EXCELLENT writing and art it was all so lovely.

if i'm honest i could not vibe with min's arc. i do think it's somewhat realistic based on what it's like to grow up in the bay area but i still think ester was treated p badly, and as a creator brianna lei should have been more thoughtful about instances of antiblackness in her work.

the other three girls' arcs were soooo compelling tho. i would love to see a third installment sometime!

The way in which both Butterfly Soup 1 and 2 switch back and forth so easily between some really funny shit, that had me laughing to a degree that video games almost never manage to make me laugh, to deeply heartfelt and thoughtful writing has got to be unparalleled. Games like these two make me wish I was better at getting through my backlog, instead of not playing a game like Butterfly Soup until five years later when a sequel is released. I truly could not say enough positive things about them both to fully articulate how happy the simple act of playing them made me. Just fantastic.

Also, I hope Diya is still just as enamored with the Home Depot lights section if there's ever a Butterfly Soup 3.

Butterfly Soup 2 expands on the first game and it's characters in a way that I rarely see sequels do. From tackling issues of wanting to connect with your parent who was raised differently than you so your beliefs will always clash, to the common second gen immigrant feeling of "Would I be better off if I had been raised in my parents home country? Would I understand my parents better?" , to the anti-black racism that is within asian communities and the constant fear of not becoming your parents.

The humor is still as funny as the last one, and it's really cool to see how Brianna Lee's writing has improved over the years. I especially related to Diya and Noelle's sections and once I completed the game, I spent a lot of time thinking about my own feelings of the relationship with my immigrant parents that I've tried very hard to bury for a myriad of reasons.

The anti-black racism section of the game I felt was a little bit messy. As a black person I get that there's not really any good way to address and handle it, but I think if I was [redacted A] I would have stayed mad for a while longer. I feel that despite [redacted B]'s self guilt, I do feel like there should be consequences. I don't want them to be tried on the cross but I feel that even if you aren't saying slurs or intend to harm people, you will still end up harming someone, and the person who was harmed has the right to not want to accept or interact with you. Especially if you get extremely defensive and try to avoid taking responsibility when called out for it. I feel like it is a serious topic that does occur, but as I said, messy. I would give this section like an 85% of hitting the mark.

Anyhow, I cheered during the epilogue section. I won't go into details, but it warmed my heart to see that the characters grew up to be alright. I played the original butterfly soup when I was in my last year of highschool, and Butterfly Soup 2 came out a year and a half after I graduated college. I only hope that I'm able to get my own happy ending and become a well adjusted adult as the other characters LMAO.

Briana Lei and her first Butterfly Soup are part of the wave of "video games that do not love our time, but the people who live in it"
It is a very difficult pill for me to swallow because this year I was expecting a lot of games that have not gone beyond remarkable, but I find it hard to believe that the one I like the least is a surprise game by Briana Lei, but of course, in hindsight, it was already clear that it would be like this. The first BP articulated a teenage fantasy where the only normative thing was its VN format and semi-anime Tumblr visuals. It was an incisive political story that almost openly framed the new generations raised in the 2000s-both in the good and in the bad-and how they lived a full adolescence in our modern turbo-capitalist world, whose foundations have been built with such eagerness that it seems There will be no room for drastic sociopolitical change that maintains and ensures equity for people. Demonstrations against homosexual marriage, situations where multiculturalism, disappointment and paternalism towards a generation trapped in an unequal system... And in the center a group of girls of varied ethnicity trying to live. everything else needs a solution, but it's in the background, because in the chaos, these girls have the right to live, we all do.
It's perfect, no need for a sequel. The important thing was the girls, yes, but their situation in the world, not so much the laughing breezy dialogues.

BS2 has a lot of heart, but it succumbs to the "improve and expand" preconceptions and thereby becomes something worse than a compliant sequel: A deal.
Expand, continuing a story, and improve by emphasizing personalities to moments of exaggeration.
You play, I tuck you in. You know this, take more of it.

It tries to pay REAL attention, and point out the social causes that didn't have as much depth in the first game as
The exploration of gender and sexuality, racism, the complexity of family relationships... But the truth is that all this was already in the first game, it was not underlined, but its presence crossed the entire work like a lightning bolt. It was not heard clearly, but it had an impact after the fact.



The pandemic has changed the world for the worse if possible for some, we go two steps forward and one step back. It's still a step forward, but still.

We can't let social and moral causes become fictional genres, not even Briana Lei, because this is what has happened in BS2.

I wanted to write more things, but it's getting difficult for me.

Bye bye, Butterlfy

very thankful for the more mature writing in this. there's still jokes & convos that don't land for me, but it's way easier to stomach. especially because the weebs & koreaboo get actual pushback compared to how nobody bat an eye at their fetishization in the first game.

very, very sweet game similarly to the first that i think i would've loved more if i would've played it in my teens as a freshly out lesbian & related heavily to the way the characters talk. still absolutely worth it if you just want a short & cute lesbian vn though.

Fuck it, I don't care, I don't have reasons, nor do I want them. I am capable of emotion, believe it or not, despite my scrawls of pontification. And I get feelings from these games. The first came out in 2017 (age of political awakening and steady decline) and this came out in 2022 (deep in the age of "it") and I needed it both times. Romance is dangerous for me; I avoid it because I get all up in my lonely feelings. This is my rare chance to curl up in it. There's no logical reason why this works for me so much and other things like it simply don't. I can dissect it or make a nuanced pitch, but it's a waste of words. This is not a recommendation or a review. I'm just saying things. I'm not going to compare one entry to the other; I don't much remember the first one other than adoring it deeply. Sure, maybe some of it is hamfisted this time around, and sure, there are anachronistic memes, but I literally don't care. I just like it. It makes me smile and I get warm fuzzies and I like it. It is so rare that I can just smile authentically and earnestly at art. Vulnerability can be embarrassing but it's liberating. Earnestness will set me free. And if you think it's cringe to find joy in something so vulnerable, then you can leave me the fuck alone

Butterfly Soup became a symbol upon its ending and the popularity/status it gained along the following 5 years. If the first one was about a fantasy created within a group of friends so strong that it was capable of ignoring the surrounding noise, Butterfly Soup 2 is the reality faced after the magical days of uncertainty materialized. Now the conflicts permeate even those reunions with the friends that not long ago could block the entire world. Fantastic and real exchange roles.

It’s actually interesting to use a direct sequel to question the fantastical symbolic status already settled and work some of the not so happy parts that come after it. And it’s not that the kids suddenly are obstructed by the world that confronts them, it's that the conflicts are inside them. It’s not that Diya’s mother doesn’t understand her or that Noelle’s parents force her to study Chinese, it’s that Diya wants to be capable of talking with her mother and Noelle wants to connect with her roots for reasons she didn’t notice before.

It’s a process of understanding that finding the place where you can finally form your true self also means that you won’t fit all molds, even the ones you desire. It’s learning to live with those contradictions and begin working your way through them. In the end, these kids will grow up and will always be themselves, but they’ll still have to face their inner worries on their way. The group stops being just a place to forget about the world and matures into a space where to deal with their inner conflicts in company.

much, much stronger than the original butterfly soup in every way. brianna lei's writing has really matured; where the original i felt suffered from severe tonal whiplash and attempting to tackle serious subject matter without a payoff i felt this game was extremely charming, nostalgic, and almost painfully true to life. Diya's experience with her mother in particular was hauntingly familiar to me but the game still managed to be hopeful about the ability of people to change or ability to love unconditionally. there's so much more i could say but i will simply put it as: looking forward to more, bravo