Crime Opera: The Butterfly Effect

Genre: Visual Novel

Players: 1

.

Review:

(Note: This game is included in Crime Opera Collection, along with Crime Opera Fandisk: The Caterpillar Candids and Crime Opera II: The Floodgate Effect.)

Crime Opera: The Butterfly Effect is a Visual Novel released in 2021 on Xbox One and Nintendo Switch, is the first part of a planned six-part series following six children born into a crime family. As a warning to those who are sensitive to such things, this game contains numerous sorts of triggering content, and I’ll be referring to some of these throughout the review. Suffice it to say, if seeing both children and adults put through trauma bothers you, this isn’t the game for you.

The game primarily follows the viewpoints of six characters, all children of various ages within the Gallo crime family, consisting mainly of the offspring of two brothers who find themselves faced with outside forces trying to play for power after the brothers’ mother and matriarch of the crime family suddenly passes away. Gerald, the more even-handed and thoughtful of the two, has been established as the next in line to run the family, but Gerald suspects his hot-headed brother Xander may have ambitions of his own.

Our point-of-view character shifts between the six children of these two men. Shana, Xander’s eldest daughter, is the frequent target of Xander’s physical abuse when his temper gets particularly high, and she has been trying to hide a romance with a young boy her father disapproves of while they plot to run away. Ronnie, Xander’s second-oldest, is a quiet and contemplative boy who only just barely tolerates the others in his family, and doesn’t seem to quite understand everything that’s going on. Burtie, the next youngest in this family, is a sociopath who enjoys torturing and killing animals. Amy, Xander’s youngest child, has her innocence shattered when she witnesses her father murder a man in their house, and she gradually starts to hear her stuffed animal telling her to kill people with the gun she saw her father using. Kevin, Gerald’s oldest, has some idea of what his family is, and wants to be treated more like an adult so he can earn his role in the family. And Izzy, Gerald’s second-oldest child, is a spoiled brat without any understanding of what’s going on.

Crime Opera’s story does a good job building suspense in different ways with these characters. Will Xander beat Shana again or kill Shana’s boyfriend after he loses his temper one time too many? What will Burtie’s increasingly macabre animal torture find as its next target? Will Amy finally do as the voices are telling her and use her father’s gun? And with this being a mafia story, there’s always the possibility that some conflict will result in the death of any character, so there’s always a threat dangling above everyone… well, except perhaps the lives of the main six characters, since they’re planned to star in five subsequent games. Still, it’s a pretty engaging story that’s well-told, and it does a good job keeping you guessing exactly where it will go next.

While the story is overall great (minus a few typos I spotted here and there), the rest of the presentation is more of a mixed bag. The visuals make use of hand-drawn 2D characters against static backgrounds, and while I quite like the character designs, the poses and expressions characters have frequently do not match up with what’s going on in the story, and at times are quite bizarre. For example, in the above image you can see Shana on the left in her default pose, which is either waving hello or half-heartedly putting her hand up defensively, which doesn’t really work when she’s just trying to act casual. What’s more, even when Gerald is furious, his expression barely changes from his usual genial look.

Another problem here is that the character visuals bob up and down as text boxes appear and disappear, which is not only distracting, but reveals they have no bottom half in the brief moment just after a text box disappears before the character drops back down. This isn’t a game-breaking flaw, but it’s quite distracting.

Finally, all of this is backed by music that ranges from decent to annoying, but ultimately ends up being at best forgettable overall. And unfortunately, not only are there no voices, but no sound effects either, even when it would really enhance the drama of a scene.

Before finishing, I should mention that this game has one fairly unique feature in that it lets players decide whether they want to play the game with or without choices – playing without ensures that characters always make choices that are canon to the story, while playing with choices lets you explore other possibilities, which is a nice touch. Unfortunately, even when playing with choices, these choices don’t come up very often, so don’t expect a strong interactive narrative either way.

Overall, I think Crime Opera: The Butterfly Effect is a Solid Visual Novel that does an excellent job building up drama, even if the game is let down in its interactivity (or lack thereof) and some of its presentation elements. If you’re looking for a gritty crime drama told from a different perspective, this game is definitely worth a look.

tl;dr – Crime Opera: The Butterfly Effect is a Visual Novel telling a story of a crime family through the eyes of six children within that family. This game’s story does an excellent job building suspense, and although the interactivity leaves something to be desired and the presentation has some weak elements, this is overall a gripping story well worth reading, so long as you don’t have issues with potentially triggering content.

Grade: B

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