Jay Castello at Rock Paper Shotgun wrote that the game "lives up to the heartbreak and hilarity of the original, while giving an even more compassionate exploration of teenage life".[10]

References

External links

• Butterfly Soup at Itch.io
• Butterfly Soup 2 at Itch.io

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